Coast Panel Approves Artificial Reef : Project Seen as Complement to Batiquitos Lagoon Restoration

The California Coastal Commission on Wednesday approved plans for a 10,000-ton artificial reef near Carlsbad, and state officials said they expect to begin construction later this month.

The quarry rock reef, to be located about half a mile offshore near the mouth of Batiquitos Lagoon, will be the sixth artificial underwater habitat built by the California Department of Fish and Game since 1980. State marine biologists believe this reef, like others near Oceanside and Santa Monica, will attract fish and eventually increase fish populations.

“We’re learning to build the ultimate reef,” John J. Grant, a marine biologist with the state’s Nearshore Sportfish Habitat Enhancement Program, told the commissioners at their monthly meeting in San Diego. With the commission’s support, Grant said, he expects no further obstacles.

Carlsbad politicians, eager to help spur the local sportfishing industry, said they were thrilled that the long-awaited reef will soon be under way. Funded with about $300,000 from a special tax on fishing equipment and fuel used by sportfishing boats, the reef is designed to complement a proposed $20-million lagoon restoration that could be completed by 1991.

“We are so pleased,” Carlsbad Mayor Pro-Tem Ann Kulchin said. “We see this as an opportunity to lure the fishes and keep them here.” And she sees it as an inexpensive recreation that requires only a fishing pole and a boat.

State scientists found that the reef will have no negative effect on the environment. In fact, Grant said, the reef will increase the “survivability” of some fish by making them less vulnerable to predators.

But some environmentalists see the reef as linked to the larger lagoon restoration, a project they fear will disrupt some endangered birds that now live there.

Joan Jackson, coastal chairwoman of the San Diego chapter of the Sierra Club, said she is particularly worried about the California least tern, a small white bird that is one of several endangered birds that call the wetlands home.

“That reef is one little stop on the way to disaster,” she said.

Jackson’s objection stems from the fact that the restoration is a so-called mitigation project, intended to compensate for the destruction of marine habitat elsewhere in the state. In this case, she says, Batiquitos Lagoon is being disrupted to aid the Port of Los Angeles, which is financing the lagoon restoration in order to offset damage that occurred when it built a landfill in San Pedro Bay. Such reparations are required under the Endangered Species Act, but Jackson said she thinks the act is being misapplied.

“I don’t believe it was the intention of the Endangered Species Act to sanction the destruction of habitat,” she said.

Grant acknowledged that the reef site was chosen in part because of the planned restoration. But, he said, the reef has “nothing to do” with the Port of Los Angeles. Although he has no role in the restoration, Grant said he believes it would have a positive effect on the area.

“The bay is already artificial and man-made. All the restoration will do is return it to the way it was before we started messing it up,” he said. “Man leaves such big footprints wherever we go, it’s nice to be able to fill one back in. And I believe that’s what we’ll be doing with this reef.”