By Sheila Pell / San Diego Reader / Oct. 14, 2025
Paradise Point Resort in Mission Bay is facing more scrutiny of its latest proposed remodel, which includes over 100 modifications.
In a letter to the coastal commission, which postponed a vote on a coastal development permit for the project last week, the city called out a number of “discrepancies” between the application it received and the one submitted to the commission for review.
The 52-acre resort is situated on city-owned land and lies within the coastal zone, so the work has to be approved by both the commission and the city.
The proposal entails over 100 instances of remodeling, installing and constructing in 19 different existing and new structures and event spaces.
But according to the letter, not all of the improvements that LHO Mission Bay Hotel, LP provided to the commission are listed in its application to the city. That makes it impossible to rule out the existence of conflicts with the city’s environmentally sensitive lands regulations.
In particular, the city’s concerns focus on a new event tent, the extent of the pier reconstruction, and floating dock plans for the Marina Dock “which may cause disturbance to the sand.”
A major remodel in 2019 that updated the hotel’s 462 guestrooms successfully jumped through all the permitting hoops, but the resort has a long history of coastal act violations, violations it continues to address through a multi-year enforcement settlement with the commission. It was fined $1 million in 2023 for years of obstructing public access to Mission Bay and for putting up unpermitted structures such as a pier, deck and fountain.
The entire site on Vacation Isle is publicly owned by the city of San Diego and leased to the resort under a long-term agreement. But it didn’t look public to visitors. Instead, from Ingraham Street or approaching the hotel, people were greeted with resort branding, fencing that visually enclosed the site, and a lack of public wayfaring signs. Those conditions, the commission said, “impede public use of the area and reinforce the impression that the entire area is private.”
For the current work proposed, the commission recommended approval with 17 special conditions, many of which concerned the past violations; for example, constructing a new coastal access path, filling in unpermitted lagoons, and the removal of an unpermitted pump station.
