WEEK IN REVIEW

The leader of the opposition to annexing Newport Coast thinks he may

have found a better way to ensure the neighborhood’s quality of life:

join forces with the city. Coast resident Phillip Greer, who headed up

two attempts to stop annexation, has said he wants to be appointed to the

city’s soon-to-be-formed Newport Coast Advisory Committee.

Carmelo’s Ristorante will go on, the City Council decided, declining

two residents’ appeals to take actions to curb noise at the restaurant.

This week marked the start of the 93rd annual Newport Harbor Christmas

Boat Parade, lighting up the waterways of the city.

By late next year, construction of 150 low- and moderate-income senior

apartments will be underway. The units, which will be built near Coast

Highway at Jamboree Road, will begin renting at about $650 and $780 a

year to qualified seniors.

* June Casagrande covers Newport Beach. She may be reached at (949)

574-4232 or by e-mail at o7 june.casagrande@latimes.comf7 .

Signing off

Opponents to the Home Ranch project trucked in the fruits of their

signature-gathering labor to City Hall last week, hoping to have gathered

enough to force the issue to a citywide vote.

Preliminary totals are not being released, but about 125 packets of

signatures were dropped off at the City Clerk’s office, each containing

about 33 signatures. Using simple math, about 4,125 signatures were

included.

However, postings on a community Web site -- by those who were part of

the referendum team -- estimated a much lower total of roughly 3,000.

Final counts will come from the Orange County Registrar’s office, once

the city ships them over.

More than 40 residents, many of them members of Costa Mesa Citizens

for Responsible Growth, spent a total of about 180 hours, walking the

streets of Costa Mesa in search of registered voters who would like to

see the Home Ranch project overturned.

While opponents may have gotten blisters, they arguably have stronger

arms -- since each packet was 50 pages long, but only included three

pages of signatures. The large girth was because the city’s resolution

approving the project was 100 pages long and has to be included in the

referendum packets. Opponents managed to cut it in half by shrinking the

font and printing on the front and back but still got stuck with quite a

heavy task.

* Lolita Harper covers Costa Mesa. She may be reached at (949)

574-4275 or by e-mail at o7 lolita.harper@latimes.comf7 .

Arresting development

Newport Beach Police on Tuesday arrested a 72-year-old man on

suspicion of molesting a teenager 26 years ago.

Bruce Knight Cleworth of Newport Beach has also been charged with

possessing destructive device after police, who searched his home in the

3000 block of Broad Street, also found a pipe bomb there, officials said.

The victim is now 40 years old and lives in Oregon, police said.

Officials said he came forward with the information recently, providing

officers with sufficient leads to make the arrest.

Cleworth’s arraignment on the charge of possessing the pipe bomb was

continued to Jan. 3. He is yet to be charged in the alleged molestation

case.

Police also declined to release any information about the

circumstances of the incident that allegedly happened years ago.

Cleworth is being held in Orange County jail with bail set at $50,000.

* Deepa Bharath covers public safety and courts. She may be reached at

(949) 574-4226 or by e-mail at o7 deepa.bharath@latimes.comf7 .

Woman kisses dog

Newport Coast Principal Monique VanZeeBroeck is using a lot of

mouthwash this weekend to rid the taste of dog slobber from kissing a

fake reindeer on Thursday. The good-natured VanZeeBroeck kissed Maggie, a

mastiff dressed up in antlers, to reward her students for exceeding their

reading goal over the past two-and-a-half months.

The Orange Coast College culinary department played host to a group of

children from the Boys and Girls Club in Fullerton on Thursday. The kids

made gingerbread houses to take home with them.

* Deirdre Newman covers education. She may be reached at (949)

574-4221 or by e-mail at o7 deirdre.newman@latimes.comf7 .

Beach planning

Gearing up to tangle with the state’s coastal commission, Newport

Beach began forming a committee to put in place a new Local Coastal

Program.

The program, which must be in place by June 30, 2003, governs

development in coastal area.

The city began developing a program in the late 1980s, but the process

stalled after the approval of a land-use plan.

This week, Mayor Tod Ridgeway began taking volunteers for a six-member

steering committee to plan and craft the program. The move comes on the

heels of an Oct. 5 letter from the California Coastal Commission

critiquing the city’s development standards for coastal bluff sites.

Also, in news presumably greeted with enthusiasm by boaters, the

Orange County Board of Supervisors lowered boat mooring fees in Newport

Harbor. The board dropped its fees from $38 to $20 per linear foot per

year. The new fees now match what the city charges, which,

coincidentally, are expected to rise in 2002.

* Paul Clinton covers the environment and John Wayne Airport. He may

be reached at (949) 764-4330 or by e-mail ato7

paul.clinton@latimes.comf7 .