Alcohol Banned at La Jolla Beach and 2 Parks : Rowdiness: The City Council wants to see if the six-month prohibition, which also affects two parks, helps reduce public drunkenness and crime.

The number of beaches in Southern California where citizens can quaff a beer or sip some wine declined by one Monday afternoon when the San Diego City Council authorized a six-month alcohol ban at La Jolla Shores Beach.

The trial ban, designed to help determine if dry beaches are less prone to rowdiness and crime than beaches where alcohol consumption is allowed, begins Aug. 3 and runs through Feb. 3. The council also imposed the trial ban at Kellogg Park, next to La Jolla Shores, and at North Park Community Park.

San Diego owns some of the few beaches in Southern California where public consumption of alcohol is still legal. But, as public drunkenness and alcohol-related crimes have risen, the city has limited alcohol use in parks.

In 1987, the city outlawed drinking in city beach parking lots, and, last year, the city ordered problem-plagued parking lots at South Mission Beach to be closed at 10 p.m.

The six-month ban adopted Monday is a scaled-down version of a citywide ban on beach drinking that council members approved without warning in December. That approval was reversed by the full council in January after a huge public outcry.

The latest ban drew strong support from the council, with only Councilman Ron Roberts voting against it. Roberts argued that rowdiness and crime linked to public drinking are best handled by “strong enforcement of existing laws” spelling out where and when alcohol can be consumed.

Mayor Maureen O’Connor, an opponent of the trial ban at past council sessions, was absent from Monday’s meeting. O’Connor had argued that the ban would be unfair to “responsible drinkers.”

Councilwoman Abbe Wolfsheimer, whose district encompasses La Jolla Shores Park, said Monday’s vote “imposes a very modest ban on the public use of alcohol.”

The council on Monday also endorsed Councilman Bruce Henderson’s demand that the San Diego Police Department step up enforcement of existing drinking laws along Mission Beach, where residents are complaining about alcohol-related problems.

It was unclear whether the Police Department would be given more money for increased beach patrols.

Monday’s vote generated a stream of testimony.

One woman said that, during a recent nighttime visit to La Jolla Shores Beach, she found “an Animal House beach party. . . . I was scared, I was really frightened.”

“People are getting hurt by alcohol at the beach,” said a spokesman for the La Jolla Shores Assn., which supports the trial ban. “The beach is a free zone for unsupervised drinking, which is giving San Diego a bad reputation that repels families and attracts rowdies.”

Bob Moore, a Mission Beach resident, urged the council to give thought to a permanent ban on alcohol at all city beaches. Moore complained that Mission Beach is ready to “explode” because of “increased violence and abusiveness.”

However, a La Jolla Shores resident who lives within two blocks of the ocean complained that the six-month ban was “very discriminatory.”