Santa Barbara Considers Closing Part of its Anchorage

A few weeks ago, Latitude 38 received a letter expressing concern about Santa Barbara’s plan to reduce or completely close part of the city’s free anchorages along its beachfront over concern for underwater infrastructure. Reacting to the proposal at a city meeting in late October, Santa Barbara’s Harbor Commission said they’d like to find solutions other than closing what’s known as the seasonal anchorage near Stearns Wharf. (There is also a permitted mooring area farther east of Stearns, as well as a free year-round anchorage.)

“There’s no proposal to touch or close the year-round portion of the anchorage,” said Mike Wiltshire, Santa Barbara’s harbormaster and waterfront director. Wiltshire confirmed that the city’s Harbor Commission would prefer a solution that preserves the seasonal anchorage in addition to the year-round anchorage. He believes a solution is possible that can preserve mooring and anchoring in the seasonal anchorage while still protecting utility infrastructure. He said the seasonal anchorage is closer to Stearns Wharf and the harbor, which is where people typically take their tenders/skiffs.

Wiltshire said the waterfront department and public works need to put together a proposal that “protects the infrastructure and preserves moorings.”

A press release from Santa Barbara’s Waterfront Department said the city was taking “proactive steps to safeguard its offshore resources and the environment,” and added that “incidents of damage to [underwater infrastructure] due to anchors dragging have heightened concerns, prompting the need for protection.”

The letter we received, written by Jeff Mcfarlane, read, “Vessels have been anchoring in this area since Stearns Wharf was built 150 years ago. Pipes have been in place and survived anchored vessels for 100 years. The only issue is that 30 years ago, a desalination water intake structure was added to the end of one pipe at the outer edge of the anchoring area. In the last 30 years, there have been two incidents where the grate to the intake was disturbed, supposedly by a vessel’s anchor. Public Works has recently added a large buoy to mark the structure and keep vessels from anchoring in that area. Problem solved.”

Wiltshire said that there have been “a couple of occurrences” of damage to infrastructure, but admitted the proposal was “more preventative than for issues that have occurred to date. We hope people are using charts and that their anchors hold.”

Wiltshire said there are 15 to 30 vessels on the seasonal anchorage — which is open from April to October — during the summer. “Predominantly, the makeup is not necessarily transient but liveaboards or non-occupied vessels.”

Mcfarlane’s letter, as well as a Santa Barbara news site, quoted a city employee who appeared to speak somewhat gravely about boat owners on the anchorage: “They are not part of the harbor community necessarily. They are just an adjacent community of boaters with this open field where they can basically kind of do whatever they want.”

For a moment, this seemed like a story we’d heard before, especially here in the Bay: Sailboats are potential renegades and environmental liabilities, so their access to anchorages should be limited. Does Santa Barbara face some of the same problems as the Bay Area, and have unhoused people living on old, non-operable boats?

“We do see some of that,” Wiltshire told us. “There are a number of derelict [boats], but our municipal code governs the anchorage. Those boats are required to be operable; [we] do semi-regular checks. Boats can be noticed.”

Wiltshire said that during heavy winters, such as the last one, as many as 8 or 10 boats were blown ashore, with the city often left with a bill of $50,000 to $100,000. Sailors who don’t stand a proper watch or have good ground tackle can become de facto renegades and environmental liabilities, and invite a tightening of the rules for those who follow them.

“[City] staff seems to think that these vessels are there for ‘boat storage’ and have ground tackle that is not secure,” Jeff Mcfarlane wrote us. “Regardless of the accuracy of the statements made, none of this has to do with the pipes and underwater infrastructure.

“Santa Barbara has a long history as a stopover for vessels traveling up and down our coast. We have one of the handful of safe and free city anchorages left. Besides the visitor vessels, there are a few boats that spend the summer, moving in and out of visitor slips in the harbor. The Summer Anchorage is a valuable resource to both the City of Santa Barbara and the larger boating community.”

The website Noozhawk said that Santa Barbara’s Harbor Commission “tanked” the reduction/closure proposal in October, and quoted commissioner Kate Ford: “I would like to find a different solution than closing that anchorage. I wonder if there’s a better way to help boaters in that area understand what’s in that area, rather than closing it off.

Wiltshire said that the [reduction/closure] proposal was the first introduction of this to the Harbor Commission, “but we have work to do to figure out a solution. The Waterfront is working with Public Works to better define ways to protect submerged infrastructure. Closing the Seasonal Anchorage was one way to accomplish this, but we aim to work with Public Works to better define and come up with a solution that preserves mooring in the Seasonal Anchorage while protecting subsea utility infrastructure.”