Live-Aboard Lifestyle Was Too Good to Last

For 15 years, Bob DeLoyd has lived aboard his boat, a breakwater away from the open sea and so close to nature that he knows the gulls by name.

People said his lifestyle was too good to be true. This week they were proven right. On Tuesday, DeLoyd and six other live-aboard boaters who moor at the far edge of Redondo Beach’s King Harbor were told they will have to move.

The eviction notice, served by the City Council, was part of the fallout from the violent storms of 1988. In just four months that year, towering waves and gale-force winds devastated the harbor area, nearly destroyed the Redondo Beach Pier and spawned several multimillion-dollar lawsuits against the city.

When the first of those lawsuits--a claim by the Redondo Beach Marina that the city had not adequately protected the harbor--was settled earlier this year, the city agreed, among other things, to buy the mooring area for $1.5 million and evict its tenants.

For years, the marina had allowed boats to anchor far from the docks and just inside the harbor passage to Santa Monica Bay. The area is far from comfortable: Phone service is limited, groceries and water have to be hauled in by dinghy and there is the annual threat of winter storms. Still, scores of boaters accepted the risks and inconvenience as the price of a home that was private, tranquil and cheap.

“It’s hard to explain,” said Bill Humphreys, a 41-year-old boat builder, professional skipper and Vietnam War veteran who has lived in the outer harbor for 11 years. “What other people feel when they go backpacking, I feel on a daily basis when I go home.”

DeLoyd agreed.

“So many people live humdrum lives, with their cars and their electric garages,” the 39-year-old student said. “I row out to my home. I enjoy the wind and the waves and camaraderie that you just don’t get in a neighborhood where people drive home and watch TV.”

Each day, he said, he is awakened by his dog, Porky, whom he would have to give up if he kept his boat in a slip, where pets generally are not allowed. When he leans over the deck of his 26-foot sailboat “Fancy Free,” curious seals pop up from the water to say hello. Sea gulls swoop down to eat from his hand.

“I’ve even named some,” DeLoyd said, smiling. “One old bird I’ve named Horus, for the Egyptian god with the wings.”

When the first massive storm hit in January, 1988, DeLoyd and Humphreys said, they felt excitement rather than fear. Familiar with the elements, they could sense what was coming from the rising force of the winter wind and the crash of the waves against the breakwater. With other neighbors, they helped less-experienced boaters get ashore.

When the skies cleared, buildings had been wrecked, the landmark pier had been battered and millions of dollars’ worth of damage had been done. But there were no injuries among the resilient live-aboards of the outer harbor, and no lawsuits filed by them against the city.

There was, however, a suit filed that year by their landlord, the Redondo Beach Marina, and when it was settled in April and the city got the moorings, the question of municipal liability arose.

Mooring tenants in the outer harbor who had removed their boats during the 1988 storms were not allowed to return, but a handful, including DeLoyd and Humphreys, had managed to ride out the bad weather. At least 10 were living aboard their boats, and of these, seven had nowhere else to go. Some complained that they could not afford the slip fees at other harbors. Others had boats that were too big to moor elsewhere. Still others, like DeLoyd, were loath to relinquish their pets or their lifestyle.

The live-aboards urged the city to let them stay, and a six-month study ensued. But in the end, a city consultant concluded that the safety of live-aboards in the outer harbor could not be guaranteed, and the city opted not to seek insurance against the risk.

The city did not admit liability in the marina settlement, but at least three other storm-related suits filed by King Harbor businesses are still pending.

DeLoyd and his neighbors, caught in the middle of the legal wrangling, contend that the city has ousted them not because of the safety risks, but because the council is unreasonably fearful of more litigation.

“This city is just paranoid,” DeLoyd said. “Nobody out there has ever been hurt in a storm or sued the city.”

But the council is adamant.

“Living aboard a boat is wonderful and romantic, and I can understand that you’ve done it for a long time,” Councilwoman Kay Horrell told the stunned live-aboards.

“But when you sit up here and picture things as we do, it’s scary. This city has lawsuits lined up at the harbor gate and waiting to come in on the tide. . . . It would only take one lost life and this city is in deep, deep trouble.”

It is unclear what the deadline will be for the people of the outer harbor. When the lawsuit was settled, the tenants were given 30 days to move. Humphreys said he is unsure what he will do. Perhaps he will simply move beyond the harbor, farther out to sea, he said.

DeLoyd said he will look for another harbor.

“I’m just devastated,” he said. “The whole reason I moved (onto a boat) was to get away from stuff like this.”