Dock-dredging permit approved

Most Newport Beach waterfront residents can again dredge under their docks, with the California Coastal Commission’s Thursday approval of a general dredging permit for the city.

The blanket permit allows residents to go through the city for permission to do maintenance dredging, rather than having to individually apply to the commission.

Newport Beach has held general permits for three decades, but the most recent one expired a year ago, so no one has been able to dredge since the beginning of 2006. Now there’s a backlog of people wanting to dredge.

The new permit is good for five years and covers most of the 1,200 residential docks in the city. Three areas where small amounts of mercury were found had to be taken out of the permit request, so the roughly 60 dock owners in those areas likely will have to wait to dredge. City officials are working on finding the source of the contamination.

Having the new permit “gives us another five-year period to continue to dredge the harbor in a relatively inexpensive and simple manner,” Newport Beach Assistant City Manager Dave Kiff said.