Ocean activist Paul Jenkin fights to clean the water where he surfs, through his work with the Ventura County Chapter of the Surfrider Foundation.
The Surfrider Foundation is a nonprofit environmental organization that strives to protect the beaches and oceans. Their documentary video, Keepers of the Coast, names surfers as the indicator species assessing the health of our beaches and oceans. Immersed in the deep blue, surfers see the state of the water. They smell it, feel it and taste it. Yet, as surfers, they are humble guests. They know that it is the creatures of the ocean who suffer silently when the waters are unhealthy.
“Our society and our generation have never seen the ocean the way it is supposed to be,” says Jenkin. “Even though we might not get sick, all of the fish and other organisms are suffering.”
Jenkin, a surfer of 25 years, has been an active leader of the club’s Ventura Chapter since 1994. One project he spearheads is the cleaning of the Ventura County coastline through rebuilding Surfers’ Point, a local beach whose water quality is suffering from an eroding bike path and dumping of oil, metals and trash at the mouth of the river.
We have designed our society to intentionally place the impact of our urban lifestyle directly in the ocean. Every concrete storm drain you see that empties directly into the ocean is a one-way ticket for all the urban ills in and onto the beaches.
“Since its installation, more than 60 feet of bike path and parking lot have cleaved into the ocean,” Jenkin says. “Today, an inland migration of concrete barricades and fences that delineate the jagged bike path mark the passing of each big storm.”
Ventura is just one of many communities facing similar issues. More than 86 percent of California’s 1,100-mile coastline experiences erosion at a rate of about one foot per year.
Jenkin points out another water quality issue: the Ventura County Fairgrounds was built on wetlands next to Surfers’ Point. “There is [a] low grade, so it fills up with water during rains and then pumps that pollution directly into the ocean.”
Jenkin and others formed the Surfers’ Point Task force, researched restoration alternatives and drafted an integrated plan for local and state governmental agencies to rebuild Surfers’ Point. While the City of Ventura and the Fairgrounds were planning to build a seawall, Jenkin and others developed a natural solution that relocates the bike path and parking lot further inland, restoring the natural buffer zone and cleaning the water. They hope that by revitalizing the beach, it will heal itself.
Jenkin is hopeful. He drafted a document urging the City of Ventura to restore wetlands and create structures that will capture storm water within parks and other urban landscapes for filtration before it hits our oceans. He is also urging them to use permeable paving or sustainable urban drainage called Grasscrete in their parking lots. Grasscrete will filter the storm water onsite and into a collection tank that would further filter it before it goes onto the beach. Jenkin is also keeping an eye on sewage treatment plants that might discharge chemicals and pathogens.
Jenkin and the City of Ventura are working together on solutions to the storm water issue. “We have designed our society to intentionally place the impact of our urban lifestyle directly in the ocean. Every concrete storm drain you see that empties directly into the ocean is a one-way ticket for all the urban ills in and onto the beaches.”
The actions of Jenkin’s Ventura County Surfrider chapter and other ocean conservancy groups are paving a clean path for surfing the coast.
surfrider.org/ventura, surferspoint.org.
Lori Denman is a yogi, surfer and
journalist.
Photo: Amy Kuhmler
