As much as I appreciate the coverage of mooring issues provided by the January 28th VOC article, there is something missing in the story.
The basis of the elimination of the mooring transferability in Newport Harbor is the fact that State Lands decided that no one should profit off of public tidelands. Even though this practice of transferability has gone on for roughly a hundred years, all of a sudden, it’s supposedly not legal. Why? Because money is involved in the transfer and appears to be a problem, as no one is supposed to make money off of State Lands. Keep reading.
Actually, anyone who keeps a mooring in Newport would tell you, transfer costs between parties generally cover the years of costs involved in keeping said mooring equipment. In the new scenario, the city of Newport Beach will make literally millions. They will also assume ownership over time of the independently maintained mooring with rates so high that no one will want to use them as they will be about the same cost as a dock. Affordability is why we use the mooring fields instead in the first place…