A young man wrote a letter to the editor in the Oct. 16, 2020 Laguna Beach Independent lamenting there was very little for young people to do stating: “But local teenagers are irritated at the insufficiency of activities and opportunities I am telling you there’s nothing to do if you were under the age of 21 the only recreational activities in this community are going to bars, dining at restaurants that are crazy expensive, going to little shops that are all selling the same thing, going to the beaches to drink and then going to peoples houses to drink some more.”
But in contrast, I would think how lucky we are living in Laguna Beach, seven miles of beach along the gorgeous Pacific Ocean, and surrounded by 22,000 acres of natural open space including the Laguna Coast, and Aliso & Wood Canyons wilderness parks, and the State Crystal Cove State Park. We are a Marine Protected Area, and a Bird Sanctuary. The website visitlagunabeach.com notes lots of activities one can participate in including hiking, swimming, surfing, tennis, pickleball, basketball, volleyball, golf, kayaking, paddle-boarding, bicycling, snorkeling, diving, and even lawn-bowling.
There are three art festivals in town: the Festival of the Arts which has the Pageant of the Masters, the Sawdust Festival, and Art-A-Fair. In addition to the arts and crafts to view and/or purchase, there’s often musical entertainment, artistic demonstrations or hands-on projects to participate in. We also have the Laguna Art Museum and the Laguna Playhouse. These activities have been curtailed by coronavirus, but all will return after the pandemic is over.
Out-of-towners apparently do know of the many attractions in Laguna Beach. Unfortunately, the City encourages many of these day-trippers to visit Laguna Beach. The City collects self-imposed transient occupancy tax from the hotel/motels and some of the funds go to visitlagunabeach.com. They are to spend money primarily to encourage destination tourists who spend at least one night lodging, and hopefully spend a lot of money in Laguna Beach generating substantial revenues for the City. Unfortunately, VisitLagunaBeach.com also promote day-trippers who come to Laguna Beach, and do not spend much money in Laguna Beach. Often the only City revenue they provide are from parking meters, if that.
VisitLagunaBeach.com promotes lots of things to do in Laguna Beach, just go to www.visitlagunabeach.com/things-to-do/100-things-to-do. The site even gives parking advice: “Nobody likes to think about parking, and thankfully when visiting Laguna Beach, we’ve taken the stress out of worrying where to park by providing you various options. Please note that during our peak season, metered parking can fill up quickly, so if you prefer to park on the street, plan to arrive early”.
VisitLagunaBeach.com should focus on promoting lodging and the destination tourist. Otherwise, the City should better use the money to mitigate the day-tripper caused problems relating to crime, smoking, graffiti, traffic congestion, parking, trash, alcohol, and lewd conduct.
It’s residents versus visitors, and I will vote for the city council candidates that will try to protect the residents’ quality of life; join me in voting for George Weiss and Ruben Flores.
Gene Felder, Laguna Beach
No offense Gene, but old men like us shouldn’t try to pretend we understand what it’s like for young adults in Laguna.
Kudos to Gene Felder. Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results. It may come as a shock to those organizations like Visit Laguna but this island called Laguna Beach does not have infinite parking, roadways, beaches, lifeguards, police, clean up crews to deal with the vast horde of day trippers who make up 95% of the 6,500,000 annual visitors. So their solution is to spend million(s) of dollars annually to encourage more tourism. This year because of the covid19 crisis causing a drastic downturn in airplane traffic some genius decided to concentrate on attracting even a higher than normal percentage of day trippers with the totally foreseeable result; destruction of tide pools, drownings, trash on the beaches and neighborhoods, dangerously clogged streets especially in the residential areas, aggressive tourists, ear splitting noises from vehicles just to name a few of the “benefits” that Visit Laguna gives the residents. And this problem will only get worse. Why doesn’t the city government realize that Laguna Beach cannot continue to have an ever increasing horde continue to come to Laguna Beach? Instead of spending millions of dollars on crony capitalism projects such as the parking structure why not hire a top notch unbiased company that can study our situation in its totality and give us a realistic assessment of what we are facing for the future with some options that can be rationally discussed. And, no, I am not talking about a study like the $30,000 dollar parking structure study of which two thirds was funded by dark money. We need an unbiased look at what our future can be based on real data. How can we continue to have an increase in the hordes of tourists and do piecemeal solutions which wast money and do nothing to address the problem in its totality? Reminds me of the “Six Blind Men of ” trying to describe an elephant.