Baby Beach Needs a Change

Pamela Denayer remembers a time when Baby Beach’s calm waters seemed perfect for her three children.

But about two years ago, she began noticing signs warning of high bacteria counts in the water. “We go kayaking now,” the 42-year-old mother said. “I don’t let my kids go in the water.”

In recent years, the stretch of beach just inside Dana Point Harbor with calm, inviting waters has become synonymous with bacterial pollution and has been on a state “most polluted” beach list.

In a continuing effort to reduce the pollution, city and Orange County officials have embarked on a project to circulate the water by using an underwater paddle that will literally stir things up.

Known as Oloids, the devices are teardrop-shaped tumblers capable of moving water without disturbing sediment, a potential hiding place for bacteria.

The city and county will split the $70,000 tab to install up to four Oloids. The tumblers will be placed between the shore and the edge of the harbor to avoid interfering with swimmers and boat traffic, said Vincent Gin, a supervising county engineer.

The hope is that the tumblers will dilute the bacteria by mixing fresh ocean water with the more stagnant water in the harbor. The devices, expected to be installed in June, are experimental. If successful, they might become permanent.

The county also will spend $50,000 on trash cans with lids to keep birds from flocking to the beach and on other animal-control methods.

“Studies in other areas show a lot of the high bacteria counts are due to birds,” said James Volz, a county engineer involved in the project. “We’re trying to make the beach less attractive to them.”

Runoff also will be dealt with. About 3,000 gallons of runoff that wash into Baby Beach daily from city streets will be channeled through a sewage pipe. An accompanying filter will rid it of pesticides, oils and bacteria-friendly vegetation.

At a cost of about $1 million, that project will be paid for by developer Headlands Reserve LLC. While in negotiations with Dana Point, the company committed to pay for improvements as it prepared to build 118 custom homes, retail space and a hotel atop the Dana Point Headlands, next to the harbor. The project requires approval by the county Board of Supervisors.

Officials are cautiously optimistic but warn the efforts are no guarantee the beach will be spared future postings. Techniques used in the state to measure bacteria are imprecise, they say, and might register pollution when there isn’t any.

Baby Beach sits in Dana Point Harbor. Built as a breakwater in the late 1960s, the harbor is, in effect, a fortress that keeps ocean waves from disturbing the boats and yachts that use its docks.

Although scientists suspect the enclosure encourages bacteria, many dispute that stagnant water is the sole reason the beach remains on a most-polluted list.

Bacteria are plentiful in many open beaches, they say. What’s more, many California beaches have tested high for bacteria even after efforts to eliminate possible sources have been made.

Since state Department of Health Services standards stiffened in 1999 at the request of the Environmental Protection Agency, officials have tried -- and failed -- to reduce bacteria counts in Baby Beach.

Starting in 2001, engineers plugged the beach’s storm drain, placed netting under the pier to keep birds from roosting and increased trash collection.

Despite the effort and expense, health postings continued. Many said they believe the postings may be due to the imprecise nature of testing.

Federal testing standards applied in California arose from EPA studies done near sewage, conditions that don’t exist on many California beaches.

Douglas Moore of the Orange County Public Health Laboratory said the probable sources of bacteria here were estuaries and urban runoff, not human waste.

Studies, done in part to help the public decide if a particular beach is healthy and safe, haven’t made matters easier.

A 1995 epidemiological study in Santa Monica Bay, for instance, found that people who swim near storm drains are more likely to get sick than those who don’t. Almost 10 years later, research done in San Diego’s Mission Bay found no substantial link between disease and indicator bacteria.

In an effort to clear things up, Dana Point is seeking an EPA grant to study a connection between illness and bacteria at perennially polluted Doheny State Beach, adjacent to Baby Beach.

“If we find the bacteria are not harmful, we’ll try to persuade the EPA to come up with a more meaningful set of tests for the Pacific Coast,” Dana Point Mayor Wayne Rayfield said. “We really need to know what the health risks are for the bacteria we’re testing.”

Still, organizations such as Heal the Bay -- a group that tracks the state’s water quality -- say authorities should reveal the presence of bacteria in the water regardless of whether they prove to be harmful.

“This is a public-right-to-know issue, not a kick-the-public-out-of-the-water issue,” executive director Mark Gold said. “People have a right to make their own decisions about going in the water.”