Move over, Marina del Rey. SLO County harbor commissioner had big dreams for local port
Port San Luis, among other locations, has been suggested as a potential area for staging and support for the construction of wind power generation.
Gerard L. Parsons would have approved: He was one of the biggest advocates for expanding the port, serving as Port San Luis Harbor Commissioner for 31 years. He died Sept 9, 2016, at the age of 98.
Here is a biography published Feb. 1, 1984 written by Carol Roberts, edited for length.
Harbor district founder dreams of busy port
Gerard L. Parsons doesn’t understand people who say they don’t want another Marina del Rey at Port San Luis.
“The busier, the better” has been his motto for the quiet bay near Avila Beach ever since he helped organize the Port San Luis Harbor District in the late 1950s.
But Parsons’ dream for a bigger harbor has been stifled through the years by fellow Harbor Board members, the Coastal Commission and constituents who don’t want offshore oil crew boats to operate there.
He’s been the only commissioner to support oil and other industry at Port San Luis, which currently is geared toward recreational and commercial fishing.
The latest issue, an initiative petition circulated by those who don’t want the crew boats at Avila, helped make Parsons more vocal about an idea he had more than a year ago.
That was to get the oil companies to join with the Harbor District and build a port at the mouth of the Santa Maria River.
Parsons is the Harbor Board’s veteran member, logging 26 years on the panel that governs concessions, boat moorings and policies at Port San Luis.
Parsons loves to talk about boats.
His words come in rapid bursts about that subject — and most other — too fast sometimes for a reporter to write down.
Born in a house at the corner of Marsh and Nipomo streets in San Luis Obispo, he had a small sailboat when he was 16 and raced it at Morro Bay. He was a charter member of the San Luis Yacht Club.
He graduated to a larger “motor-sailer” just before he entered the Navy.
“I’ve always wanted to invest in a larger boat,” he said recently. “But I wanted more protected boat slips at Port San Luis first. That’s why I’ve pushed for boat slips, not just moorings, and a southern breakwater. I’d like to see another Marina del Rey”
Parsons, who grew up working in his father’s lumber mill, was a carpenter’s mate in the Navy. He lived aboard an LST (landing ship tank) for two years. “We built a wooden house onboard and sub-chasers and mine sweepers, which were mostly wooden, would pull up alongside for repairs.”
His Navy travels took him to Tunisia, Algeria and Spain.
Since then, the 66-year-old harbor enthusiast has traveled around the United States, to Europe, the Caribbean, South America, Hawaii, Switzerland, Greece, Turkey and Israel.
But when he got out of the Navy, he and his now estranged wife, Frances, struggled like other young couples.
“We were starting our family — a daughter Lori and a son Bruce — and had to pay some of our creditors $10 a month.”
He has always worked at his father’s business, San Luis Mill and Lumber Co., which he now owns with his brother Roy. They have a sister, Adele.
His father, Lee R. Parsons, was born in Adelaide, the son of A.F. Parsons, who was county surveyor. His mother, Iva Brumley, was a well-known artist and the grandchild of Chester Brumlely, the first settler on the Carrisa Plains.
“I’m a seventh-generation Californian, derived from Jose Francisco de Ortega who was a guide of Father Serra,” he boasted.
Parsons also has other hobbies, woodworking for example.
He likes to help people renovate Victorian homes and can match the original molding. “I enjoy my work at the mill. Every day is a challenge, even after 50 years.”
Parsons said the most fulfilling part of being a millman is duplicating ornate moldings long out of stock. it’s a tricky process.
“Knives must be ground and machines have to be set up for the special moldings,” said Parsons, claiming his is the only “full mill” between Salinas and Santa Barbara.
Parsons built the new Douglas fir conference table that harbor commissioners use in the new harbor office building.
To avoid a possible conflict of interest, Parsons said he bought the materials for the table at Pacific Home Improvement Center and then “donated the labor.”
The original harbor office and restrooms were built with a state Wildlife Commission grant. Before that commissioners met in the Pismo Beach elementary school building, which is now Pismo Beach City Hall.
Parsons also likes antique cars and helped form the San Luis Obispo Antique Car Club.
Parsons, however, has never seemed embarrassed about speaking his mind, no matter how controversial the issue.
At times he was the only Harbor Commission supporter of Union Oil Co. at the firm went through hearings toward rebuilding its storm collapsed pier in Port San Luis Harbor.’
He also has been vocal in his opinion that crew boats should operate off that pier rather than Harford Pier to the north.
His latest proposal, a multi-use harbor on the San Luis Obispo County side of the Santa Maria River, is perhaps his most grandiose idea.
He said the Port San Luis Harbor District could govern tidelands from Diablo Canyon to the Santa Maria River.
“We’d have to lease or get a state grant of the southern tidelands like we did for San Luis Bay,” he said.
Parsons wants a bustling harbor at the river mouth. “That should satisfy those who don’t want to see one at Avila and still get the district off the tax rolls,” he said.
“Port Hueneme made a $1 million in profits last year with its banana and oil boats. There’s no reason the Port San Luis Harbor District can’t do the same.”
