Huntington Beach Votes to Make Plans for New Pier

The Huntington Beach City Council voted unanimously Monday night to seek proposals for the design of a new municipal pier, essentially dashing any hopes that the downtown landmark could be repaired instead of replaced.

Despite the pleas of an emotional crowd of residents and merchants who spoke nostalgically of keeping their 74-year-old municipal pier, the council voted with little discussion and also established an advisory committee of citizens and city officials to solicit money to rebuild the pier and oversee the design process.

Some residents assailed the council for not giving 74-year-old Ella Christensen more notice before abruptly closing the pier last Wednesday. Christensen’s pub and bait shops have for decades been fixtures on the pier.

Ravaged by time and the briny elements, the Huntington Beach Pier was deemed a public safety hazard and closed to the public last week by city officials at the recommendation of engineers. Those city-hired consultants, who were paid $55,000, concluded that years of exposure to salt water and ocean air had rusted away the steel reinforcement of the pier, leaving it vulnerable under the pressure of pedestrians, 1.5 million of whom visit it each year.

City Administrator Paul E. Cook said he expects several engineering companies to bid on the design contract, which city engineer Les G. Evans estimated would cost about $500,000.

Costs $10 Million

City officials are hoping that construction on the new pier can begin by May, 1989.

Cook estimated it will cost $10 million to construct a new, steel-reinforced concrete pier at its original length: 1,840 feet. However, Fluor Daniel Inc. of Irvine--an engineering firm hired by the city to analyze the condition of the pier after Jan. 17 high seas ripped off 250 feet from the seaward end--estimated it would cost $4.5 million to rebuild the pier.

In explaining the $5.5-million disparity, Evans and Cook said the engineers provided only a bare-bones estimate of the cost to rebuild the pier.

None of that really mattered to some attending the meeting. Those who favored speedy action toward building a new pier were in the minority. After letting loose with a stream of insults, Carol Miller, a customer and one-time employee of Christensen, told the council that closing the pier was “stupid.”

Christensen has contributed 37 years of “caring and loving and letting the community know what it’s all about. I don’t care if it was handing out a cookie.”

She chastised Cook for giving Christensen an hour and a half’s notice of the pier closure when the consultants’ recommendation to do so was published June 30. (Cook said later that he hadn’t made the decision to close the pier until 10:30 a.m. Wednesday.)

“How many End Cafes have come and gone” with storms, while Christensen is still there to “open the door and serve the coffee the next morning? Now why don’t we think of something serious?”

Then, Christensen, gray-haired and hobbling to a podium with the help of a walker, took her turn.

“In all my life have I felt ever so hurt as to get the shaft,” she said. She then offered to donate half of her profits toward rebuilding the pier if the city would keep the base of it open. She received a standing ovation.

Whatever the actual cost, it is not yet clear where the money will come from.

“I would hope to get about $4 million from outside sources. We may get more, but that would be my goal right now,” Cook said. “Once the committee gets going, we can begin to find out what agencies might be interested (in contributing money toward constructing the pier). But it will probably be six months until we know for sure.”

Some money may come from a new residential trash collection fee that the City Council was considering Monday night. The monthly fee of $8.56 per household, which would go into effect in September, would be charged to 44,739 households that currently receive curb-side refuse pick-up for free.

Cook said that, at the $8.56 monthly rate, the city would net about $3.5 million that could be used for capital improvement projects, such as the top-priority new pier.

But other capital improvement projects, such as a downtown municipal arts center--which would cost the city $1 million to buy the property and spruce it up--may be postponed, Cook said.

The proposed arts center was discussed Monday evening at a special study session before the regular 7 p.m. council meeting. The city, seeking a cultural magnet in the downtown redevelopment area, has negotiated to buy a 10,500-square-foot building at 538 Main St. from the owner, Southern California Edison Co. The city would buy the property for $758,000 and spend an estimated $250,000 on “rehabilitations and alterations” to the building.

But Cook urged the City Council to delay any action on a proposal to buy and fix the building, saying that it would be “unwise to spend $1 million on a cultural center when we don’t know yet where the money will come from to build the pier.”