Posted on 09/14/2015 9:49:02 AM PDT by MarvinStinson
“Just because you buy the front house, doesn’t mean you own the beach,” says Tony Salaza. “The beach is for everybody.”
He gestures towards a sweep of architect-designed houses to his left.
Over the past few years, many of Malibu’s 13,000 residents have been watching with alarm as public access rights to the 27-mile coastline have come under threat.
Many celebrities and multimillionaires own sprawling Malibu homes overlooking the Pacific, including actors Robert Redford and Angelina Jolie, the rapper Dr Dre, the director Rob Reiner and media mogul David Geffen. In an effort to protect their privacy, some homeowners have now taken matters into their own hands by employing security guards to patrol the sands in front of their houses.
Twice in the past few weeks, members of the public have been asked to leave Malibu’s Escondido Beach by a uniformed security guard who wrongly claimed they were on private property and threatened them with a fine for trespassing.
That area is treated as a private riviera … the most egregious example of privatisation of public land in Los Angeles.
Of late wealthy homeowners have taken to erecting their own “No trespassing” signs and putting out traffic cones to discourage people from parking their cars. The hiring of private security guards is the newest skirmish in a long-running battle.
Noaki Schwartz of the California Coastal Commission, tested the waters herself with her six-year-old daughter and a friend. Within minutes of sitting on the sand, says Schwartz, a uniformed guard with a clipboard walked over.
“He was polite but pretty firm and said I was trespassing and needed to leave and if I didn’t leave, I would be fined $1,500 and probably get a citation for trespassing.”
(Excerpt) Read more at msn.com ...
Everywhere I know about on the West Coast (WA, OR, CA), the rule is that if you can access a navigable waterway by legal means, the shore is public property up to the annual high water mark.
That means if you can land a boat there, have a picnic! It’s MY PROPERTY, as it is public property.
I’ve waded many a river. You put in at the publicly owned bridge, and walk down below the high water mark wherever you want to go.
The rule gets a little gray when you get to really small creeks. Those are often not navigable, and therefore are actually owned and may be posted against trespassers.
Anyone have information to the contrary?
Still, they don’t own the beachfront. They didn’t own it when they moved in either.
And as far as the dangers you seem to be concerned about, they’re unfounded. And the homeowners obviously have security guards patrolling the area very closely. Have their homes been broken into?
And if they want a fence, I’m sure they can afford to build one.
If they’re that worried about their privacy, they shouldn’t have bought beach-front property. Property ownership stops at the high tide mark.
No they were not. The beach was there first. No one can own the ocean or the ground it covers. This also applies to most waterways. It also applies indirectly to the common law principle of free transit. The right to move across others properties such as roadways and paths.
Research our common law heritage with regards to how our English and German forbearers handled the king and upper classes restrictions on mobility and uses of waterways.
Not sure how it works in Malibu. I once new a guy who owned a house on the beach there, he claimed the beach was private and it was posted as such. There was no public parking around there so little issue “trespassing”.
Here in Wa state the water front homes own the beach and tide land. Local Indian tribes have a right to pass but that’s it and in 20 years I’ve never seen it happen.
I have no objections to one being so called ‘rich’. Many of these persons have worked hard and learned the value of having not just earning ‘money’. However, many of these persons seem to have a difficult struggle to remain part of where they arose from. Perhaps they never intended or felt any obligation for such.
These rich liberals have no problem putting terrorist in your back yard....
Oh, I certainly agree it's not their backyard. My "fair point" comment related to another poster's observation that some folks on the beach could present a safety/security threat to the homeowners.
My solution is not to remove the beach-goers. Any homeowner who feels threatened should just build a high fence on the edge of their property.
Note to the big-shot liberal homeowners: High fences (walls, if you will) work.
The beach was there first then the people. The people then the houses. How does building a house give you ownership of an ocean? Do you get that? You can’t own the ocean. The beach is part of the ocean.
Yeah you said remove the beach goers when you said close the beach at 9:00. Too late to walk that comment back.
Nope. No. None.
If the elite want privacy, they need to BUY it. Let them live in a wooded compound.
I'm pretty sure that every property along this section has on the deed specifically stated that they are building or buying property that is up against a public beach, and further notes that they can't restrict access to that beach. The problem isn't the city (or the California Coastal Commission), but private property owners who ignore what they signed and agreed to and treat public property as if they own it.
They've painted curbs red, put up fake no-parking signs, put gates across public access lanes, and now hired guards to chase off visitors to the public beach. That most of these homeowners are liberals is likely the only reason why the DA hasn't filed charges against them.
Here's the issue. It's NOT their back yard. They have a public beach adjoining their property line, and they are unlawfully trying to lay claim to the land between their property line and the sea.
An analogous situation would be a property owner deploying security onto the public sidewalk fronting his property and deciding who could or could not walk there.
Great post.
I didn't mean to walk that back! I stand by it. All local parks in my neck of the woods have a closing time. Some close at dusk. Some close at 9 PM. And I'm sure that's done on police advisement. I'm not all that pro-police, but OK with that, and don't see why beaches should be any different.
Oh, and one more thing. If a beach closes at, say, 9 PM, that means it's closed to everyone, including the adjacent homeowners. So if Barbra Streisand is on the beach after 9 PM, she gets a ticket. Do it again Babs, and spend the night in jail.
In California, the area between the water line and the mean high tide line is public land by law. More simply put, wet sand means public beach. In theory, anyone could walk the length of California’s coast — some 1,100 miles — and never set foot on private property.
Celebrities- You don’t have to love ‘em.
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