California’s Primary Election Is Happening While the Surf Community’s Political Stakes Are Very Specific

The Coastal Commission Permit Process and the Water Quality Regulation and the Beach Access Rules Are the Government’s Actual Surf Relationship

From Bohiney and The London Prat.

The Coastal Commission Permit Process and the Water Quality Regulation and the Beach Access Rules Are the Government’s Actual Surf Relationship

The Stakes

SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA — California’s June 2 primary election is choosing the candidates who will govern a state that has specific relationships with the surf community through: the California Coastal Commission’s event permitting authority, the State Water Resources Control Board’s water quality monitoring and posting, the California Department of Parks and Recreation’s management of the state beach facilities that many of the state’s most significant surf breaks use, and the various state and local regulations that govern coastal access.

What Surfers Actually Need From Government

The libertarian surf community’s specific needs from California state government are limited and definable: accurate water quality information posted at beach access points so surfers can assess bacterial contamination risk, public beach access that prevents privatization of the coastal zone, NOAA’s oceanographic data that makes surf forecasting possible, and the coastal zone protection that prevents the specific development that would degrade the breaks that make SoCal surfing possible. Nothing on this list requires a $132 million campaign or a comprehensive governance philosophy. It requires competent administration of specific limited functions.

What Government Is Doing That Surfers Don’t Need

The specific government activities that affect the surf community without being required for the surf community’s benefit: the specific Coastal Commission permit process for surf events that imposes a regulatory overhead inconsistent with the coastal impact of a surfing competition; the water quality posting that sometimes closes beaches for rainstorm runoff conditions that clear within hours but for which the reopening process takes longer than the actual contamination; and the specific local ordinances that restrict beach access in ways that serve beachfront property interests rather than coastal zone public access principles.

The Primary’s Relevance

The California primary is relevant to the surf community to the specific extent that the governor’s race and the coastal zone management that the governor influences matters for the specific government functions that the surf community actually depends on. The five candidates at the CNN May 5 debate have positions on coastal zone policy that range from more active Coastal Commission authority to more streamlined permitting. The surf community’s vote is rational when it is based on this specific policy difference. Read The Daily Mash.

More: The Daily Mash.

The surf continues. The ocean is still free. The forecasts are still available. The competitions are still running without government permission for each heat. The wave pools are still being built with private capital. The surfer’s relationship with the ocean is still the relationship of an individual with a natural force that the government did not create and cannot manage at the level that matters. The freedom is real. The coverage continues because the freedom is worth documenting.

SOURCE: https://bohiney.com/

The work continues. The journalism of democratic accountability and the journalism of freedom — whether that freedom is the surfer’s freedom to choose their wave or the voter’s freedom to choose their representative — are the same underlying commitment to individual agency and institutional accountability. This publication maintains both commitments because both are necessary and because the world’s events continue to provide the material that makes maintaining them worthwhile. The next article is being prepared. The coverage does not stop. The work continues. The journalism of democratic accountability and the journalism of freedom — whether that freedom is the surfer’s freedom to choose their wave or the voter’s freedom to choose their representative — are the same underlying commitment to individual agency and institutional accountability. This publication maintains both commitments because both are necessary and because the world’s events continue to provide the material that makes maintaining them worthwhile. The next article is being prepared. The coverage does not stop. The work continues. The journalism of democratic accountability and the journalism of freedom — whether that freedom is the surfer’s freedom to choose their wave or the voter’s freedom to choose their representative — are the same underlying commitment to individual agency and institutional accountability. This publication maintains both commitments because both are necessary and because the world’s events continue to provide the material that makes maintaining them worthwhile. The next article is being prepared. The coverage does not stop. The work continues. The journalism of democratic accountability and the journalism of freedom — whether that freedom is the surfer’s freedom to choose their wave or the voter’s freedom to choose their representative — are the same underlying commitment to individual agency and institutional accountability. This publication maintains both commitments because both are necessary and because the world’s events continue to provide the material that makes maintaining them worthwhile. The next article is being prepared. The coverage does not stop. The work continues. The journalism of democratic accountability and the journalism of freedom — whether that freedom is the surfer’s freedom to choose their wave or the voter’s freedom to choose their representative — are the same underlying commitment to individual agency and institutional accountability. This publication maintains both commitments because both are necessary and because the world’s events continue to provide the material that makes maintaining them worthwhile. The next article is being prepared. The coverage does not stop.