SB county sheriffs to close public beach on party rumor

Details are not clear about the legal nature of such a move, or the extent of the beach access ban along the 3+ mile beach.

UCSB is frequently included in the Princeton review's list of top 10 party schools. The city of Isla Vista is a dense oasis of apartments with about 20,000 in 3/4 sq.mi, located about 10 miles from upscale Santa Barbara. It has become reknowned for its large Halloween parties, which attract tens of thousands of outsiders from Los Angeles. In 2009, about 800 alcohol tickets and over 150 arrests were made in the Halloween weekend. On regular weekends, the beachside street Del Playa, is well known for a friendly but alcohol saturated culture http://www.onlyinIV.com

Here are some videos of last year's Floatopia party. Many people felt shame for plastic rafts and beer bottles which were abandoned. The ticketing rate for alcohol was much lower than at the halloween.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SBIXE40zY_I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q_opegLAFHY&feature=related

At the same time, beaches in Los Angeles and Malibu to the south are known to host 100,000 visitors on holiday weekends such as labor day http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YjoU8w-cYNI

http://www.thedailysound.com/News/040610floatopia
By ERIC LINDBERG — April 6, 2010

Law enforcement officials hope to sink plans to hold a massive beach party known as Floatopia this Saturday by closing access to beaches in Isla Vista.

With word circulating online that the gathering is scheduled for this weekend, county parks and university officials decided to shut down beach access to prevent a repeat of last year’s Floatopia, which saw an estimated 12,000 people take to the shoreline.

“We don’t do this lightly, but our concern for public safety and health and the environment just outweigh the people’s idea of having a good time for a day,” said Dan Hernandez, the county’s parks director.

Sheriff’s deputies will be stationed at access points to the beach throughout Isla Vista, while university officials will be patrolling access on campus. Anyone found on the beach this weekend will be subject to citation or arrest, authorities said.

“We’re doing this to prevent a public nuisance,” Hernandez said, calling last year’s event “uncontrolled chaos.”

In addition to citing 78 people for alcohol-related violations, sheriff’s deputies arrested 13 people for throwing bottles from the bluffs and other crimes last year. Two people were hospitalized after falling from the bluffs and another suffered a head injury from a thrown bottle.

Several dozen attendees received treatment for alcohol poisoning, cuts from broken bottles, and heat exposure — boosting the number of medical calls for that area to eight times above normal.

“I think we were very fortunate last year that we didn’t have someone become very seriously injured or even die,” said County Supervisor Doreen Farr, whose district includes Isla Vista. “When you mix that many people and alcohol with the ocean, it’s a recipe for disaster.”

In addition to the public safety risks, authorities said the event had a serious environmental impact. From broken glass, bottles, plastic and beer cans to abandoned rafts and floatation devices, the shoreline was strewn with garbage, sheriff’s officials said.

“Without restroom facilities, many attendees simply used the ocean, creating a large concentration of human waste that threatened sea life,” according to a sheriff’s news release, in which authorities also lamented the lack of security, medical support and liability insurance coverage.

Some UCSB students and community members responded by staging cleanup efforts in the days following the event, and others have formed online groups opposed to future efforts to hold the beach party.

The county wound up spending upwards of $20,000 last year to deal with intoxicated revelers and the environmental impacts of Floatopia, and officials said they expect costs would be significantly higher this year if the county provided the services needed for an event with more than 12,000 attendees.

“Every dollar that the county has to spend staffing up for fire and police and other emergency services is that much less money to help people in real need throughout the community,” Farr said.

She said the county is open to working with a responsible group that would sponsor an event like Floatopia and presumably apply for an alcohol permit — similar to the permits issued for the West Beach Music Festival in Santa Barbara.

Despite some interest from various individuals, Farr said nobody submitted a sufficient application outlining the resources and organization needed to stage such a large gathering.

“When the Facebook page first went up, we reached out to anybody in the community that seemed to be associated with it and said we would like to help you access the process so it can be a permitted event,” she said. “…This would be the same process if someone was planning a huge event at Lake Cachuma or anywhere else in the county.”

Although Floatopia first emerged in Isla Vista in 2004, it never attracted more than 1,000 people at a time — until last year. Authorities attributed the increase in attendance to invitations sent out through online social networking sites.

“It’s unfortunate, but this event is being pushed forward by individuals on Facebook who are saying, ‘Come on down, we can drink and party,’” Hernandez said. “It’s just not acceptable.”

In response to last year’s beach party, county leaders approved a ban on alcohol consumption along the beaches below Del Playa Drive — a move authorities said led to fewer alcohol-related incidents and less trash.