Sounding Board -- MICHAEL DILSISIAN

I am a homeowner in Mesa Del Mar.

I attended the Planning Commission’s hearing on the rezoning of the El

Camino Shopping Center to medium density housing, and was one of the

homeowners who spoke in favor of the change. Thank you planning

commissioners for finally helping us take back our neighborhood!

There is still much work to be done, but this is a good start.

However, I am disappointed in the comments made by some of the nearby

apartment dwellers and store owners, the majority of whom are Latino.

They are so quick to label us as racists wanting to rid our

neighborhood of all minorities, as though there was some covert

conspiracy against them as Latinos, instead of actually looking at the

facts of the matter.

The El Camino Shopping Center is an old, run-down, ugly, useless,

outdated commercial property that was doomed to fail right from the

start. It should never have been zoned in the middle of a residential

community, as with the apartments that should never have been zoned in

the middle of a single-family residential community.

The shopping center has outlived its usefulness. It was built in an

attempt to provide a convenience to the surrounding homes 35 years ago

and has not done that for many, many years.

The center is now a haven for loiterers, drug users and sellers,

drunkards, prostitutes, homeless, thieves, muggers and the list goes on.

Just ask the surrounding homeowners who have to put up with all the

noise and violence on a daily basis, into the wee hours of the night. Has

this anything to do with racism?

No landlord is going to pour out capital to renovate a commercial

center that will never make enough money. You will never attract major

retail chains to such a location to make it work. This is not rocket

science.

Some of these Latino apartment dwellers complain that they will no

longer have a place to shop when the shopping center is demolished. Have

they not seen the multitude of retail services available all along Baker

Street?

All we are trying to do is make our neighborhood and city a more

beautiful and safer place to live. All we are trying to do is to get rid

of the “slums” that surround many of our beautiful residential

neighborhoods. Whats wrong with that?

I must also correct the Daily Pilot’s news story that reported the

homeowners only collected 300 signatures in favor of the re-zoning

[“Homes in El Camino Center’s future,” Feb. 28]. They actually collected

nearly 400 signatures.

That’s about half the number of homes in Mesa Del Mar.

* MICHAEL DILSISIAN is a Costa Mesa resident.