Vision committee to set goals

Barbara Diamond

The City Council got a glimpse on Tuesday night of the Vision

implementation committees’ activities in the past year.

Goals for the new year are expected to be set within the next

couple of months, although most of the committee representatives

reported they are still working on the first year’s goals.

“We will meet with committee representatives sometime in March to

find out what projects they will undertake for next year,” said

Planning Commissioner Anne Johnson, implementation subcommittee

co-chair.

The most concrete implementation in the first year was a sand

sculpture contest held by the Housing and Human Affairs Committee.

“We were asked to do a project that would bring the residents

together,” Jerry Nielsen said. “We discouraged professionals from

entering, like you see in Newport Beach. We encouraged family teams.

“The newspapers reported that 2,000 people came by, but I think

that was a generous estimate,” Nielsen said. “It was more like 500.”

Nine teams participated in the contest, six of them from Laguna

Beach.

The contest will be held again this year, Nielsen said. He invited

the council to enter a team.

Open Space Committee member Catharine Cooper said the assignment

to merge the defunct Wastewater Committee and the Open Space

Committee into an overarching environmental oversight committee

proved daunting.

“Open Space has its hands too full,” said Cooper, who earlier in

the evening was reappointed by council to the committee. “We would

need a committee of 15 or ask a committee of seven to take on the

world.”

The committee recommended a separate environmental body with

subcommittees for light, air and noise pollution and view issues,

with no expansion of the duties of open space, as defined in the

Vision 2030 report.

Steve Fairbanks reported that the Heritage Committee is reviewing

the historical element in the city’s general plan. The element

provides the guidelines and incentives for preserving historical

structures in town.

“A draft element will be discussed Feb. 20 at a joint meeting of

the Planning Commission and the Heritage Committee,” said Norm

Grossman, implementation committee co-chair. “The existing element

will be updated to preserve even more structures. Most really nice

restorations in town can be traced back to the historical element.”

Laguna Beach Chamber of Commerce President Ken Delino said the

council had assigned three tasks to his group: resident/visitor

mobility, economic sustainability in the business community and civic

participation -- called governance by the 2030 Vision Steering

Committee

“You volunteered; we didn’t assign you,” Councilwoman Elizabeth

Pearson said.

The chamber worked with the different groups on its projects,

including the preparation of a welcome packet for newcomers to the

city, soon to be ready for printing.

“I wish I could say the chamber did a lot on this, but Linda Brown

did most of it,” Delino said.

Brown is the co-chair of the Laguna Beach unit of the League of

Women Voters. She could not attend the council meeting.

A letter from the mayor will be included in the packets, which

will be distributed by Realtors to home buyers. No plans are in the

works to distribute the packet to new renters.

The chamber also tracked the city’s master plan for parking

Downtown and is trying to broaden residents’ participation in solving

the problem.

Lastly, the chamber worked on increasing resident patronage at

Laguna’s businesses.

Ways to sustain the historic Downtown will be discussed at a

chamber breakfast set for 7:30 a.m. Feb. 27 at Aliso Creek Inn. It is

open to the public. For more information, call (949) 494-1018.

Village Laguna veteran Arnold Hano said the reports validated the

group’s activities in town, although it was banned from official

participation in the implementation process because it is a political

action committee.

“People who move into town have been getting a welcome letter from

Village Laguna,” Hano said. “That’s how we get new members.

“The city already has an Environmental Oversight Committee,” he

said. “It is called Village Laguna, which had an entry in the sand

sculpture contest, and we won in the low-rise category.”

Hano said the group had always been involved in governance, but he

hasn’t yet figured out to get it involved in the Arts Alliance.

“But I am working on it,” Hano said.

Mayor Cheryl Kinsman asked the subcommittee to put more emphasis

on children in next year’s goals.

“Children seem to be missing from the vision,” Kinsman said.

“They’re here. The pied piper didn’t come and take them away. This is

not just a town of old people.”