Plans floated for Mason’s Marina in Bodega Bay cause stir on Sonoma Coast

Sonoma County’s plans to study the creation of a new interpretive center and recreational hub at the site of Mason’s Marina in Bodega Bay have triggered alarm among coastal residents who fear the region could be overwhelmed with additional tourists and traffic if such a project were to go through.

Though still an unformed vision, the prospect of a new visitor destination in the busy harbor has critics deriding what some have dubbed a proposed “theme park” that they worry will spawn unwanted development and what one called “the plasticization of Bodega Bay.“

“If the coast is being viewed as a cash cow for very large-scale industrial recreation, then somebody ought to ask the people who live here now, who pay the taxes and support the supervisors who will have to vote for this,” said Richard Charter, a fellow with the Ocean Foundation, whose skepticism was deepened by the crowds that jammed the region over the Labor Day weekend.

Board members with the Bodega Bay Fire Protection District also expressed concerns over the plan at their regular meeting Tuesday night.

But Sonoma County Regional Parks Director Caryl Hart, whose department is responsible for the site, said it appeared many people were reacting without a clue about what the county has in mind for the run-down marina adjacent to Spud Point.

“I think that the problem is we’re having some alarmism that is based on no factual basis,” Hart said. To describe what’s being contemplated as a theme park, she said, “is a complete misinterpretation.”

Mason’s Marina had been leased for 40 years before its surrender to the county in 2012 in dismal condition. Inattention by the former operator and a declining commercial fishing industry left the county with $1.7 million in deferred maintenance and a tiny store with gas pumps that consistently lose money and need costly repairs, said Jim Nantell, the deputy regional parks director.

There is not enough demand for commercial berthing to fully support the operation, officials said, but Mason’s Marina does have a critical fish-buying operation run by North Coast Fisheries that the county wants to maintain, along with the docks.

The idea for an interpretive center and recreation hub came up two years ago as a way to integrate fishing operations with hands-on exhibits about the history of the harbor and its offshore ecosystem.

Dubbed the Bodega Bay Center for Outdoor Opportunities and Learning, or BBCOOL, the facility could include food and beverage sales and rentals of hand-launched boats that would provide some revenue.

Also floated has been the prospect of using water taxis to transport people across the harbor from Doran Beach and other locations to the Mason’s site to avoid excessive traffic and parking demand.

“My number one interest is to at least provide the public, ideally, with an understanding of that rich, offshore environment,” Hart said, “and also another strong desire is to provide another way for people to get out on the bay.”

Funding was only recently secured for a study, estimated to cost at least $50,000, to determine what the site might support.

The struggling Bodega Bay fire department, which provides public safety response across a large swath of coastal land, was among those notified of the project. Its subsequent request for more information resulted in the presentation at Tuesday night’s meeting.

Norma Jellison, a Bodega Bay resident, said the project study should be delayed until the community knows more about the county’s plans.

“You’re going down a slippery slope without knowing if you have buy-in,” Jellison said at the fire station in Bodega Bay Tuesday.

Nantell responded that the study, authorized by the Board of Supervisors, will include “community input.”

Fire board members expressed concern that the project would draw more people to the coastal community, which copes with bumper-to-bumper traffic on weekends, taxing the agency’s response capability, as well as local utility services and parking space.

“I, for one, am very worried about increasing the number of tourists out here,” board member John Doolittle said.

If the project included water sports, board member Charlie Bone said it would be “a tremendous draw on our resources.”

Hart and her staff are suffering some mistrust related to a controversy that erupted two years ago, when residents of Occidental learned their community center was being considered as a central feature in an expansive West County Gateway plan aimed at connecting disparate public lands and open spaces through a system of trails and shuttle buses. Bodega Bay was one of several key connecting points in what Hart then described as wholly conceptual.

But some residents think she and her staff may be trying to slip part of the gateway proposal past them in an area already suffering from inadequate parking and pedestrian infrastructure, including public restrooms.

“It seems that the people of Bodega Bay who will be most impacted by the influx of people envisioned by Regional Parks should have a say,” said Cea Higgins, policy coordinator for the Sonoma Coast Chapter of Surfrider Foundation.

Fire Chief Sean Grinnell said he and his board understand planning for the site is very preliminary, but “we just want a seat at the table.”

“We tend to get a little anxious when we’re told about more activities in Bodega Bay,” Grinnell said. “We’re not sure the infrastructure can support more people.”

Grinnell and Higgins also noted that the site is in a seismically active, tsunami zone that is additionally subject to sea-level rise.

But Nantell and Hart said the point of a project study is to determine what the community and the site would support, what the environmental and financial impacts will be, and how to develop and design a project that would work.

Nantell said the county’s options were limited because they only have 4,800 square feet to work with at Mason’s Marina.

“If we do generate a lot of traffic, it’s going to be a real problem,” said Nantell. “That will be an obstacle I don’t think we can overcome, so we’ve got to balance building something for the community with the impacts it will create.”

Hart also noted that any planning would be subject to layers of oversight that include the California Coastal Commission.

“We are at zero, and it’s a blank page,” Hart said. “We have our ideas, like any county department. We have our ideas of what we’d like to see. Are they feasible? Are there other ideas that might make more sense? It is certainly not in any kind of way anything like a major facility or a theme park.”

Staff Writer Guy Kovner contributed to this report. You can reach Staff Writer Mary Callahan at 521-5249 or mary.callahan@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter @MaryCallahanB.