STAFF REPORT
Meeting Date:
October 14, 2025
BUSINESS
19 SUBJECT: SUMMER 2025 OPERATIONAL WRAP-UP AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR 2026
RECOMMENDATION: It is recommended that the City Council:
1. Receive and file the Summer 2025 Wrap-Up Report and Recommendations for 2026;
2. Provide direction to Mayor pro Tem Orgill and Council Member Kempf and to staff on whether to further evaluate or return with proposals related to the potential Municipal Code amendments, operational changes, or programmatic suggestions outlined in the report;
3. Provide additional guidance regarding preparation for Summer 2026; and
4. Find that this action is not subject to the California Environmental Quality Act pursuant to Section 15378(b)(5) of the CEQA Guidelines.
SUMMARY OF THE MATTER
In the months after a busy, visitor-heavy summer in 2024, the City heard a lot from residents and businesses about some of the adverse impacts of tourism, including excessive violations of our municipal code, impacts to ocean resources, trash, parking problems, traffic and much more. In advance of Summer 2025, the City Council formed an Ad Hoc Committee on Stewardship (“stewardship” being a different concept in destination information that tries to educate visitors as to the sensitivity of an area’s cultural, historic, and environmental resources). Mayor pro Tem Orgill and Council Member Kempf serve as the Ad Hoc Committee members.
The Committee and City staff worked on efforts for Summer 2025 that included:
1. More targeted enforcement of Municipal Code violations (such as parking violations, smoking on the beach, trash left on the beach, blocking public safety members’ views of the beach, alcohol on the beach, loud vehicle exhaust, and more) by the PD team, including sworn officers, Parking Control officers, Animal Control officers, and Park Rangers.
2. Adding to the Park Ranger corps – two positions were added in FY 25-26.
3. Adding trash cans to beaches and beach entries.
4. Staying nimble and adjusting the pacing of trash pickup at Main Beach, Aliso Beach, the downtown, and at other beaches.
5. Placing portable restrooms in South Laguna.
SUMMER 2025 OPERATIONAL WRAP-UP AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR 2026 October 14, 2025
6. A pilot project that installed temporary signage – in this case, at Woods Cove – to improve awareness of commonly-violated code provisions.
How did we do? This staff report attempts to answer that. The report also outlines potential Municipal Code amendments, operational adjustments, and stewardship strategies for future Council consideration.
While no immediate fiscal impact is associated with receiving this report, future actions stemming from its recommendations may require separate City Council review and budget allocation.
Any future recommendations may result in funding needs, which would be brought forward separately.
This action is not subject to CEQA, as it constitutes an informational update and general administrative direction without any commitment to a physical project (CEQA Guidelines Section 15378(b)(5)).
DISCUSSION
Following community concerns in Summer 2024 about the impacts of increased tourism on public safety, environmental resources, and code compliance, the City Council formed an Ad Hoc Committee on Stewardship. This committee worked closely with City staff to implement targeted initiatives during Summer 2025. Below is a department-by-department summary of those efforts and their outcomes.
A. Public Works & Utilities
The Public Works Department expanded its maintenance operations in response to anticipated high summer demand. Enhancements were implemented across trash collection, restroom servicing, pressure washing, and beach grooming. These changes helped maintain cleanliness and responsiveness in high-traffic public spaces. The table below outlines these service enhancements compared to off-season levels:
Table 1. Public Works Summer 2025 Enhancements
Service Area Summer Frequency Off-Season Frequency % Increase / Notes Main Beach Grooming 4–5 times per week 2 times per week 100–150% increase Day Porters (Downtown, Main,
Heisler) 2 per shift 1 per shift Doubled staffing per shift Trash/Recycling Bins (South
Laguna) 232 bins 143 bins +62% more bins
Trash Collection Frequency 3 times per day Once daily Tripled frequency Sidewalk Pressure Washing
(Downtown) 4 times per week Twice per week Doubled frequency Looking Ahead to 2026: Although demand for maintenance services remains consistently high during the summer season, the City Council could consider increasing contracted day porter staffing at high-use areas to further enhance service levels. Currently, downtown Laguna Beach, Main Beach, and Heisler Park are served by two day porters per shift. To better meet demand, the City Council may wish to consider increasing this to four per shift, assigning one dedicated day porter each to downtown and Main Beach, and two porters to serve Heisler Park. Additional day porters could also be deployed at Aliso Beach Park and along the South Laguna beaches, including West Street, Table Rock, Thousand Steps, and Totuava, to support trash collection, restroom maintenance, and overall site cleanliness during peak visitation periods.
