RESTORED BEACHES = RESTORED HABITAT

Dear Oceanside Beach Restoration Advocates,

Summertime is in full swing, with Harbor dredging behind us and some sand returning to our Northern beaches as a result. I wanted to catch you up on some recent milestones. Over the past two months,  the SOS team engaged with the city on having beach restoration as a funded item in the 2024-2025 city budget and recurring years. We commissioned a survey that showed the amazing support of committing funding to beach restoration at a 71% approval across our city. Due to the results of our survey presented in meetings with city council members and city staff, your emails to the city leadership, and testimony at the council meeting,  the budget was approved with a first-ever budget line item for a Beach Restoration fund with a committed initial amount of $867K! 

See more here at the Coast News coverage.

On July 4th, we celebrate our United State’s 248th birthday! Oceanside celebrates this every year with an amazing Independence Day Parade. Join the Save Oceanside Sand crew on June 29th and walk with us down the iconic Pacific Coast Highway (Hill Street to us long-time O’siders). This will be our third year participating in getting the crowd fired up on supporting beach restoration.  Family, friends, bikes, skateboards, scooters, roller skates, and dogs are all welcome. Contact Bob Walker at bwalker@sosoceanside.com to let him know you’ll join us.

News updates follow; I hope to see you at future events or down at the O’side shoreline! Thank you all for your continued support!   SOS continues to make a difference in working with our City leaders to do something no other California City is doing - Implementing an innovative beach restoration program. We always welcome new volunteers for our Summer Saturday pop-up events for education and outreach as well as the SOS Citizen Science program. These opportunities are not just about volunteering; they are about impacting our community and our environment.

Thank you in advanced for your continued support!

Sincerely,

Bob Ashton
President/CEO, Save Oceanside Sand
(808) 429-1770
rcakalaheo@gmail.com

We have 6 high school interns joining us again this year to learn about our shoreline, coastal processes, and what is being done by the City of Oceanside to restore our beaches. Additionally, they assist our Popup Chair, Dirk Ackema, and the SOS team in education and outreach to the public at our Saturday beachside popup. Lastly, the interns will join our Citizen Science Chair, Serena Milne, who will teach them beach transect data collection processes during our monthly shoreline data collection event. Learn more about our Intern program here at the Coast News.

Our Citizen Science program is in full swing under the amazing direction of our Citizen Science Chair, Serena Milne.  She coordinates the safe data collection of beach transects from North Carlsbad beaches to the North Jetty in Oceanside, spanning some 4 miles of beach. An all-volunteer program since 2020, the SOS Citizen Science Program continues to conduct monthly data collection and situational monitoring for storm and dredging activities.   This work is in collaboration with our City Coastal Zone Administrator and Dr. Adam Young of Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Adam’s lab processes the data and provides visual and raw data for anyone’s use on the Coastal Process Website. This data is provided as a free service to coastal scientists and engineers for their studies of our coastline performance.   Organizations using the data include  US Army Corps of Engineers, GHD (Oceanside’s prime contractor for the Pilot project),  ContractorSpecific organizations using the data:   US Army Corps Navigation Dredging Team, US Army Corps Mitigation Study Team, GHD Coastal Engineers (Prime contractor) for RE:BEACH & Pilot Project Team, Rincon Consulting, Oceanside Coastal Dunes Project, Dudek Consulting, Loma Alta Creek Maintenance Program and SANDAG Regional Beach Sand Project 3 (RBSP 3).   SOS - continuing to make a difference in a big way! Go, SOS Citizen Science Team!

The Oceanside Sand Replenishment and Retention Pilot Project is still in full swing, with the City staff working closely with the coastal engineering team of GHD and its Australian partner ICM on the next steps. The RE:BEACH competition resulted in unanimous approval of the headland/offshore reef design. The siting analysis is nearing completion for the three potential locations along our shoreline, spanning Tyson Street South to the Buena Vista Lagoon mouth. All three locations in this zone are being considered and analyzed using a comprehensive set of exacting and specific criteria.

On July 16th and July 18th, there will be public meetings by the Pilot Project team led by Jayme Timberlake (our Oceanside Coastal Zone Manager) to present the siting analysis.  These meetings will be virtual to ensure maximum participation by all interested parties. The meetings will include presentations along with a question and answer period. Stay tuned for more specifics on the meeting times and information on how to join.

An SOS meeting is planned for the 4th week of July 2024. The specific date and location will be announced shortly. The focus will be to provide an engaging agenda with updates on the progress in restoring our beaches, volunteer recognition, a guest speaker, and short briefs from our volunteer committee chairs with opportunities to interact with all. Stay tuned via our website and social media feeds for an update on specific date and time information.  

SOS continues developing collaborative relationships with other shoreline restoration advocacy groups.  We have been in dialogue and have met with Save our Beaches San Clemente and, most recently, with one of the founders of Save West Cliff.  The goal is to develop a strong coalition of shoreline advocates to align and unify on important shoreline issues in the future.