HOW WE SEE IT

Making for a merry Christmas

The best bad news stories always end up as good news.

And that’s what happened over at Someone Cares Soup Kitchen.

The kitchen, which helps Newport-Mesa’s less fortunate every day, was

faced with a major toy shortfall -- they only had 500 of the 1,500 they

needed.

And it was the community’s more fortunate to the rescue.

Along with individual readers who brought in more than 100 toys, workers

at Corona del Mar’s Toy Boat stepped up to fill that toy need. They have

pledged about $1,000 worth of Barbies and Beanie Babies to the kitchen.

Now, the only reasons someone might not get a toy is if they were naughty

this year, and that’s up to Santa to decide.

At a loss for paperwork

It sounds awfully familiar.

The county’s loss, or misplacing, of documents for an Irvine Co.

development in Newport Coast seems like a replay of a story which came to

light earlier this fall when the county lost a $1-million federal grant

application from a combination of county social agencies.

The county ended paying the agencies $300,000 to keep them running for a

year, a costly mistake.

Now residents near the development are hoping the county will have to pay

for this lost paper trail as well.

Which all begs the question: Shouldn’t the county hire someone to keep

all its paperwork together?

The late, late show

Speaking of Costa Mesa, it was almost a throwback to the old days of

Costa Mesa City Council meetings.

At 1 a.m., the council was still going, having hauled its way through an

epic agenda that included the El Toro airport issue, the proposed county

CenterLine, a city skateboard park, the West Side moratorium and

annexation of county land.

It was a full plate that also served as a reminder that the quieter of

Newport-Mesa’s two cities keeps going steadily and strongly.

And after that meeting, the council and city staff certainly deserve a

holiday.