City Now Owns All of 3-Acre Beach Parcel : Pierside Village: Huntington Beach gained full title to the land it wants to build restaurants on, but opponents say it still can’t be developed.

The city on Monday gained full ownership to prime beach-bluff land it has been seeking for a controversial development project, but opponents of the project said the city will still be prohibited from building on it.

At issue in the legal dispute is a three-acre parcel between Main and 1st streets on the ocean side of Pacific Coast Highway. The city has for four years been trying to gain clear title to the land through eminent domain for its Pierside Village “restaurant row” development immediately south of the city’s pier.

The State Lands Commission and the state attorney general’s office have opposed the development, arguing that it would restrict public access to the beach. The state has also argued that the project would set a bad precedent for other beach communities.

In a tentative agreement reached Monday in Orange County Superior Court, the state and city said they could achieve their opposing goals without going through a jury trial. The proposal is expected to be formally ratified today before Judge Robert C. Todd.

Under the proposed agreement:

* The city would get a formal statement in which the state says it does not claim any of the Pierside Village acreage as state-owned tideland.

* The state, for its part, would still be able to claim that a continuing public easement exists on the land. According to the state, that easement, which grants public recreational use of the land, would prohibit any large-scale development such as Pierside Village.

How the agreement would affect the project remained uncertain Monday because people on both sides of the issue disagreed over what kind of development could be considered public recreational use of the land.

“Pierside Village is dead,” said Geri Ortega, chairwoman of the city Planning Commission and a longtime opponent of the project.

But Deputy City Atty. Robert Sangster said the city believes that it can build on the land without violating the easement. Sangster said Pierside Village still would allow public access to the area and that it would enhance the public’s ability to use the land.

“Many people want to come to the beach, not to surf, but to sit and enjoy the view,” he said. He noted that Pierside Village calls for a plazalike area around the restaurants that would offer views of the ocean.

The State Lands Commission and state attorney general’s office, however, have said that more commercial buildings in the beach area would be a violation of the public easement.

The city obtained the easement in a 1932 court decision. The city decided in 1986 that it wanted to lease the land for restaurants, and it began the eminent domain lawsuit to gain full ownership of the property. It was that case that was being discussed before Todd Monday.

The city had previously obtained partial ownership to the property through agreements with two of the land’s three co-owners, the Huntington Beach Co. and Chevron USA. The third, the Southern Pacific Transportation Co., also agreed Monday to cede its interest in the land to the city.

“The city has been seeking to get clear title to the land, and that is what we have achieved today,” Sangster said in an interview Monday outside the court.

But Deputy Atty. Gen. Robert G. Collins, in a separate interview, said the city is still no closer to building the restaurant project. “It’s very questionable that the (California) Coastal Commission would ever approve this because of the public easement,” Collins said.

Added Ortega: “If the city tries to continue with Pierside Village, it’ll find itself back in court.”