Stairways to Heaven

Illustration by Bob AulA man could get killed going to the beach. In south Laguna, there are six county-owned stairways to the beach, and two of them—the two south of Camel's Point—are deadlier than the bacteria levels in the water off Huntington Beach.

Reaching the beach means risking your life—unless you're the Human Fly or Sir Edmund Hillary. Would it kill the county to put up some handrails? I don't think so.

A woman in Supervisor Tom Wilson's office told me three years ago that Wilson had walked both stairways and agreed they needed fixing. So why haven't they been fixed?

Maybe it's because, as the county director of harbors and beaches told me, the county doesn't want to lose the historic and rustic appeal of these two pathways. He suggests people use the Camel's Point Drive entrance to the beach.

But if "historic" and "rustic" mean tumbling ass over teakettle, maybe we could use a little less of both. It's about time the county stops limiting access to one of its most precious resources and fixes those two stairways.

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