After months of back-and-forth communication between UC San Diego and the California Coastal Commission, a hearing appears to be on the horizon to address the university’s plan to continue keeping the Scripps Coastal Reserve closed to the public most of the time.

UCSD — which administers the scenic property adjacent to the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla — recently filed a response to the latest series of questions from the commission regarding the ongoing closure. Commission staff is reviewing the response with plans to schedule a public hearing on the proposal.

Andrew Willis, enforcement staff counsel for the commission, told the La Jolla Light this week that while it is possible reviewers might have more questions, “I think it’s more likely that we’ll file the application as complete.”

Should that happen, “we will schedule the application for a hearing,” Willis said.

There is not yet a specific time frame for that. The Coastal Commission meets monthly, and a Scripps Coastal Reserve hearing is not on its July agenda.

The reserve encompasses nearly 1,000 acres, including an upland area called the “Knoll” or “Cliffs” and the shoreline and Marine Protected Area below the cliffs. It can be viewed from a half-mile loop trail along what is known as the Mesa across the top of the reserve.

The property has been mostly closed to the public since the beginning of COVID-19 pandemic restrictions in March 2020. It was partially reopened in January 2022 for volunteer maintenance from 8 to 10 a.m. Fridays and a docent-led tour that is offered from 9 to 11 a.m. the first Saturday of each month.

Before the restrictions, the reserve was open from 7 a.m. to sunset daily. Now its gate is locked unless tours are being given or the reserve is being used by UCSD students.

The California Coastal Act requires a coastal development permit for a change of access to a coastal site, and several local residents have accused the university of violating that law by continuing to limit public access after statewide pandemic restrictions were lifted and not applying for a permit until January this year.

UCSD filed its permit application with the Coastal Commission with a twofold request: continued “managed access” to the site and retroactive approval for the gate.

The application says the limited-access approach is used across the University of California Natural Reserve System and is “proven to better protect biological and cultural resources while balancing the need for research and education programs.”

The university added that the access restriction better protects public safety “due to the unsafe cliff beach access.”

After receiving the application, the Coastal Commission in March sent UCSD a five-page response including questions and requests for more information. Commission staff stated at the time that while it generally supports efforts to balance protection of the site with public access, it also supports exploration of alternatives to what UCSD is proposing.

UCSD responded to the questions in April, but commission coastal planner Stephanie Leach sent back a letter in May saying the staff had several follow-up requests for more information.

Among them, staff asked for proof of outreach to any property owners where development is proposed, more about the history of the gate at the site, a date or period of time when a trail was abandoned and clarification on when docent-led tours of the reserve began and the area they cover.

Commission staff also said UCSD’s information about geological instability and biological resources at the site was insufficient, and it wanted to know more about coordination with local Indigenous tribes.

The university’s most recent response was submitted this month. A copy was not immediately available.

An administrative post on the Scripps Coastal Reserve’s Facebook page last year said visitors’ misuse of the area was the primary reason for the closure.

During previous “unsupervised public access,” the post stated, “native plants and animals were routinely disturbed and displaced, instruments could not be left to operate unattended, natural processes were disrupted and resources were routinely damaged.”

“We learned during the pandemic how much better we needed to manage this land for the purpose of fulfilling our mandate not only as a program of the University of California but also specifically as a state of California trustee agency,” the post said.

In September, the La Jolla Shores Association board voted unanimously to send a letter to UCSD and the Coastal Commission expressing “strong opposition” to the limits and requesting that the daily public access that was in effect before the pandemic “be restored immediately.” ♦