This contributed article is from Keith Curry, the former Mayor of Newport Beach. TheLiberalOC welcomes articles from outside sources.
Newport Beach City Council incumbents Lauren Kleiman and Erik Weigand are learning the risks of being too close to high rise developers and contemptuous of protecting open space.
Walter Stahr and Dr. Andrew Gerken are mounting broad based bipartisan campaigns to replace the incumbents on a platform of “Restoring Newport Beach Values”.
Kleiman and Weigand are part of a four-vote majority that proposed moving the Newport Beach police station and jail to Civic Center Park, sparking outrage and opposition from throughout the city.
The Jail in the Park plan would be an environmental disaster. The park is a designated riparian wetlands habitat, requiring expensive replacement mitigation. The park is the drainage arroyo for Newport Beach hillside communities, requiring extensive underground piping and site preparation to prevent flooding and a police station would require a state permit to install an underground fuel tank in the middle of a subterranean stream flowing to the ocean. The Sierra Club and other environmental advocates have come out in strong opposition.
Because of the extensive environmental problems, the project would also be a financial disaster. Environmental mitigation and site preparation are expected to add $50 million in unnecessary costs, brigining the total price tag to over $200 million. It would be the most expensive project in city history.
Finally, the plan has serious operational issues. Last year, Newport Beach released 2,244 arrestees directly from jail. Most are people who live out of town. If the jail is moved to the park they will be waiting around in the park and adjacent central library awaiting transportation. Twenty-four sex offenders will register in the park site and a planned heliport and drone station will take off and land over Corona del Mar.
So why are Kleiman and Weigand so intent on putting the police station/jail in the park? It appears the way they plan to pay for it is to sell the existing police station site which they have zoned and entitled for a 300 ft. tall, high-rise, high-density apartment tower. It would be the tallest building in the city. This project, along with other proposed high-density projects at the Edwards Theater, Newport Beach Tennis Club, Hyatt Newporter, Environmental Nature Center, and Bayside Ave. are why developers and their lobbyists are spending hundreds of millions to keep the incumbents in office.
Part of this strategy is a plan to move Fire Station No. 3 to the site of the Newport Center OCTA transit station. This move would require taxpayers to pay $30 million to move and rebuild the OCTA facility to the airport, a place few of the 140,000 annual bus riders who work at the medical buildings, offices, restaurants and hotels in Newport Center want to go. The proposed new site is owned by a major donor to both Kleiman and Weigand.
Rather than run on the issues, Kleiman and Weigand have given much of their campaign funds to the Orange County Republican Party. In Weigand’s case, he gave the party nearly half of all his funds, essentially outsourcing his campaign to the OCGOP. Of course, Weigand’s opponent is also a Republican The party is also being used to oppose Measure H that would reduce the number of housing units authored in the General Plan to a number closer to the state requirement. It will come as a surprise to Newport Beach Republicans to learn their party is now the party of high-rise high-density development.
Challenging Kleiman is Dr. Andy Gerken, the retired head of Hoag Orthopedics, for twenty years the volunteer team doctor for Corona del Mar football and a graduate of Harvard and UCI Medical School. Gerken’s father was responsible for moving Pacific Life to Newport Beach where it is now the city’s second largest employer.
Taking on Weigand is Walter Stahr. Stahr is a Stanford and Harvard Law School graduate, former SEC lawyer, and noted author and historian. The Stahr family was instrumental in funding the central library and the library plaza is named the “Stahr Courtyard”.
The police and fire unions have spent over $200,000 to protect the incumbents who granted police a 20% raise over three years. They dearly want to negotiate the next contract with Kleiman and Weigand.
Attacks on the challengers have been simply partisan appeals, bogus charges related to non-city issues and old Yelp reviews. In contrast, the challengers have laid out clear platforms for reform, and they are backed by a bipartisan coalition of twelve former mayors and councilmembers.
Kleiman and Weigand defied multiple court orders to allow Newport Beach voters to consider initiatives on transparency, term limits and district elections. Voters are not taking the denial of the right to vote sitting down.
Newport Beach voters seemed poised to reassert Newport Beach values on the city council.
Keith Curry
Former Mayor, Newport Beach
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