SUMMER 2025 OPERATIONAL WRAP-UP AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR 2026 October 14, 2025
Also, staff is evaluating types of trash receptacles to better prevent spillover, seagull nuisance issues, and to provide better source separation to meet recycling and diversion goals.
B. Police Department
The Police Department significantly increased its enforcement presence in Summer 2025, responding to a broad range of municipal code violations. The following table summarizes year-over-year trends since 2023:
Table 2. Police Department Summer Activity Comparison (2023–2025) Category 2023 2024 2025 % Change (2024 to 25)
All Calls for Service 13,795 15,820 17,781 +12.4%
Citations 1,859 2,354 3,329 +41.4%
Parking Citations 8,159 7,197 8,526 +18.5%
Felony Arrests 72 78 65 -16.7%
Misdemeanor Arrests 269 299 269 -10%
Reports 906 1,031 1,169 +13.4%
While Summer 2025 remained operationally demanding, officers and support personnel reported a generally calmer environment compared to Summer 2024. Several contributing factors were noted anecdotally, including cooler coastal weather patterns, clearer signage, and increased coordination across enforcement teams. Despite a rise in calls for service and citations, fewer confrontational or disorderly incidents were reported, suggesting that enhanced presence and public awareness may have had a “deterrent” effect.
Looking Ahead to 2026: The City Council could consider whether to sustain or adjust enforcement staffing levels based on anticipated crowd sizes and ongoing compliance trends. Additional focus areas for 2026 may include:
• Continuing to reduce repeat violations through signage, visibility, and social media education. • Evaluating potential deployment of mobile response units or foot patrols in high-volume areas. • Strengthening interdepartmental coordination between Police, Marine Safety, and Park Rangers.
It may be important to consider improving supervision and promotional avenues in the Park Ranger Program (without adding new staff). Converting two ranger positions to senior ranger positions, along with designating the two senior positions and two non-senior positions as Homeless Liaison Rangers, might make sense as we focus on homelessness services in a post Grants Pass environment.
Our experience has shown that our feedback-based approach successfully maintains a strong enforcement presence while balancing community expectations and resource availability.
C. Marine Safety
SUMMER 2025 OPERATIONAL WRAP-UP AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR 2026 October 14, 2025
The Marine Safety Department reported an increase in rescues during Summer 2025 compared to previous years, while other key statistics declined. This trend suggests increased visitor activity in the water, offset by successful preventative outreach and safety education efforts. The table below presents a year-over-year comparison of key operational metrics:
Table 3. Marine Safety Activity – Memorial Day to Labor Day (2023–2025)* Category 2023 2024 2025 % Change (2024-25)
Rescues 6,613 9,618 10,329 +7.4%
Medical Aids 5,991 6,741 5,617 -16.7%
Ordinance Advisement 157,957 150,569 118,096 -21.6%
Preventative Actions 349,876 432,518 390,133 -9.8%
*The City assumed operations in South Laguna on March 1, 2023.
In addition to its core lifeguard and rescue functions, the Marine Safety Department expanded its public education and outreach efforts in Summer 2025. While the City offers tidepool and ocean safety talks at Main Beach, participation by non-local schools is often limited by transportation logistics. To broaden access, staff launched an inland outreach initiative targeting nearby school districts.
Marine Safety personnel visited schools in Aliso Viejo, Laguna Hills, Mission Viejo, and San Juan Capistrano, engaging over 1,000 students in presentations focused on:
• Recognizing ocean hazards and rip currents;
• Practicing safe behavior in and around the ocean;
• Understanding how to protect sensitive marine environments.
This initiative helped increase awareness among student visitors and likely contributed to declines in ordinance advisements and medical aid calls. Enhanced education, coupled with consistent staffing and proactive enforcement, supported a safer beach environment for both residents and visitors.
