IT WAS THE SEVENTH TIME the issue had come before the Coastal Commission, and this time it was to be resolved. Were sunshelters and kiosks decked with advertisements the size of movie posters to be permitted on Los Angeles County beaches?

The question had been considered and reconsidered. Commission staff had worked with the permit applicant, the Los Angeles County Department of Beaches and Harbors, to craft a proposal that would meet the Coastal Act requirement that "scenic and visual qualities" of the coast be protected, and had finally recommended approval.
      If the Commission agreed, 22 tile-roofed sunshelters, much like city bus shelters, and 23 four-sided, six-foot-high "beach information directories," would stand along the County's 31 miles of beaches between San Pedro and Malibu. Each structure, built and maintained by corporate sponsors, would display four-by-six-foot ads on two panels. Ads would be sold by the sponsor for $1,320. The County would get 40 percent of the revenue plus an annual fee and use the income to operate the beaches and expand a program that brings needy children to the shore.
      The permit hearing was a bit after-the-fact: The County had all 22 of the sunshelters up and in use by 1994. Then it received notice from the Commission that its failure to obtain a permit violated the Coastal Act.
      Citizens stepped forward to speak passionately for and against. Beth Skiba, 79, of Redondo Beach, said: "My daughter is a cancer survivor. We walk daily. Sunshelters have added to our pleasure." Dr. Brent Weinberger, of Torrance, said he had stopped at a shelter to repair his bike chain, and had seen women with baby carriages stop at them to change diapers. Lt. Mike Cunningham of the County Fire Department, spokesman for the lifeguards, said the shelters functioned as landmarks to direct paramedics, and that they served a "public safety function." County Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke spoke of the children who would benefit from the revenues to be generated.
      To many others, however, these shelters and kiosks were primarily billboards. Jude McGee, of Santa Monica, expressed the prevailing sentiment: "We need the beaches as a refuge from advertising. On sunny days when the beach is full it's flying in the sky and trucks go by whose sole purpose is to pull billboards behind them. Isn't there one place you can look, one natural place for our eyes to give us rest from this ubiquitous advertising?"
      Among letters the Commission had received was one from Assemblywoman Debra Bowen, of Torrance/Marina del Rey, pointing out that "Los Angeles's beaches are a major economic resource, drawing tourists from around the world who pour millions of dollars into local businesses each year. People don't go to the beaches to soak up more advertising or to be bombarded by billboards."
      Ads and corporate logos already speckle these beaches, which attract 60 million visitors a year. They're on some 6,000 trash barrels, on benches and volleyball nets, on lifeguard towers and trucks. The County has actively marketed its beaches since the mid-1980s, generating more than $l,269,000 in cash and savings in 1996-97 alone, with sunshelter ads accounting for $200,000 of the total. (Most of the County's marketing program is beyond Commission jurisdiction, because it has not required any permanent structures to be built.)
      In the end the Commission rejected the sunshelters and kiosks by a resounding 10-2 vote and gave the County 120 days to remove what was already up. All are now gone, according to Dusty Brogan, head of the L.A. Beaches and Harbors marketing program.

"Where Do You Stop?"
THE DISCUSSION THAT preceded the Coastal Commission's vote raised issues that now trouble many other public agencies that manage natural resources, as well as public media, libraries, hospitals, and schools. All face pressures to generate revenues or meet some of their costs by tapping new sources. With "public/private partnerships" more and more popular, the word "marketing" has crept into discussions among public servants, and the line between government and the private sector has blurred. Some who are watching this trend are asking: Is this a healthy way for those charged with stewardship of public resources to go? How far is too far?

60 million consumers . . .
LA Beach sponsors and advertising opportunities.

      With its decision to reject the sunshelters and kiosks, the Coastal Commission drew a line in the sand. "There are a lot of ways to generate revenue," said Commissioner Penny Allen. "I'm not sure selling the asset is a way to do that . . . . You start selling the beach, where do you stop? . . . At some point you're not going to have a beach worth going to anymore."
      "Our beaches and forests are among the last refuges from the commercial world," said Commission chairman Rusty Areias. Commissioner David Potter reflected: "As transit commissioner in Monterey County I agreed to ads on bus shelters, and now I wish I hadn't. Now we're being barraged by large ads on the buses."
      "Commercialism creeps up slowly but it creeps up relentlessly," Mike Clark, executive director of the Greater Yellowstone Coalition, and Michael L. Fischer, president of the Yosemite Restoration Trust, wrote in a 1996 article arguing against a proposal to permit corporate sponsorship in national parks.
      Surveys show that most citizens cherish their parks as part of their heritage and want them preserved. But legislatures and taxpayers have lately been loath to provide necessary funds. The National Park Service has a maintenance backlog estimated at $4 billion; State Parks has one of $458 million. Rangers are overwhelmed as crowds of visitors grow and the infrastructure deteriorates. Some counties, after repeated tax cuts and voter rejection of revenue measures, are hard put to provide basic services such as police and fire protection, much less keep up with park needs.
      As a way out of this morass, government agencies have been looking more and more to private sources, especially corporations, to whom they can offer acknowledgment in exchange for financial support. San Francisco's Candlestick Park is now 3Com Park; San Diego State University has agreed to sell the name of its new multi-purpose indoor arena to Cox Communications; the new San Francisco Main Library has rooms named for Chevron and other contributors; the Washington Monument is to be restored with funds from a consortium that includes Target Stores.

