LAGUNA BEACH : Spate of Landslides Launched by Recent Rains

Recent rains have prompted a rash of landslides throughout the city, most of them on private property, officials said.

“I’ve been here five or six years and I don’t recall seeing quite so many of them at one time,” building official John Gustafson said. “Every time it rains, we get a few more.”

As a result of storms since January, more than a dozen hillsides need to be repaired, Gustafson said, and individual property owners must pay for the work.

While the landslides are relatively minor compared to others this city has endured--including one that destroyed three homes in the Mystic Hills community two years ago--some concern city officials.

In one case, a stairway and deck on Ocean Way dropped down to the ocean, Gustafson said. In another, a chunk of a hillside behind a shopping center in the 800 block of Laguna Canyon Road fell and city officials have ordered that a vacant business at the foot of that hill remain unoccupied.

Employees at nearby Canyon Auto Supply said the hill began to slide March 7. “We’re just wondering why nobody’s doing nothing about it,” Marc Good said. “It just moved again this week.”

Officials say the city is not responsible for repairing damage to private property. City workers do remove dirt if it blocks a public street and notify property owners about the slide.

Don Amato, who lives on Sun Valley Drive in Laguna Canyon, said he returned from a trip last weekend to find that a section of the hillside behind his property had tumbled. “I’m worried if another rain comes and it gets worse, there’s going to be more of it coming down,” he said.