Battle over Calif. beach has gone on for decades

For those who have clung on to their property, it's not hard to see why.

Dwayne B. Smith, a lot owner in Seal Beach, bought his first Pacific Shores property in 1964. At the time, he was a 29-year-old rookie with the Los Angeles Fire Department living with his wife in rented house. He responded to an ad in the local paper and a sales representative came over, dazzling them with a slide show.

The young firefighter paid $20 a month out of his then $400 a month paycheck until he finally paid off the $5,000 price tag for the property.

"The vast majority of us were young couples with this dream of one day moving up to this beautiful part of California," he said.

Now 73 and living in a retirement community called Leisure World, Smith has yet to lay a single brick. As the years have passed, Smith has built all manner of homes in his mind, from a Kennedy-style complex for family vacations to a one-story ranch style home for retirement.

Had he been able to develop, Smith might have watched pelicans lumbering over crashing waves from his front porch and fished the lake a few steps from his back door.

Time has taken a toll on those who have remained. Smith and other graying members of the homeowners association still hold monthly meetings at a Los Angeles hotel to strategize. Many believe state and federal agencies are working together to allow Pacific Shores to flood to snap up lots on the cheap.

"It's like being between Malibu and Palos Verdes and being told your lot is worth $4,000," said Tom Resch, who heads the property owner's association.

Smith has filled a thick manila file with photocopied newspaper articles, maps and letters he's scribbled on. He tapes interviews and answers most questions about his development battles with a lengthy history about the subdivision. His frustration is palpable.

"It's like owning Florida swampland," he said. "You pay your taxes but the government won't allow you to do anything with it."

At times efforts to turn the situation around have gotten them into trouble.

After the Army Corps of Engineers stopped draining the lake, Smith and Resch were caught doing just that in 1995 and were fined $5,000 and put on 18 months probation. That year Smith fired off a series of letters pleading their case to the assistant secretary of the U.S. Interior Department and the secretary of defense.

"This letter is to inform you of an especially egregious and sinister situation," he wrote. "Federal agencies are conspiring with the United States military to sabotage the development of a 1,534 lot subdivision of homesites in Northern California."

Water district closed down in December
Holzworth and her handful of neighbors are now living on borrowed time.

After a decades-long standoff, state officials appear to be finally closing in, ousting squatters and buying back half of the lots. Local officials moved to dissolve the dues-collecting water district in December on the grounds that it never provided any water or septic services.

Many have sold their lots for about $5,000 a parcel to the Smith River Alliance, a nonprofit working with the state. The land will eventually be added to the nature preserve.

Defiant property owners remain among the only obstacles to completing the wildlife area. Dwayne Smith believes lot owners are being cheated, but when asked if he'd sell for a fair price and walk away after such a long ordeal, he hesitates.

Like tens of thousands of others still holding onto undevelopable parcels around the country, he isn't ready to let go of the dream.

"I have hopes of turning this around," he said. "What happened is we waited too long."

Last fall, Holzworth was visited by a state Fish and Game officer who told her the day is coming when she'll have to move. By law the only thing lot owners can do is pitch a tent for two weeks out of the year.

"There's always people hassling you," Holzworth said. "You get hassled a lot here."

She told the officer she had a legal lease — and has for a decade.

She tried to hold her ground but wobbled a bit in her hip replacement brace, her bare feet unsteady on the shifting sands.

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