Carpinteria Committee Floats Idea of Closing Harbor Seal Rookery for Three Years

Seal Advisory Committee to Vote on Recommendations to City Council at Final Meeting This Thursday

A three-year closure of Carpinteria’s rookery is just one of many ideas the city’s Ad Hoc Harbor Seal Advisory Committee has been toying with to address the problem of declining seal populations. | Credit: City of Carpinteria

The Harbor Seal Rookery, a mecca for Carpinteria residents and tourists, has seen a decline in seal populations in the past several years. Whether that’s primarily due to climate change, food scarcity, sonic booms, or walking dogs on the beach is hard to say for certain.

Still, the data working group for the city’s Ad Hoc Harbor Seal Advisory Committee thinks that, whatever the cause, this observed decline is significant enough to warrant a three-year closure of the rookery.

Public disturbances, such as loud noises and dogs, are sufficiently suspect to suggest a beach closure may help boost seal numbers, the data working group proposed during the committee’s November 21 meeting.

Right now, it’s just a suggestion, based on reports from the volunteer group Carpinteria Seal Watch, who stand on the bluffs to monitor and count seals. The group observed that seal populations appeared to decrease from about 365 seals in 2004 to 158 in 2023.

However, when the suggestion of a beach closure was first reported by Noozhawk, city officials clarified that nothing is even close to being set in stone.

The committee had not formally agreed upon recommending a beach closure as of their November 21 meeting, and nothing has been presented to the City Council.

According to Jeanette Gant, the city’s director of Parks and Recreation, the committee was created about two or so years ago, in response to volunteers from the Seal Watch group repeatedly coming to council meetings to highlight concerns over the disappearing seals.

After collecting data on the recent decline in adult seals and seal pups — and associating that with human disturbances, such as dogs running off leash — the committee’s data working group initially wanted a seven-year beach closure, but decided three years may be an easier sell.

But a closure is just one of many ideas the committee has been toying with to address the problem — alongside a full-time park ranger (a costly option the city likely can’t afford), wildlife viewing cameras, and updated signage, to name a few.

The group began drafting this list of recommendations in April, with the committee set to sunset this Thursday.

During this last meeting, the nine-member committee — including five members of the public, two councilmembers, and two alternate members — will finalize and vote on their list of recommendations to present to the City Council, who may or may not accept them.

If — emphasis on “if” — the City Council were to pull the thread on a beach closure, Grant said, they would have to go through an extensive process to gain permission from the California Coastal Commission, which would be the deciding body on the matter.

Additionally, as of now, the city already closes the beach annually during pupping season, when harbor seals raise their young, which lasts from December 1 through May 31. A 1,500-foot section of Carpinteria coastline is closed during this time to protect the seals.

People can still sneak peeks at the seals from the overlook on the bluffs. But the beach is closed off, stretching from the base of Chevron Pier, extending east and west with signs on each end of the beach in English and Spanish warning people to stay away.

And stay away they should — touching, disturbing, or feeding harbor seals is illegal under the Marine Mammal Protection Act and carries penalties of up to $100,000 fine and imprisonment.

The committee’s data working group wants that same stretch of beach to be closed year-round for three years. But, again, there would be numerous hoops to jump through to get there, if the committee does decide to include the recommendation in their finalized list for the City Council.

“From what I have witnessed at these meetings thus far, the committee hasn’t had a 100 percent consensus on it,” Grant said. “I would say there are more of the public members who are in support of the closure, but not all of the committee is in support of it…. We’ll see how Thursday goes.”