VENTURA COUNTY NEWS : Sand Called a Resource in Jeopardy : Beaches: Experts at a Ventura conference on coastal erosion say the problem is being accelerated by a wide range of human activities.

Beaches from coast to coast are starving for sand, leaving the nation’s shoreline vulnerable to increasingly punishing storms and prompting calls to give beach sand the same protection afforded other scarce natural resources, experts at a conference on coastal erosion said Thursday.

Coastal erosion is being accelerated by a wide range of human activities: Dams capture sediment in foothills. Mines extract it from riverbeds. Harbors and jetties divert it into deep-sea canyons.

Taken together, those actions disrupt a natural cycle that for centuries has taken sand eroded from mountain slopes and distributed it along the coast, experts said at the conference being held in Ventura.

“The common thread is sand,” said A. Paul Jenkin, chairman of the Ventura County chapter of the Surfrider Foundation. “One way or another, we’re not getting enough of it to the beach through natural deposition.”

Across the country, experts are working to correct the problem. The efforts have taken on increasing urgency in recent years as hurricanes pummel the East Coast with increasing ferocity and El Nino-powered storms inflicted heavy damage on California earlier this decade.

But until elected officials and the courts begin to think about beach sand as a public good, solutions will be difficult and beach erosion will wreak more damage, said Ventura attorney Katherine E. Stone, who co-chairs the conference and has represented the California Coastal Commission and others seeking to keep sand on the state’s beaches.

“We’re talking about sand rights,” Stone said. “Sand should be treated more like an endangered species.”

The theory is rooted in English common law and legal notions that date to the Roman Empire. It holds that sand, like other natural resources, is a public good that should be common to all people. The theory, which has gained credence among engineers, environmentalists and marine scientists, maintains that those who benefit from disrupting sand cycles should be responsible for correcting the damage.

“The beach is the same as a sort of environmental commons,” said Ralph Faust, legal counsel to the California Coastal Commission. “It belongs to everyone.”

Although the so-called public trust doctrine has been employed in efforts to fight smog, protect drinking water supplies and save Mono Lake, so far courts have not applied it to sand. Attempts by the Legislature to protect sand also have failed, Stone said.

Sand provides economic benefits in the form of increased tourism, a buffer to absorb angry blows from the sea that threaten property and dunes that provide habitat to coastal wildlife.

A San Francisco State University study last year identified beaches as California’s top tourist and recreation draw and the source of 500,000 jobs and $1.1 billion in state tax revenues. About 10% of the gross domestic product in the United States comes from tourism, and much of that is concentrated on or around beaches, said Howard Marlowe, a Washington lobbyist and president of the American Coastal Coalition.

“Beaches equal bucks,” Marlowe said.

Yet human and natural changes are working to erode beaches. According to experts, sea walls are blamed for magnifying wave energy and stripping away sand. Roads, rail lines and flood-control channels block sand from reaching creeks and streams that otherwise would flush sediment to the ocean. Rising water temperatures cause the ocean to expand, pushing waves higher on the beach and exacerbating storm surges, experts say.

Consequently, beaches, increasingly cut off from sand, are shrinking. Estimates vary, but researchers say the California coast is receding by 1 to 3 feet a year. Similar losses are reported along the Atlantic and Gulf coasts.

In Ventura, a combination of human-induced changes has contributed to the loss of the Omar Rains bike path along Surfers Point. Undercut by erosion, the popular path has crumbled into the sea and waves now threaten a parking lot. Repair will cost about $6 million, Jenkin said.

“It’s no surprise we’re seeing the erosion we are seeing at Surfers Point and other places,” Jenkin said.

The conference, “Sand Rights: A Legal System to Protect the Shores of the Sea,” is sponsored by 18 coastal protection groups, government agencies, cities and research institutions. It continues at the Holiday Inn in Ventura through Saturday.