Oceanside Revetment Repairs

On Thursday, the Commission approved a permit for the repair of an approximately 700 foot-long rock revetment fronting 19 residential lots along South Pacific Avenue in Oceanside. The permit was originally granted by the City of Oceanside and then appealed to the Commission by Commissioners Donne Brownsey and Caryl Hart, Surfrider Foundation and Citizens for Preservation of Parks and Beaches. The appellants alleged that the seawall was partially located below the mean high tide land and therefore impacting public trust resources and that the impacts to sand supply were not adequately mitigated. The Commission added Special Conditions to the permit that required public access improvements including the construction of new stairways and annual mean high tide line surveys and a permit amendment as the revetment encroaches onto public trust lands based on the surveys. The applicants will also be required to remove all unpermitted structures and concrete grouting.

South Pacific Street properties sit atop Oceanside’s historic back beach, and heavy erosion continues to occur and will only become worse as sea levels rise. While the conditions placed on this permit application result in a better outcome for public beachgoers, they still fall short of our assertion that a MHTL survey should be conducted prior to issuing additional CDPs for South Pacific Street revetment work.