Looking Ahead to 2026: Marine Safety will continue to prioritize community education and operational readiness. Key goals for the upcoming season include:
• Expanding the Junior Lifeguard Program, with a particular focus on adding sessions in South Laguna to accommodate increased beach activity in those areas • Sustaining and growing pre-season school outreach, including in-person presentations and digital materials to reach a broader student audience;
• Increasing the number of trained Wave Watch rescue vessel operators, to enable consistent summer deployment of this program, weather permitting;
• Enhancing coastal observation infrastructure by identifying new locations for cameras in highuse or high-risk areas, enabling real-time monitoring to improve incident response and resource allocation.
SUMMER 2025 OPERATIONAL WRAP-UP AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR 2026 October 14, 2025
These efforts will help foster a culture of safety, environmental stewardship, and preparedness throughout the summer season.
D. City Manager / Public Information
In addition to working with the Ad Hoc Committee on Stewardship, we put out more targeted information via advertisements and social media, providing information about beach behavior, parking, and our municipal code. Using Google Ads’ social media programming, we targeted the Orange County region Monday through Thursday with stewardship ads and “don’t do this” ads. Friday through Sunday, the same ads were geofenced to anyone using social media while here in town.
We also prepared and distributed six key videos about beach issues in advance of Summer. Subjects included stewardship generally, beach safety, tidepool protection, our obligations under the Coastal Act, and more.
Looking Ahead to 2026. We’ll likely continue to refine the messages and delivery of our paid social media work. We hope to work in close collaboration in messaging with Visit Laguna Beach’s updated stewardship effort.
E. Community Services and Transit
The City continued its long-standing efforts to reduce vehicle congestion by promoting the use of public transit during the peak summer season. The Laguna Beach trolley program, first introduced in 2002 and expanded to year-round service in 2015, marked its 10th full year of continuous operation in 2025. This summer, the system recorded over 282,000 boardings on its primary routes, while an additional 34,263 riders used the Summer Breeze park-and-ride service from Irvine. The ridership trends for the past several years are summarized in the table below.
Table 4. Trolley Program Ridership by Route (2019-2025) Year Canyon Coastal Summer Breeze Total
2019 142,753 276,432 10,846 430,031
2021 104,651 209,874 8,825 323,350
2022 115,461 244,721 17,248 377,430
2023 116,781 208,880 18,509 344,170
2024 118,586 186,584 23,486 328,656
2025* 118,532 163,931 34,263 316,726
*Boardings recorded through August 31, 2025.
Looking Ahead to 2026:
To further reduce traffic congestion and improve visitor access, the City Council could consider strategies to increase trolley ridership and streamline service delivery. While overall boardings saw a modest decline in 2025, the 46% increase in Summer Breeze ridership suggests growing public interest in convenient parkand-ride options. For Summer 2026, staff may evaluate potential adjustments to route frequency, service hours, or promotional efforts to boost use of underutilized routes, or eliminate underutilized routes.
Continued collaboration with regional partners, including OCTA and the City of Irvine, could also enhance SUMMER 2025 OPERATIONAL WRAP-UP AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR 2026 October 14, 2025
outreach and rider incentives. Additionally, data collection improvements, such as mobile ridership tracking or real-time service updates, will help refine transit planning and responsiveness.
F. POSSIBLE MUNI CODE AND OTHER CHANGES FOR 2026
• Parking Enforcement. Parking spaces and parking enforcement seem to be a recurrent concern, and rightfully so. As a reminder, our parking enforcement officers both issue tickets and address critical other needs, such as accident reports and investigations, cars that are blocking residents’ driveways, or that have exceeded the 72-hour time limit. Other cities that have city charters are able to have private sector parking enforcement (where the contracted staff only issues tickets), but Laguna Beach, as a general law city, is likely required to have a city employee be the person who places a ticket on a windshield.
In the spirit of effectiveness and cost savings, asking the voters to consider becoming a Charter City in November 2026 may make some sense here.
• Parking Rates/Paid Parking Locations. Assuming all goes well, the City will be implementing new parking rates for 2026, including assuming success in issuing a Coastal Development Permit (CDP) to do so. A similar CDP is likely to include requiring payment to park at more locations in South Laguna, consistent with a conversation with the community and Council in August/September of 2025.
