Mooring rules for Newport Harbor are likely to change with Tuesday’s City Council vote
Two years of work are expected to bear codified fruit Tuesday when the Newport Beach City Council votes on sweeping modifications to local mooring regulations.
The key change, says Newport Beach Harbor Resources Manager Chris Miller: Unlimited transfers for the life of the mooring permit, up to one time per year, between private parties.
Newport Harbor encompasses about 1,200 moorings — 800 offshore and 400 onshore — over 12 mooring fields, which are essentially watery parking lots.
Moorings are marked by floating cans tied to either end of the boat, made up of chains, weights, lines and other items collectively referred to as tackle.
Boat owners rent their spaces within the boundaries marked by the tackle, with a city-issued permit allowing them that patch of water.
Under the current rules, which were enacted in 2010, a mooring permit holder could only transfer his or her permit twice before 2020.
After 2020, the permit could not be transferred at all. Owners who no longer wanted their patches of water would have to return the permits to the city, allowing the city to offer them to the next person on the waiting list.
But those surrenders didn’t happen. Miller said the waiting list has names going back to the 1970s. Owners did transfer permits, but through private sales.
Annual mooring permit rent is charged by the linear square foot. For 2017, that’s $35.43 per foot for an offshore mooring, or $1,417.20 for a 40-foot boat.
The transfer charge would be half of that — so, in the case of a 40-footer, $708.60. Under the proposed new charge, the transfer would cost $1,062.90.
The Harbor Commission arrived at this percentage to provide a defined dollar amount that does not distort the fair market rate. This adjustment would increase transfer-related revenues to the city Tidelands Fund from about $30,000 a year to about $45,000, the city estimated in a staff report prepared for Tuesday’s meeting.
Putting permit movement back in the market’s hands also means abolishing the wait list. But to keep track of the transfers and show trends, city staff recommends establishing a city-maintained website that lists the location, size and sale price of the sold permits.
The proposed new code also addresses allowing two names on a permit, allowing two permits per permit holder, and auctioning revoked permits.
The city conducted an extensive review of mooring permit rental rates in 2010, updating rates and regulations for the first time since 1994.
In 2015, the council returned to the Harbor Commission to again review mooring operations. The Harbor Commission, with public input, hammered out several suggested changes, most recently bringing them before the City Council at a study session last month.
Miller said the new rules were vetted at that last study session.
“It’s a complicated piece of our municipal code, so it does take some time and a lot of coordination with the mooring association,” he said.
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