What's "Appropriate"?
THE LEGISLATURE OPENED the door to corporate sponsorship of California state parks in 1994. It granted authority to the parks director to accept private, corporate, or business funds for the maintenance of any state park and authorized him to erect "an appropriate sign in recognition of the sponsorship." With Don Murphy as its director, the State Parks Department has been highly selective in pursuing entrepreneurial opportunities. It has chosen corporate partners who will be satisfied with minimal visible acknowledgment, such as having their names listed on a plaque in a visitors center along with donors of Pennies for Flowers and other contributors.
      To make sure that the need for financial support does not override dedication to its mission, the department last July published Donor & Sponsorship Recognition Guidelines, designed to help superintendents. "People don't want parks commercialized," said Vic Maris, assistant deputy director of the Office of Revenue Generation. "They come to parks because parks are sanctuaries. We're going very slow and being very careful about what we leave as a legacy."
      Murphy resigned in late 1997. A successor could have different standards. At one time, trash cans in state parks were decorated with ads for Coppertone suntan lotion. They disappeared after William Penn Mott became parks director in 1967.
      Public opinion can be a potent force on this issue. When a bill to permit corporate sponsorship of national parks was introduced in Congress in 1996, it was greeted with outrage. "We believe that this proposal, patterned in many ways after the sponsorship program for the Olympics, will lead to commercialization of America's unique and magnificent National Park System," the leaders of 21 conservation organizations declared.
      Opponents of that bill, which was dropped and has not been reintroduced, pointed out that there are other ways to raise money for parks. "One obvious source is the concessionaires - those companies that are allowed to operate hotels, restaurants, gift shops and other visitor services within the parks," noted Joshua S. Reichert, director of the environment program of the Pew Charitable Trusts. "Many concessions are highly profitable, yet pay very low fees."
      Corporations can support national and state parks and many wildlife areas through nonprofit organizations such as the Golden Gate National Park Association, the State Parks Foundation, and many others. Nearly every protected piece of public land now has an associated nonprofit organization, which can take care that no conflicts of interest arise between donors and public agencies, and that private and corporate support is acknowledged tastefully, discreetly, and without eroding the resource.
      The Los Angeles County Department of Beaches and Harbors is not alone in marketing California recreational resources to advertisers. The Department of Fish and Game has a contract with the Dodge Corporation, now in its third year, by which Dodge prints its hunting and fishing regulations, seven booklets with a total of 3.5 million copies, free of charge, saving the Department $300,000 a year. "That's a lot for this department," said Joan Prince, of the Conservation Education Office at Fish and Game. In exchange, Dodge has prime ad space on four pages of the regulations booklets, a two-page spread in the front of the department's magazine, Outdoor California, banners at hatcheries, posters displaying the company's name, and the right to have a truck present at important events, such as seasonal openings.
      "We gave away the whole store," lamented Bob Garrison, interpretive services coordinator. "Everybody is now trying to raise money, but we need to realize that what we provide has a very high value."
      The deal also caused headaches to staff and required unanticipated expenditures. When staff tried to bring a Dodge truck to the Sacramento State Fair, the fair said no: it had a deal with Ford. So the Dodge truck went to a Los Angeles event instead.
      "We're learning as we go," said Prince. "The advertising game is different from everything we've ever experienced."
      Do citizens want their public agencies to get into the "advertising game"? Some coastal communities, including Santa Monica and Manhattan Beach, have adopted Local Coastal Plans that exclude advertisements on beaches, but others admire Los Angeles County's successful marketing program and are seeking to emulate it. Dusty Brogan, at L.A. Beaches and Harbors, is working with Orange County and some local jurisdictions toward a joint powers agreement that would enable them to develop an effective marketing approach. "These [ad sales] were done to support sinking budgets," Brogan said. "But if done right, they can be more attractive than anything government can do." She said people enjoy and respond to "The Simpsons' " advice on a trash barrel ad: "Put it in the can, man."
      The most direct way to support parks and beaches is by providing public funds for them. This year citizens will have opportunities to do that by supporting appropriations and bond acts proposed by legislators and the governor.