Mailbag - Jan. 18, 2001

OK, City Council members, here is another chance to do something more

for the majority of the people of Huntington Beach.

Now that Montgomery Wards is out of the mall, we need you to vote on

eminent domain to move Burlington Coat Factory to another location of its

choice (“Wards’ closure may ‘breathe new life’ into mall,” Jan. 4). It is

a very difficult decision to make, but you have to think of the future.

The residents have been stuck with a defunct mall for years and have

been spending their tax dollars out of the city.

I know that at least three of our council members did a great job on

the wetlands, but the decision will take a heart-wrenching vote.

It’s a vote that must be made if we are to get the center that will

benefit us all -- except the cities of Westminster, Fountain Valley,

Newport Beach and Costa Mesa. Please look at the big picture.

BUDDY ROBERTS

Huntington Beach

Hearthside Homes should consider selling land

The decision by Hearthside Homes (formerly Koll Co.) to sue the

California Coastal Commission for its unanimous decision to save Bolsa

Chica’s lower mesa from development is ludicrous.

In the first place, the entire 1,700 acres of Bolsa Chica should be

saved as a biodiversity park for generations to come. After many years of

controversy, all but 65 acres of Bolsa Chica has been saved.

All Hearthside has to do is take a fair market value for the 62 acres

and move on. But no way. It insists it is not a willing seller, so there

can be no government agency, private foundation or other entity that will

engage in negotiations to buy the property if there is no willing seller.

There is no taking here. The Coastal Commission decision saved the

lower mesa with the scientific evidence that the wetlands cannot survive

without enough foraging for the raptors to exist. Bolsa Chica is one

ecosystem. All Hearthside has to do is get real and set a fair price for

the property.

The company wants $1 million an acre for property that has no water,

has archeological sites that should be protected, has the

Inglewood/Newport fault running right through the middle of it and

wetlands that the state bought for $90 million and are to be restored

surrounding the Bolsa Chica mesa, which they want to build on.

Quit suing and sell is my advice.

EILEEN MURPHY

Huntington Beach

* EDITOR’S NOTE: Eileen Murphy is a member of the Bolsa Chica Land

Trust.

Meeting did not allow all voices to be heard

To all the residents of the Spring View Middle School neighborhood who

attended the Community Advisory Committee meeting Jan. 10 and were ready

to discuss the gymnasium proposal as outlined in the meeting notices

mailed to neighborhood residents, I apologize.

It is clear that you were not allowed to present your views in a

non-hostile environment. That should not have happened.

Please feel free to send in the survey attached to the meeting notice

with your views and concerns so they can be incorporated into the

committee’s recommendations.

To all the rest of you who obviously came with the intent to present

your own agenda [the no-gym proposal] and to lambaste Supt. James

Tarwater and the other guest speakers, you’ve had your say.

As a courtesy, we allowed you to present your views despite the fact

that the no-gym option was outside the scope of the meeting. You did it

in a rude and disrespectful manner and that is how the rest of the

community will remember it.

Now the Community Advisory Committee will attempt to make a

recommendation to the school board lacking any specific concerns the

neighborhood may have had.

If you succeed in your quest to stop the gym project, then the

committee’s recommendations will be moot. Sadly, the memory of your

disruptive behavior will remain.

If you are not successful in stopping the gym construction, you have

done your neighbors a big disservice. Why? Because the three other middle

school neighborhoods that also are affected did manage to have

respectable meetings with constructive outcomes and they will have input

to the gym in our community.

To the gentleman who came forward after the meeting and not so

politely asked if we understood that there will be no compromise and “do

we get it?” Yes, we got that two hours earlier when you all first said

it.

But if your efforts to prevent the gym construction fail, we will have

somebody else’s gym design built in our neighborhood. Do you, sir, get

that?

KAREN MARTIN

Huntington Beach

* EDITOR’S NOTE: Karen Martin is a member of the Spring View Middle

School Community Advisory Committee on gymnasiums/auditoriums.