Competing views of the Westside

RE: “Focus on Westside must be for all who live there,” Geoff

West’s Community Commentary of Oct. 11. West’s essay was moving and

obviously heartfelt. I would like to add my feeble voice to his

eloquence by suggesting just one specific effort that this diplomatic

visionary leader could address to achieve “the integration of the

Latino population” into the mainstream of (the Costa Mesa) community.

Costa Mesa leaders -- and this applies also to Newport Beach

leaders -- could lobby the commercial banks in Costa Mesa and Newport

Beach to accept the relatively new identification card that is issued

by the Mexican Consulate in Santa Ana to its migrants as the primary

identification necessary to open a checking or savings account.

Utility bills should be sufficient as secondary ID.

It was my understanding that businesses in Orange County had

widely agreed to accept this photo identification, but, recently, I

witnessed it being rejected, with courtesy, of course, by the manager

of my local branch of a major multi-state bank. I knew the applicant

involved very well, and even my offer to co-sign the account was

rejected.

The failure of Costa Mesa and Newport Beach banks to allow even

longtime local residents to open checking and savings accounts helps

to exclude these established working members of our community from

the benefits of our modern financial economy and, instead, relegates

them to the unnecessary rigors of the cash-only economy. Banks do not

lose money on these kinds of accounts; and we are not talking about

loans here.

A neighborly first step for the Costa Mesa and Newport Beach

leaders to take would be to convince our own local banks to accept

the new business that these excluded customers are anxious to bestow

on them. I do, of course, realize that the various local

check-cashing outlets may not appreciate losing some of their

business to the banks.

ROBERT M. BEARD

Newport Beach

Geoff West has fallen victim to the well-executed, often repeated

fantasies regarding Costa Mesa’s Westside. I would like to address

these: Coming from areas that the city administration chooses to

maintain does leave one confused when accidentally arriving on the

Westside. While West believes the problem has to do with a

class/ethnic “access” discrepancy, he is unaware that research shows

that for the last 10 years the Westside has received less than 9% of

the expenditures by the city as compared with other neighborhoods.

During this period no elected official lived, worked or schooled

their children here. Is West aware that the city uses a separate

repair schedule for the Westside infrastructure? Is he aware that the

city receives millions each year in federal funds for housing, but

somehow the slums prevail? Somehow West would have us believe that

the Westside is predominately Latino and this somehow is the cause of

the problem. (The Latino population is approximately 34%).

West, like so many, has been fooled into thinking this is a Costa

Mesa problem with a Costa Mesa solution. One only has to look at the

millions in dollars provided to various charities and ask, “Without a

slum, how would they prosper?” The Westside is a slum of

“convenience” created by the city of Costa Mesa and hijacked by the

poverty franchises ensuring the longevity of their “honey pot.”

If all the council, all the council candidates and all the

politicos’ citywide really wanted to fix the problem, how could it

continue? While West summarizes the problem as the exclusion of the

Latino population, this exclusion applies to all groups on the

Westside.

MICHAEL W. BERRY

Member, Westside Improvement

Assn.

Geoff West “hit the nail on the head” when he described the

Westside as somehow being disconnected from the rest of Costa Mesa.

He, however, suggested the lack of participation by the Latino

population was the basis for the separation. I disagree with his

assumption. It is not a lack of anything, rather an excess of

participation by special interest groups who for the most part are

not residents of Costa Mesa.

I have lived in Costa Mesa (Westside) for more than 10 years. I

would love nothing better than being considered a “Costa Mesan”

rather than a “Westsider.” But as long as UC Irvine gets

multimillion-dollar grants to help the poor people of Compton, Santa

Ana and “Westside” Costa Mesa, and we continue to live with

substandard housing, a disproportionate number of charities and

deteriorating streets, we will not be considered in the same context

with the rest of Costa Mesa.

JUDITH M. BERRY

Costa Mesa