I bet a lot of people on the island wonder what is legal when it comes to walking along a beach here on Orcas Island. I know that I’m always wondering what the correct thing to do is. During a joint book-signing event last Saturday at the Orcas Island Historical Museum, I happened to meet Judi Watson, who became very knowledgeable on this subject after having to deeply research these issues for her grandmother’s property, Terrill’s Beach.
I asked Judi some questions so that we could all learn what she learned…
1. Judi, is it true that low-tide property is public?
It depends on what state you live in. On the West Coast, I believe Oregon and California have completely different rules. As for Washington State, the main factor is whether your property was homesteaded before statehood, November 11, 1889, and whether or not the description on your deed states that the outermost boundary is the meander line. The US government meander line was called the General Land Office meander line, an average line along the extreme low tide line. Washington State surveyed their meander line along the mean low tide lines and refer to it as a Balanced Meander Line, for those homesteads after statehood, of course. For a period of time you could purchase tidelands from the state, the area from ordinary high water out to the Balanced Meander line. Here in this instance, the extreme low tidelands are public unless the extreme low tidelands were also purchased from the state and are recorded in their deed. If the property owner did not purchase these extreme low tidelands or were homesteaded after statehood, the tidelands still belong to the state and are public, if you can find public access to these waters across private property. Now tidelands are only leased by the state.
2. What happens if a property owner allows even one person the right to walk on their beach at low tide?
I am not happy how the courts have made case law the rules these days. It is hard to be friendly. If you give unlimited access to your beach, even your neighbors, you are granting unconditional usage to the public. You must grant permission. Deer trails to your beach, if left unattended, can be the beginning of a public path. To me personally, this is crazy; so I go out and start a friendly conversation with visitors, finding out where they are from and their interests in our beach. This acknowledgment of their presence is permission.
3. How can someone figure out if a person’s beach property is accessible to the public or not?
You can find out about homestead dates at the Orcas Island Historical Museum. Most public beach access is posted by the County. You can ask permission or get directions from a property owner. Just don’t assume all beaches are public, and respect the owners that do pay property taxes on their water. It’s been the more recent bad attitudes from visitors that have made the beach owners grumpy.
4. How did you come to find out this information?
Most of the information has been obtained through the court’s legal process and speaking with John Thalaker and Steven Ivey, the surveyors, both experts in their fields, land homesteads, and state tidelands.
5. Tell readers how your book, A Perilous Puzzle, came into being.
I started with a scrapbook for my seven generations of Terrill’s Beach family and decided that all of my original documents needed to be published somewhere, as they were too old to have been accurately recorded legal documents.
6. Where can people find your book?
A Perilous Puzzle is distributed by the Orcas Island Historical Museum as a donation to preserving history.
Thank you so much, Judi!!
You can also find this on the May 8th Sun Days column on theOrcasonian here.
