Ventura Role in Bike Path Erosion Plan Defies State : Beachfront: The city issues an emergency permit to the county fair board. The California Coastal Commission will seek an explanation.

The city of Ventura defied a ruling by the state Coastal Commission Monday, joining the Ventura County Fair Board in an emergency plan to stem erosion of an oceanfront bike path by erecting a protective wall of giant boulders.

State coastal officials said they had not been notified of the city’s approval of the project, which has been opposed by the Coastal Commission or its staff four times since November, 1991, most recently in August.

Under terms of an emergency permit issued by the city Monday, the 31st District Agricultural Assn.--the county fair’s ruling body--will pay $35,000 to shore up the eroded beach with 1,200 tons of boulders.

The repair project is meant as a temporary measure to delay further damage to the five-mile-long Omer L. Rains Trail and fairground parking lot at Surfers Point beach, and is expected to be completed by the end of the week, city officials said.

Built in 1989 for $223,000, the bike path has been threatened by erosion from winter storms. A detour was routed through the parking lot in May when portions of the bikeway collapsed onto the beach after erosion severely undercut the concrete path.

In turning down a similar plan last year, commission staff said the bicycle path and parking lot were built as temporary facilities in 1989 and were only expected to last between five and 25 years. A previous bike path built nearby in 1981 was destroyed just two years later by severe winter storms.

“We made our concerns clear to them in the past,” said Virginia Gardiner Johnson, a commission analyst who inspected the project late Monday. “We don’t see that anything has changed.”

The commission’s Santa Barbara office will send a letter to the city today, notifying officials of the commission’s concern and asking for an explanation of the emergency permit, she said.

At a news conference Monday at Surfers Point, Steve Chase, the city’s environmental coordinator, said the city issued the permit for emergency work under power vested in it by the Coastal Commission.

Since the state body rejected the city’s bid last year, Chase said the city has obtained more comment by scientific consultants in support of the project, which will repair a 250-foot stretch of eroded beach. The limited revetment or rock barrier, known as riprap, will be built above the mean high tide line, and should pose no threat to the transport of sand by ocean currents, Chase said.

By the end of the month, the city and fair board will apply to the Coastal Commission for a development permit to allow a long-term solution to the beach erosion, he said.

“We’re buying some time so we can (relocate) the bike path,” Chase said of the emergency project.

James Johnson, who heads the Southern California office of the Coastal Commission, questioned whether the city’s use of an emergency permit was justified.

“It is unclear how this activity could be considered unforeseen when we’ve been discussing this matter for several years,” he said.

Johnson, who said his office was not informed of the city’s plan, questioned whether the city was handling the case in the same way that it would respond to another property owner.

“It appears the city is proceeding with its project as an emergency situation rather than applying for a coastal permit and a coastal plan amendment, as the city and Coastal Commission would require of any public or private landowner,” Johnson said.

The start of the project also surprised Steve Treanor, superintendent of the Channel Coast District for the state Department of Parks and Recreation, which owns the bicycle path easement.

Treanor also questioned the nature of the emergency that prompted the repairs. “I’m not aware of any changes in the situation that would make it more urgent now than it was before,” he said.

“You can’t fight Mother Nature,” Treanor said. “A lot of money has been put into (the parking lot and bike path), but with the full understanding that these were temporary improvements. Right now, it seems like there’s a move under way to make the temporary improvements last forever.”

Fair Manager Michael Paluszak defended the city’s actions, saying it would be ludicrous to stand by and watch erosion destroy the beach facilities.

“It doesn’t make good common sense to allow public improvements like that to wash out to sea,” Paluszak said.