HomeMy WebLinkAbout00 - Non-Agenda ItemReceived after Agenda Printed
May 28, 2024
Non -Agenda Item
May 28, 2024
To: the City Clerk of Newport Beach
From: George Hylkema
Subject: Attached one sheet: Text and illustration supporting my intended
comments for City Council Meeting on 5/28/2024
Request: Please provide this to the City Council in hard copy and make
available to the public at tonights Meeting. Thank you.
Respectfully submitted,
Z__" --- - ---- ------- ------ -------
George Hylkema
Do some of the boats in Newport Harbor pay no tideland fee at all?
Every boat in Newport Harbor uses the public tidelands in exactly the same way. On a sunny
day every boat casts a shadow on the bottom of the bay which outlines its shadow bottom print
and its approximate claim on the tidelands. Whether it is secured to some cleats on a dock or
secured to lines attached to floating buoys and the buoy in turn secured by chains to iron
weights on the bottom of the bay there is no difference in its claim for private use of public
tidelands. Every boat then should be paying for the private use of the public tideland space.
In this familiar slide below, boats are illustrated at a private dock compared to a boat on an
offshore mooring. The text on the slide notes that for the same number of square feet of dock
surface compared to the same number of square feet determined to be the footprint of a boat on
a 40 foot mooring the dock owner pays $30 per month while the mooring permit holder will pay
$480 per month as a tideland fee. This is actually a dock to boat comparison.
If you look again at the drawing you see that there are two boats, one on each side of the
wooden dock. A minimal fee is paid for the dock, but no tideland fee is paid for the boats.
Given the non discrimination requirement of the code* under which the City of Newport Beach is
granted administration of the public tidelands, the reality that some boat owners pay no fee at all
for private use of the public tidelands is obviously not in compliance with the rules.
Price Discrimination in Rates Charged by the City
Wealthy Waterfropzt Bock Permit
Average Joe Mooring Permit
Will pay $480 a month
The City will be forcing mooring permittees to pay 15x for the same
permit in the same harbor
*Beacon Bay Bill, Granting Statue for the City of Newport Beach Tidelands
Chapter 74 of the Beacon Bay Bill STATUTES OF 1978 page 199
(d) In the management, conduct, operation, and control of the lands or any improvements, betterments, or
structures thereon, the city or its successors shall make no discrimination in rates, tolls, or charges for
any use or service in connection therewith