Newport sea activist rails against coastal group

Paul Clinton

NEWPORT BEACH -- California Coastal Commissioner Shirley Dettloff had

planned her speech to the Orange Coast Assn. to be a relaxed reminiscence

through five years on the statewide panel.

But an appearance by Newport Beach environmentalist Rodolphe

Streichenberger, a commission nemesis, sparked a confrontation over the

legality of the agency on Wednesday.

Standing up in the luncheon room of the Newport Dunes Waterfront

Resort after Dettloff delivered her speech, Streichenberger accused the

commissioners of having too much power.

“I announced to her I am a critic,” Streichenberger said later about

his stir with Dettloff. “I said, ‘You [commissioners] are outmoded, you

are backward.”’

When interviewed Thursday, the usually unflappable Dettloff said she

didn’t mind being put on the spot.

“I hope I answered him well,” said Dettloff, who also is a Huntington

Beach councilwoman and former mayor. “He brought a little bit of a

different perspective.”

Streichenberger’s five-year battle against the state commission came

to a head in April 2001, when a state Superior Court judge agreed with

the environmentalist’s claim that the agency is unconstitutional.

He sued the commission in April 1997, shortly after it refused him a

permit to operate a marine habitat about 300 yards off the Balboa Pier.

He founded the Marine Forests Society.

Dettloff said she disagreed with the ruling, as well as

Streichenberger’s views. She praised the commission as “fair-minded” and

said developers appearing in front of the commission should have “no

reason to be upset by the process.”

State Senate Pro Tem John Burton appointed Dettloff in 1998. Her term

will expire in February. However, as she is not running for her City

Council seat in November, she would be required to give up her commission

seat anyway.

The veteran Surf City leader said she has valued her time on the

commission.

An issue close to Dettloff’s heart, development plans for Bolsa Chica,

could prove to be her last hurrah. Hearthside Homes is heading to the

commission in the near future for approval of a plan to build 388 homes

on 107 acres of land.

Dettloff got her start in politics as a member of the Amigos de Bolsa

Chica, the group that has fought to protect the wetlands since the

mid-1970s.

At the association’s Wednesday lunch, Dettloff also discussed the

creation of the commission by the Coastal Act in 1972. The association is

a loosely knit group of coast cities.

* Paul Clinton covers the environment, John Wayne Airport and

politics. He may be reached at (949) 764-4330 or by e-mail ato7

paul.clinton@latimes.comf7 .