King Harbor Blog

There are plenty of reasons to avoid King Harbor but you won't see any of them here. Instead, I prefer to focus on the reasons why I spend so much time there.

I was there this morning from about 7:45 to 8:15. I was riding on the bike path. I can't remember the last time I rolled out of bed and got on my bike but last night when the urge hit me, I knew that was what I wanted to do.

My strand bike rides usually begin at Pier Avenue in Hermosa or 190th Street. I usually ride north to El Segundo.

As I've mentioned previously, I like boats. I like going places on them. I like just being around them. I (usually) like the people I meet on them. I even like taking care of them although that has to go to the bottom of the list.

So I had the notion it might be fun to ride south, through King Harbor and I was right. The first thing that should be pointed out is that if you bring music on an iPod as I did, you need to crank up the volume when you're on the street. There are a lot of cars and trucks around at that time of day.

I must have missed the sounds of the surf in the horseshoe and the seabirds but Jimmy Buffet was a satisfying substitute. Once I got out of traffic, the air was clear with the subtle scent of ocean. Even though the sun was low in the sky, it warmed the land and water with a kind of orange glow that  turned to a radiant gold right before my eyes.

The wind wasn't up yet so the water in the marina and the ocean beyond
shimmered and reflected the occasional sharp speck of sunshine.Crews on the fishing boats were getting ready to head out to sea. Cleaners opened restaurant doors then locked quickly them so they could get to work preparing for today's lunch and dinner guests.

One of the things I like about the Pier/Harbor area is that it's completely different at different times of the day. 7:45 to 8:15 was a treat. Maybe tomorrow I'll check out 7:15 to 7:45. Maybe I'll see you there.

It has been awhile since I updated the Harbor Commission section of this blog. I’ll try to summarize the high points.

Since September, 2009 the commission has lost 4 members. The only remaining members of the previous commission are me, Harry Munns, Shane Michael and Alex Bannerman. Shane took over as Chairman from Alex in October.

Three of the 4 open slots have been filled and we expect the remaining empty chair to get a new commissioner in April, 2010. We have welcomed the following new members.

Blaise Tracy – a communications specialist and President of the RB Education Foundation

Anthony Cignarale – an attorney who works in the insurance industry

Tarek Shaer – an architect/developer

We have a very impressive group of people who volunteer to lend their expertise to the community. But even some of the newer members of the Harbor Commission have commented that we aren’t given a lot of meaningful work to do. This is a struggle that continues regardless of who’s on the commission.

There have been some glimmers of hope. The City Council sent the long-awaited Harbor Business Plan to the HC for evaluation. The commission will begin gathering public input  through the Business Plan Subcommittee this month, March 2010. If you have an interest in this document or King Harbor business in general, please try to attend these meetings.

I will try to post information here when I have it. Meanwhile, the plan will be on the HC agenda for at least two more months. The April meeting will take place on the second floor of the main library at 7 PM, April 12th and the May meeting will be in the same place May 10th. The location will move next door if the City Council Chambers renovation is completed.

It was a great pleasure to welcome District 2 City Councilor, Bill Brand to the HC meeting in March. He came to the podium on more than one occasion to provide insight for commissioners and attendees on a number of items.

One issue the commission considered was the refusal of the City Manager to provide monthly harbor budget updates to the commission. Councilman Brand shared the commission’s opinion that if this information was available, it should be shared with the commission.

City Manager Workman cited 8 reasons he believed he was not obligated to share this information with the HC. I took exception with his claim that the City Charter didn’t include the HC in budget discussions. The charter clearly says that the HC, “… will further the commercial and recreational development of the harbor.” We can’t do that without accurate, comprehensive financial information.

Councilman Brand also briefed the HC about the 5 recommendations we made for items to be included in the recent City Council strategic planning meeting. Twice a year the council meets to update the strategic plan. As a matter of city policy, you could say if it ain’t on the strategic plan, it won’t get done. It looks like we got 3 of 5 recommendations on the plan.

We also found out from Brand the perception of cloudy information coming from city government about the operation of Seaside Lagoon in the summer of 2010 probably has more to do with a lack of definitive knowledge than a grand conspiracy. The Mayor, council and Recreation Director, Mike Wytzansky all seem pretty sure we’ll be swimming in the lagoon in May. We’re still not sure why they’re so confident so we may fall back on the more entertaining conspiracy theory before too long.

A group of King Harbor fishermen (and women) came to comment on the Marine Life Protection Act. If you aren’t up to speed, there’s a lot to know about this issue. One admittedly biased but comprehensive source of information is http://www.keeprockypointopen.com/. If you use or might use the part of the ocean that borders the northern corner of the PV peninsula, you may want to get involved in keeping it open because there’s a distinct possibility that severe restrictions will be enforced in the near future.

Those are the high (and low) points. If you have an interest in King Harbor you may want to familiarize yourself our agenda and what we do. You can see our agenda here http://laserweb.redondo.org/weblink/Browse.aspx 72 hours or more prior to our meetings which occur on the second Monday of each month, at 7 PM. Please come and address the commission on any agenda item about which you are concerned. This is really democracy at work. We’re all real people, citizens of the city and interested in what’s best for our community. Don’t be shy!