MRCA to Manage Access

• Five Beach Easements Are Transferred

BY BILL KOENEKER

The transfer of five beach accessways to the Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority is almost completed with a grant of $20,000 from the state's Coastal Conservancy.

In August 2011, the MRCA board voted to accept title to the five vertical easements in transfer from Access for All and to manage them for public use, according to state officials.

"The immediate need is for MRCA to manage an existing beach access stairway located at 26500 Pacific Coast Highway in the neighborhood known as 'Latino Shores," a Coastal Conservancy staff report states.

AFA had notified the Conservancy in July 2011 that it no longer had an interest in holding five of the six vertical access easements with the exception of the Ackerberg easement.

The California Coastal Commission, Coastal Conservancy and AFA agreed that those five easements would be voluntarily transferred to another public entity or nonprofit organization by September 1, 2011.

The Latigo stairs and an accessway on the Geffen property are the only ones open and needing management, according to state officials.

Management of the Geffen accessway has been funded with monies provided through settlement of the litigation pertaining to the opening of that accessway. The settlement funds will be  available to MRCA.

State officials say they have determined that most of the funding provided under the proposed allocation of $20,000 will be used for management of the stairway at Latigo Shores.

The unopened accessways or future projects include 26664-26668 Seagull Drive, 19016, 22126 , 26520, 26524 and 26330 Pacific Coast Highway.

Since 2000, AFA, a nonprofit based in Malibu, has accepted 47 access easements that were derived from Offers to Dedicate required by the Coastal Commission as part of its coastal development permitting authority, according to state officials.

AFA was successful in opening the easement of the Geffen property. State officials acknowledge the relationship between the AFA and the state agency soured in 2009 over litigation involving the Ackerberg easement.

"The [Coastal] Conservancy and the MRCA have recently been working together to construct a beach stairway on Malibu Road, to design another accessway on Conservancy-owned property on La Costa and to manage Lechuza Beach.

"This grant will expand MRCA's role in managing beach accessways in Malibu," the Conservancy report concludes.