• Signage. The pilot custom signage program for Woods Cove should be expanded to other key beach areas.
• Those #$%@# Fake Rose Petals. They’re clearly litter – but maybe folks are not aware that they are litter and don’t decompose. They’re (often) not picked up, and leave multiple pieces of plastic in or adjacent to the ocean ecosystem. While any permitted wedding ceremony agrees to not have loose petals of any kind for their ceremony as part of the application process, enforcement is challenging – and several ceremonies (engagements, photo shoots) don’t always go through the permitting process. Should we further ban fake rose petals? Educate more about how harmful they can be? Both?
• Canopies. As beaches get busier, and sometimes as sandy space is limited, Council may wish to consider changing our somewhat outdated code involving canopies. The current code says that no canopies can be larger than 6’ by 6’ by 6’ – yet most visitors don’t know this, and many canopy vendors sell mostly 10’ by 10’ by 10’.
It is tough on Park Patrol to tell a friendly beachgoing family that their canopy is too large (though a 10’ by 10’ by 10’ can be walked in and lowered to become a 6’ by 6’ by 6’). Remember that the main purpose of this regulation is to allow Marine Safety and other officials to have clear views of the water for swimmer and wader safety.
SUMMER 2025 OPERATIONAL WRAP-UP AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR 2026 October 14, 2025
The council may wish to consider whether the canopy size limitation should be change to reflect the market – but also that canopies larger in size only be allowed on certain beaches such as Main Beach where generally dry sand is more available. At other beaches, shade structures could be limited to umbrellas.
• Hours. Council may wish to discuss different options for some of our more secluded coves where beachgoer safety can be compromised by isolation and darkness. This would have to be in consultation with the California Coastal Commission to ensure that wet sand beach access is not constrained. A working tool to assist in this might be drones to be able to determine if someone is not where they should be after certain hours.
• Volunteers. Other ideas include having volunteer community members at the top of busy beach steps to advise beachgoers as to limitations on drinking, smoking, or shade structures and the location of restrooms. While this has been suggested to us from community members, we certainly don't want to put a community volunteer in an unsafe situation should tempers escalate. • Stewardship. As noted, we expect the new team at Visit Laguna Beach to be on board with more changes to stewardship marketing – with plans to be discussed soon. These could involve cultural, heritage, and environmental activities and messaging to complement the City’s work.
Summary Outlook for Summer 2026
As Laguna Beach continues to experience high levels of summer visitors, maintaining service quality, public safety, and environmental stewardship remains a top priority. This report outlines a range of preliminary ideas for Summer 2026, including potential increases in staffing, targeted outreach, expanded public education, improved observation infrastructure, and refined transit operations. Staff welcomes Council input on which initiatives to explore further, with the goal of balancing community expectations, visitor experience, and operational feasibility in the upcoming budget and planning cycles.
FINANCIAL ANALYSIS
There is no direct fiscal impact associated with receiving and filing this report. The actions described herein, including enhanced summer operations, public education efforts, enforcement activity, and transit services, were funded through previously approved departmental budgets for FY 2024–25 and FY 2025–26. Should the City Council wish to pursue any of the potential code amendments, staffing changes, or capital investments discussed for Summer 2026, separate staff reports and fiscal analyses will be brought forward for consideration at a future date.
ENVIRONMENTAL ANALYSIS
The proposed action is not a project under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) pursuant to CEQA Guidelines Section 15378(b)(5), as it involves an administrative activity of government that does not result in a direct or indirect physical change in the environment.
ATTACHMENTS
None
SUMMER 2025 OPERATIONAL WRAP-UP AND RECOMMENDATIONS FOR 2026 October 14, 2025
Submitted By: . Approved: .David A Kiff
Dave Kiff, City Manager Dave Kiff, City Manager
Report Prepared By: Coordinated With:
Mark Orgill, Mayor pro Tem
Sue Kempf, Council Member
Dave Kiff, City Manager
Mark McAvoy, Director of Public Works & Utilities
Jeff Calvert, Police Chief
Alexis Braun, Acting Director of Transit and
Community Services
Kai Bond, Marine Safety Chief
Megan Garibaldi, City Attorney