Public needs watchdogs patrolling school districts...

Public needs watchdogs patrolling school districts

Kudos to the Daily Pilot for allowing critics of our powerful

public school monopoly to voice publicly some of their concerns. I

have no way of knowing if the local teachers’ union used questionable

methods to remove one of their critics, Wendy Leece, from her

Newport-Mesa Unified school board position, but the facts certainly

indicate there is corruption in the system, starting at the top, and

few members of the media and/or government officials are willing to

inform the public of such abuses.

In her last month in office, outgoing state Superintendent of

Public Instruction Delaine Eastin and her Department of Education

were hit with a $4.5-million judgment in a whistle-blower case. The

jury found that Eastin had retaliated against longtime education

department employee James Lindberg. During the 1990s, Eastin’s

Department of Education was accused of giving away million of dollars

in federal education money.

Whistleblowers and outspoken critics within the public school

system are rare, and so we do not learn of the internal problems.

That alone is one reason to lament the departure of Leece and begs

the question of whether her replacement, teachers’ union candidate

Tom Egan, will prove as unbiased as he claims.

ADAM MURRAY

Newport Beach

Bridge idea collapsed, don’t bring it back

Re: Costa Mesa City Council deciding against authorizing a study

of the 19th Street bridge.

Historically, we’ve been through all of this before. The reports

have been done. The public hearings have been held. It was determined

that a bridge, which would create a minor highway on 19th Street,

would be detrimental to businesses. It was not a good option, and the

city is taking, I think, the correct path on this. Robert Graham has

been stumping for the 19th Street bridge for a long time. I ran into

him several years ago in Canyon Park, talking to me about, “Wouldn’t

it be nice for residents down here to have a straight shot to the

beach.”

Well, you know what, we have a straight shot to the beach. We have

quick access. We don’t need to bear the brunt of that highway, minor

highway on 19th Street, in order to get to the bridge. It’s

interesting that Graham has always wanted the 19th Street bridge but

he doesn’t want the Gisler Bridge by his house to go through.

The logical thing that might happen then, if we have the 19th

Street bridge and then the 19th Street build up on the Westside, is

that there would be an extension through the Eastside neighborhood to

Dover. The city has already taken a stance that they won’t do that

and put in the sidewalks. I think there’s a need for a review of the

history of this in the paper, perhaps. I just really feel that the

Eastside and Westside Costa Mesa neighborhoods should not bear the

brunt of traffic so that the merchants on Mariner’s Mile don’t have

to confront their need to develop parking alternatives. Costa Mesa

should not be a bypass from Coast Highway to serve Huntington Beach

and Newport Beach.

I really feel that the city should not reconsider the bridge on

19th Street.

SUSAN EMERSON

Costa Mesa

Why not just extend the freeway to Huntington?

There is no need for the Costa Mesa City Council to reconsider a

bridge at 19th Street. We deemed it out many, many years ago.

Besides, all we have to do is have Caltrans extend the Costa Mesa

Freeway along 19th Street, over the river and through the woods to

grandmother’s house in Huntington Beach, because that’s what

everybody wants, isn’t it: access to the Costa Mesa Freeway. Then we

won’t have to worry about a bridge at 19th Street because Caltrans

will have taken care of it with the freeway carousing down 19th

Street.

I am being very facetious, but that’s all I can see. The whole

idea of this nonsense of bridges from Costa Mesa to Huntington Beach

-- and I might add, the Gisler Bridge to Fountain Valley -- is

absolutely out of the question.

JO BLACK

Costa Mesa