Just to say..I had done it.
I used to fish off the Huntington Beach pier. I usually caught “Pasadena trout” (white croaker, also locally called tom cod). A fishing license wasn’t required to fish off the pier, and I think that is still the case, but the fishing isn’t that great anymore.
I used to live in HB (well FV but the line was right next to my house) and the 90s were a great time to live there. Hardly any homeless. No liberalism.