New suitor gets city to rethink ‘surf cams’

Noaki Schwartz

NEWPORT BEACH -- After more than a year of negotiations, the City

Council -- hoping to get more money from a new suitor -- walked away from

a deal with an established Web site vendor that offered lifeguards

cameras to keep an eye on swimmers.

Surfline Inc. officials said they were backing out of the deal --

which was supposed to be cemented at Tuesday’s council meeting -- when

another Internet company jumped in at the last minute offering to sweeten

the pot with money.

“We’re probably just going to back out of this whole thing now,”

Surfline President Sean Collins said. “We had a formal proposal to the

city. And then there was all this confusion and mistrust.”

HardCloud, a similar company that also provides information on surf

conditions, offered the city as much as $7,000 annually. This prompted

council members to reconsider the original offer which would not have

netted the city any money.

Hearing this, the council instructed the fire chief to meet with

representatives from both companies and compile the information for a

future meeting. City officials said they had no idea there were other

companies that could provide similar services.

“To be honest we’re definitely interested in striking a deal,”

HardCloud spokesman Jim Kempton said. “It’s always good for the city to

have revenue for services.”

HardCloud plans on starting negotiations with the city in September.

The plan between the city and Surfline was to install video equipment

at the city’s lifeguard headquarters at Newport pier. In exchange for

being allowed to install the camera on public property, the city would

get access to the company’s two other “surf cams” at 56th Street and the

Wedge.

The cameras would come in handy particularly during the off-season

when there are only five lifeguards watching the beaches in comparison to

60 in the summer, lifeguard Capt. Eric Bauer said.

HardCloud is interested in a similar deal in which a camera would be

mounted at lifeguard headquarters. However, Kempton said they could offer

five additional camera venues at 30th Street, 36th Street, 54th Street,

56th Street and Blackie’s. The more views the site can offer, the more

viewers and the more advertising potential, Kempton explained.

Still, Surfline countered that they have better technology and have

already established similar relationships with other cities in

California.

A year ago Surfline mounted cameras in Seal Beach, and officials there

rave about the technology and the company.