10 minute read
Making Waves
GIVEN A LONG LIST OF CONCERNS FROM VARIOUS GROUPS,
IS IT POSSIBLE TO PRESERVE A HISTORIC AND RARE COMMUNITY
WHERE PEOPLE LIVE IN THEIR BOATS ON THE BAY?
he idea of conservation is complex, and the word may be used in the context of both wildlife and human rights. Much of our recent Marin County history is a story of the push and pull of two aspirations — to protect flora and fauna on one hand, and to preserve quality of life for people on the other — and the beryl-blue water of Richardson Bay is currently a host to this natural tension.
Whether in the Sausalito and Tiburon marinas or out on the open water, humanity strives to peaceably and symbiotically coexist with one of the most important and ecologically rich waterways in the hemisphere. The ongoing struggle to find a humane and environmentally successful balance on the bay has been unfolding for decades. Over the past few years, discussions about the “anchor-outs,” a group of people who live on illegally anchored and moored boats, have been especially acrimonious and polarizing, pitting those who live on the water and their supporters against shoreline dwellers and regulatory and environmental organizations such as the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission (BCDC) and Audubon California.
On April 5, after months of study and community input, the Richardson Bay Regional Agency (RBRA), an entity charged with management of Mill Valley, Tiburon, Belvedere and Marin County waters, announced long-awaited updated policy recommendations for the management of Richardson Bay. Over the course of the past year, RBRA and the City of Sausalito, which broke from the agency last spring to monitor its own jurisdictional waters, have grappled in public and private with the issue of how to better manage the long-standing community of boaters.
BY KIRSTEN JONES NEFF • PHOTOS BY TIM PORTER
The nonprofit Audubon California believes the presence of this community is an unequivocal environmental disaster, especially with regard to eelgrass, a not-so-glamorous but nonetheless elemental puzzle piece in the bay’s complex ecology. Additionally, a number of shoreline residents have expressed frustration with anchor-outs, claiming the community’s wayward boats damage property and that their trash and sewage pollute the bay. The anchor-out community and its supporters, including on-shore residents who see the existence of this community as emblematic of the creative and diverse character that has made Marin County unique, say that contrary to popular perception, anchor-outs are generally responsible citizens whose environmental impact — including wildlife displacement, toxic runoffand carbon footprint — is minuscule relative to that of the average land dweller.
The story of the anchor-outs of Richardson Bay dates back to World War II, when a flotilla of retired barges, ferries, schooners and fireboats was repurposed by folks who hoped to live inexpensively just offshore. “In Sausalito people live on anything that floats,” reads a caption for an August 1951 photo essay in the San Francisco Chronicle. “Some live there because it’s cheap, others because it’s ‘arty’ and some because they like the water and the way it rocks them to sleep.” By 1959, the first big push to control the vessel and houseboat dwellers came from Sausalito City Attorney John Ehlen, but the offshore community resisted and only grew, establishing itself in the ’60s as a colorful part of the Sausalito shoreline. In June 1971, a well-documented battle — what would become known as “The Houseboat Wars” — erupted when the Coast Guard and the Marin County sheriff attempted to clear out several houseboats. They were met with an armada of waterborne resistance.
“I think there were always some issues between the ‘hill people’ on land and the ‘anchor-outs’ on the bay,” says Memo Gidley, a professional race car driver who grew up as an anchor-out on his parents’ 54-foot cutter. Gidley’s father, Cass, was a seaman who came to Sausalito in the 1920s, owned a sailing school and a commercial fishery, and was known to many as the “godfather of the anchor-outs.” Memo and his mother, Mary Gidley, remember life on the bay in the 1970s as challenging and beautiful. In Mary’s words, “It was a lifestyle for hardy people, but also a romantic lifestyle, quiet and peaceful on the water, the sky full of stars.”
The Gidleys describe their neighbors as individuals who loved the water and the sense of freedom found offshore. “The community was full of diversity,” Memo says. “Mostly low-income, and not only hardworking but also a community full of role models.” One aspect of the lifestyle he particularly admires is cooperation of the sort you do not easily find on land. “If anyone ever needs help at any time, even if they knock on your boat at 4 a.m., you go help.”
Anchor-out Chad Carvey is a charity auctioneer who was a Marin County school principal for 29 years. Nine years ago he and his wife, Carolyn, moved aboard their 43-foot sailboat to save money for a 10-year circumnavigation of the globe. Carvey, who considers himself an environmentalist and regularly posts videos on Facebook of the bird and sea life surrounding his boat, has become a vocal advocate for the anchor-out community. “At a time when the gentrification and sterilization of our communities is happening everywhere, these waters have always been a sanctuary city for poets, artists, musicians, maritime workers, retirees, homeless folks and seagoing voyagers,” he wrote in a May 2017 opinion piece for the community newspaper Marinscope titled “Anchor-Out Community Good for the Environment, Good for the People.”
