Costa Mesa skate park idea revived

Lolita Harper

In an effort to bring a highly-demanded skate park to the area,

City Council members tonight will discuss teaming up with local

boarders -- school-boarders, that is.

The City Council will consider a proposal to team up with the

Newport-Mesa Unified School District board of education to pursue the

possibility of a skate park at Davis Elementary. Council members will

consider passing a resolution outlining a commitment to research the

possibility of a skate park. If passed, the resolution would go to

Newport-Mesa Unified school board members for their stamp of

approval.

Mayor Linda Dixon, whose two sons grew up skateboarding, said she

is “one happy council person.”

“This is really exciting,” Dixon said. “This has been near and

dear to my heart for many, many months.”

Dixon said she and school trustee Jim Ferryman brainstormed about

possible sites for a skate park and settled on the elementary school

at 1050 Arlington Drive.

“The two of us put our heads together and this is one site that we

felt would work,” Dixon said.

Davis was chosen for its accessibility and because it has the

space available to hold an adequate facility, she said.

The need for a skate park in the Newport-Mesa area has been a hot

topic for more than a year. Proponents of a park say it is ludicrous

to not afford Newport-Mesa residents an adequate facility to practice

one of the area’s most popular pastimes.

Costa Mesa resident Jim Gray, a former professional skateboarder

who now owns a skateboard manufacturing company, has been at the

forefront of the fight for a skate park.

Gray, a self-described skateboarding junkie, has gathered a large

coalition of parents, students and boarders from the area to push

their local leaders to keep progress on a possible park rolling.

Gray said he is optimistic about the progress and hopes leaders

will act quickly. Children in Costa Mesa have been disappointed too

many times, he said, and it is time for politicians to show that the

city cares about all their recreation needs.

“We’ll be here to help assure good design and good construction,”

Gray said.

Last year, Costa Mesa council members halted plans for a

skateboard park at the corner of Charle and Hamilton streets as the

plans reached their final design stages. The site was dropped by a 3

to 2 vote, with Dixon and Councilwoman Libby Cowan dissenting.

Councilman Gary Monahan has consistently contended that his vote

then -- and any future votes -- would hinge on one thing: location.

Steel, who also voted down the Charle Street location, said he has

pushed for some sort of a joint venture -- whether it be with the

school board or counterparts from Newport Beach -- for more than a

year. He recently voted down a routine traffic study for a proposed

Kohl’s department store on Harbor Boulevard because the report would

not include data on the possibility of a skate park on site.

Officials explained to Steel that the council could not legally

require Kohl’s representatives to conduct and pay for a skate park

study because they were not proposing such a facility at the site.

Steel said later he understood that but still wanted to send a

“political message.”

“I don’t care if we can’t make them do that, but I think there

needs to be a strong message that we are at least pushing for one

somewhere in the city,” Steel said.

Newport-Mesa residents have been waiting for a skateboard park for

more than a decade. Costa Mesa officials gave the idea serious

consideration in 1998 when state law changed to protect cities from

serious liability.

Since then, hopes for a park have wavered from the possibility of

one at Lions Park to Charle Street to talks between Newport Beach and

Costa Mesa for a shared facility -- and now the Davis Elementary

idea.

While skateboard enthusiasts are gung-ho about the possibility,

there is a less-vocal camp that contends skateboarding facilities

only promote the appearance of general trouble-makers. Some fear an

increase in skateboarders would bring an increase in drug use and

overall delinquency.

Too often, those negative voices have influenced city leaders and

resulted in broken-hearted skateboarders, Gray said. But he is

anxious to prove the neigh-sayers wrong.

“I can’t wait for the city to see what a positive benefit having a

skate park will be for their kids, but I am a realist and, to some

extent, I’ll believe it when I see the concrete pumpers pouring the

concrete,” Gray said. “That is a day I’ve waited many years to see.”

* LOLITA HARPER covers Costa Mesa. She may be reached at (949)

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