Dock rentals will get scrutiny

June Casagrande

NEWPORT BEACH -- City officials want to know how many residents rent

out their private docks and whether the practice is so widespread that

the city should levy portions of the rental fees to pay for tidelands

preservation and improvement.

City Council members will examine the issue in a upcoming study

session, and it’s likely that the soon-to-be-formed Harbor Commission

will take on the issue as one of its first tasks, Assistant City Manager

Dave Kiff said.

“We need to find out more about what the law says,” Kiff said. “We

need to tackle the question of how we would measure the practice.”

Local ordinances, as well as the city’s agreement with the California

State Lands Commission, are unclear whether the practice is improper or

possibly illegal. City ordinances distinguish commercial from private

piers, designating only multi-slip piers as ones that can be rented for a

fee.

The private piers also are in state-owned tidelands. Most of the time

when tidelands are used for profit, the city is required to collect a

portion of the proceeds and put the money in a tidal fund. The fund is

used to pay for environmental preservation and improvements, such as

dredging the waterways.

A lands commission representative has said it’s not clear whether the

situation in Newport Harbor constitutes a violation of the spirit of the

city’s agreement with the state.

Those are the types of questions the city will look into, Kiff said.

While no one has advocated prohibiting the practice, it’s possible the

city would want to regulate it, perhaps with lease agreements, and charge

a fee.

“That’s just one possibility,” Kiff said.

Owners of waterfront homes pay a fee to the city for their private

piers -- usually $75 a year.

A January 1999 report that came into public view just this month

estimates that homeowners who rent out space at their docks could be

getting between $5,000 and $9,600 per year per boat. Estimating that 50%

to 60% of the boats docked at the city’s 1,200 private piers are in

rented space, that would mean that between $4 million and $7 million a

year could be changing hands in Newport Beach between private pier owners

and renters

Some in town say these figures are greatly exaggerated. The study

checked ownership records on 63 boats docked at 33 private piers and

found 62% of them were not registered to the dock owners. Estimating that

the average boat size was 40 feet, the report arrived at $5,000 a year

rental fees based on a rate of $10.42 per month per foot. At $20 per

month per foot, the annual receipts are $9,600. Space at a city-owned

rental slip is about $17 a foot for a 40-foot boat.

“I’d say the 62% estimate is probably pretty close,” said Sean Acosta,

owner of Newport Slip Rentals, whose business is matching up boat owners

with private pier owners. “I feel it was inevitable that this was going

to fall under some scrutiny and some regulation eventually. So it doesn’t

surprise me that the time has come.”

Acosta added that his business, which has about 10 private docks available for rent in Newport Beach at any given time, could benefit from

regulation because his expertise would be in greater demand.

The report suggests that 10% of rental fees should be put into the

tidelands fund. The document was never sent to the council or called to

the public’s attention because it was produced just as a reference: The

Harbor Committee was looking into the question of whether mooring rates

should be changed and used dock rental rates as comparison.

* June Casagrande covers Newport Beach. She may be reached at (949)

574-4232 or by e-mail at o7 june.casagrande@latimes.comf7 .