No more Night diving at BH!

[RonFrank]

In November, we were doing some night dives, and the police came by and told us that the park closes at 5:00, and that night diving was no longer allowed! We went over to the sign at the entrance, and sure enough, a "board" was nailed up over the "old" hours, and the "new" hours say the park closes at 5pm.
This happened at about 8pm, after 2 night dives. We just went over to Josephs and had fun.

This sucks, and we need to attempt to do something about this. I drive 800 miles to dive this place, and I do so often. When I arrive, I expect to get a night dive in even if that is at 10:00pm!

From a larger perspective, many LDS's go to BH specifically to do night diving specialties, and AOW that includes a night dive.

Who can we talk to about this? We need to take some action. Santa Rose needs to realize that closing the park at 5:00pm is NOT acceptable!

Thoughts folks?

 

[amascuba]

I just went to santarosanm.org and downloaded their permit form and got a couple email addresses from it. Here is the email that I just sent off.

Subject:   	Blue Hole hours.
From:   	"James Williams" <semper_at_securitygeek.net>
Date:   	Tue, December 18, 2007 1:04 pm
To:   	         dpacheco_at_srnm.org
                  rdelgado_at_srnm.org

To whom it may concern,

I was recently told that the City of Santa Rosa changed the business hours
for the Blue Hole and is now closing the park at 5PM MST. Is this true? If
so, may I ask why the hours were changed?

Thank you,

James Williams

 

[georoc01]

Thanks James, Please let us know what you here back (if anything!).

 

[amascuba]

I just got a return email from The City of Santa Rosa. It appears that there was some mis-communication on the part of the Police Officer.

Subject:   	Re: Blue Hole hours.
From:   	"Richard Delgado" <rdelgado_at_srnm.org>
Date:   	Tue, December 18, 2007 2:37 pm
To:   	"James Williams" <semper_at_securitygeek.net>
Cc:   	tdodge_at_srnm.org
          szamora_at_srnm.org

James, 
This is Richard Delgado with the City of Santa Rosa, you can contact me at this
email if you have any further questions or concerns or call my office at 575 472
3763.  If for whatever reason you cannot get into the gate at the Blue Hole on a
weekend, call my home *** *** **** or my cell *** *** ****. 
The Blue Hole hours have not changed.  Blue Hole is open 7 days a week, 365 days a
year. 
The gates are open almost all the time.  It is open during daylight hours, and night
dives are allowed.  it is always best to let someone know you are there at night. 
Very rarely are the gates locked.  
There have been very isolated incidents where a gate might be locked at night by an
officer if there is a car load trying to party in the parking lot and the officers
don't communicate that at shift change, but again very rare if not at all.  
At times when there is an ongoing project that requires equipment that might pose a
danger to a diver or the workers involved, Blue Hole access can be limited, however
in the past we have been able to keep that down to weekdays only and have been open
on weekends.  There are new projects being started in January, but that will not
affect access to the Blue Hole. 
Again, please feel free to contact me witrh any concerns. 
Richard

 

[Jasonmh]

Thanks for doing that James, someone might want to print out that reply and take it with them, incase it becomes an issue.
I still wonder though why Richard's answer doesn't seem to jive with the new sign that Divedoggie saw:

""board" was nailed up over the "old" hours, and the "new" hours say the park closes at 5pm"

I just got a return email from The City of Santa Rosa. It appears that there was some mis-communication on the part of the Police Officer.

Subject:   	Re: Blue Hole hours.
From:   	"Richard Delgado" <rdelgado_at_srnm.org>
Date:   	Tue, December 18, 2007 2:37 pm
To:   	"James Williams" <semper_at_securitygeek.net>
Cc:   	tdodge_at_srnm.org
          szamora_at_srnm.org

James, 
This is Richard Delgado with the City of Santa Rosa, you can contact me at this
email if you have any further questions or concerns or call my office at 575 472
3763.  If for whatever reason you cannot get into the gate at the Blue Hole on a
weekend, call my home *** *** **** or my cell *** *** ****. 
The Blue Hole hours have not changed.  Blue Hole is open 7 days a week, 365 days a
year. 
The gates are open almost all the time.  It is open during daylight hours, and night
dives are allowed.  it is always best to let someone know you are there at night. 
Very rarely are the gates locked.  
There have been very isolated incidents where a gate might be locked at night by an
officer if there is a car load trying to party in the parking lot and the officers
don't communicate that at shift change, but again very rare if not at all.  
At times when there is an ongoing project that requires equipment that might pose a
danger to a diver or the workers involved, Blue Hole access can be limited, however
in the past we have been able to keep that down to weekdays only and have been open
on weekends.  There are new projects being started in January, but that will not
affect access to the Blue Hole. 
Again, please feel free to contact me witrh any concerns. 
Richard

 

[Waterskier1]

Thanks for doing that James, someone might want to print out that reply and take it with them, incase it becomes an issue.
I still wonder though why Richard's answer doesn't seem to jive with the new sign that Divedoggie saw:

""board" was nailed up over the "old" hours, and the "new" hours say the park closes at 5pm"

Yes, thanks for doing this James.

I'm pleasantly surprised that you got a response that quickly.

 

[RonFrank]

Great Job James, and thanks

I also got my renewal but was at work.

Seems like I started to get upset for no good reason!

I'm not at all surprised they replied so quickly. First, how busy is Santa Rosa? More important, the one thing that is VERY clear is that Divers provide a LOT of income for the Town (food, booze, hotels, gas, diving fees), and they are very aware of it.

Good to have this cleared up. We have been told in the past that the area closes at 9:00pm, but I've done dives there later than that.

 

[ABQdiver]

Hooboy!! I got really excited (not in a good way) at the title and first couple of responses of this thread.

Thanks for posting that James. If anything, Santa Rosa does need to work on their "communication skills". Glad that Richard Delgado is on top of it. Hopefully, he will pass the word on to the enforcement officers.

What I found interesting was his comment about a project starting in January. I've heard that they had a do or lose money situation for the scheduled renovation project and the November date passed with (obviously) no new work being started. I hope that wasn't the case.


BTW, Maybe it was Greg and the gang were loudly parting that caused the problem in the first place.........

 

[amascuba]

No problem guys! I was not only impressed that Richard answered my email promptly, but went the extra mile to give me his home and cell numbers in the event that we ran into problems on the weekends. If you guys want, I'll print copies of the email off to put into your log books in case you run into issues of getting locked out.

 

[Divedoggie]

Hopefully the police have been informed that they can go talk to the divers that are there after hours, in order to make sure that they are indeed divers.
In defense of the police officer, who was very nice and polite, I have seen some pretty shady things taking place there after dark.

Check out the entrance sign when you are there next. Its definitely a mixed message.

Thanks James, for that update from Richard Delgado. We actually called him after we returned from BH last time, and he said that he would check into it. Now we know the answer.