Carvey argues that “most anchor-outs use solar and wind power, so our ecological footprint is approximately 10 percent of [that of] land-based neighbors.” He adds that the alleged sewage problem is not truly a problem because of the free pump-out (waste removal) service provided by the RBRA, and says monthly water quality testing has shown no contamination. “Meanwhile, Sausalito and Mill Valley have had millions of gallons of accidental sewage spill into the bay over the past 30 years,” he adds, referring to a recent Marin County Grand Jury Report. Carvey praises Audubon California for its environmental work across the region, but he takes issue with its claim that anchor-outs lead to the demise of eelgrass; he cites a 2010 S.F. Bay Subtidal Habitat Goals Report that shows an increase in eelgrass in Richardson Bay, from 13 acres in 1987 to 670 acres in 2009.
Audubon S.F. Bay Program Director Rebecca Schwartz Lesberg strongly disputes Carvey’s arguments. Audubon monitors the health of the eelgrass through aerial geographic information system (GIS) photography, and it estimates that eelgrass damage is on average one-half acre per boat.
Clockwise from top: Several anchor-outs in Richardson Bay; anchorout dinghies and rafts at Galilee Harbor; Memo and Mary Gidley.
“It is staggering to see the scale of damage,” says Schwartz Lesberg, describing “crop-circles” caused by the movement of illegally moored boats. “And it is almost impossible to overstate how important eelgrass is to the health of the bay.” Eelgrass, Schwartz Lesberg adds, cleans the water, reduces ocean acidification, stabilizes the shoreline from erosion and buffers against sea level rise. It also provides the habitat for commercially important species such as Pacific herring and Dungeness crab, and, most critically, eelgrass supports the tens of thousands of migratory birds in Richardson Bay that stop to feed and forage: “The birds rely on the herring eggs laid on the eelgrass. So that’s where we really plugged in — protecting that eelgrass-herring-waterbird system.”
The anchor-out–Audubon disagreement about the impact of the boat community on Richardson Bay ecology comes down to interpretation of data. Schwartz Lesberg says that no comprehensive, up-to-date study has been conducted and that Carvey’s data is misleading because it comes from a report that documented expanding eelgrass beds between 1987 and 2003, a period in which “we essentially became better at finding eelgrass.” She points to the 2015 State of the Estuary report by the California Coastal Conservancy and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Fisheries that found an almost 50 percent decline of eelgrass in Richardson Bay between 2009 and 2013, although this study does note that “eelgrass beds are a dynamic habitat and can experience tremendous variability in coverage from year-to-year,” meaning some decline may be due to natural environmental conditions such as heavy rainfall and subsequent flooding that depresses salinity and increases turbidity.
Beyond the significant disagreement about environmental impact, there has been marked progress over the past year as the various interests inch toward compromises and a viable long-term management plan. In spring of 2017, the city of Sausalito passed ordinances that subject unregistered vessels and boats “occupied by persons who are in danger to themselves or others” to removal. The new Sausalito codes set a 10-hour limit on vessels anchoring in city waters. The codes also include a rule that after 72 hours a boat may be impounded, and it outlaws beached boats and limits activity off unphy Park to protect eelgrass.
Sausalito Police Lieutenant Bill Fraass, who uses GIS technology to monitor the boats and their status, says the number of crafts varies seasonally. “You see a slight increase or decrease depending on what time of year it is. Over the last several years in the entirety of Richardson Bay, the numbers have increased to as high as 250 vessels at one point. The occupancy also changes day to day.” According to an April 5, 2017, RBRA report, the number of vessels is currently at 175, but only 64 percent of those vessels have someone living on board.
Although a portion of the anchor-out population resists any regulation, Carvey and others openly praise the work of the Sausalito Police Department, which has been working in conjunction with RBRA boats, providing trash and waste removal for the anchor-outs and identifying “derelict moorings” deemed unseaworthy or hazardous. Since last spring, approximately 100 abandoned or derelict vessels have been cleared from the bay.
“Our main effort is to make sure the waterways are as safe for everybody as possible,” says Police Lt. Fraass, who has headed the cleanup effort. “We’re talking about quality of life, making sure there’s no crime, no navigational hazards on the water, no pollution hazards. And we want to give people an opportunity to come into compliance.”
The RBRA Board’s April 5 policy adoption mandates increased enforcement of registration and seaworthiness criteria for vessels, and it adds to the management plan a dimension that addresses eelgrass concerns. Among the new requirements is that all vessels need to be securely moored rather than anchored. “This is intended to prevent vessels from breaking loose — especially during storms — and to prevent anchor chains from dragging through sensitive eelgrass on the bay floor,” says RBRA Executive Director Beth Pollard.
Details such as exact location of the moorings and funding — each mooring will cost approximately $2,000 — will be determined in the coming months. Schwartz Lesberg of Audubon remains dissatisfied with the RBRA’s new policy, fearing that overall the new path forward is “business as usual, with no clear mechanisms for enforcing new or existing regulations.” From Pollard’s perspective, a clear plan is critical for all, but especially so for the many she has heard from who feel anxiety about their future. While RBRA Director Pollard and Police Lt. Fraass may not consider themselves conservationists per se, both are public servants who have found themselves working on a complicated jigsaw puzzle of environmental preservation and public health and housing.
“One of the most eye-opening aspects of this process is seeing how fragile housing conditions are in Marin,” Pollard says. “How do we make sure that the vulnerable among us have a safe place to be — safe to themselves and to others?” m
