Close Main Street as soon as possible...

Close Main Street

as soon as possible

I would like to see Main Street closed to traffic as soon as

possible. I don’t go to town unless I can go on my bicycle it’s so

horrible.

LAURA DIXON

Huntington Beach

Main Street should close for the summer

I think Main Street should be closed to traffic, probably May,

June, July, August and September, pretty much all of summer because

that’s when the kids have summertime and probably less kids will get

hurt and run over and all of that.

STEVEN KERPER

Huntington Beach

I believe that Main Street should be closed to traffic for just a

few months in the summertime when it’s really unbearable with all

those cars and pollution from smog and it messes up while we’re

trying to dine on Main Street and you can’t even cross the street. So

I would say, close it from June, July, August, probably September,

but just a few months during the summer when it’s really congested

and people are really down there. But during the winter months it

would be foolish to close Main Street because there’s not much

business there or traffic there during the winter.

FRANK RUGELL

Huntington Beach

Main Street should close up to Orange

I own a condo in Downtown Huntington, I’ve lived there two years.

I highly recommend them closing off Main Street. The traffic down

there is terrible and they speed through there. I don’t know how many

times walking through that area, I saw people almost get hit by cars

because people just walk, they don’t even look to see if a car is

coming. And the cars at the stop signs can’t get through because of

the people and I definitely think it would be a great idea to close

off Main Street all the way up to Orange Avenue, indefinitely.

MARLENE GOODRICH

Huntington Beach

I think the promenade possibilities for Main Street are great.

Close the streets for the first three streets. I think it’s going to

be great for Huntington Beach. Let’s close them.

ALAN WEBB

Huntington Beach

We need to consider disabled people

My problem with closing this street is disabled people. How do

they make it three, four blocks, maybe even more, during the

summertime away from all the businesses and stuff? Unless you put

some parking near those streets I can’t see closing the street. It’s

a good idea so that we don’t have to suck fumes up as we sit there

but it’s not a good idea for the disabled.

VALERIE BUSTILLOS

Huntington Beach

Lots to be done before closing street

As you know they’re thinking about closing Main Street. I don’t

think the City Council wants to see merchants go out of business. Nor

do I think the City Council wants to displease residents. Nor do I

think the City Council wants to lose any revenue from Downtown. I

don’t think that at all. I think you have a couple of zealous

reporters, but I think we need to do research. Without research it

should not be done. No. 1, how much money are we going to be losing

in citations and tickets that are issued down there? No. 2, how much

money are we going to be losing from parking revenue? No. 3, when

Downtown is full, and everybody’s going through, isn’t it a fact that

during this time the parking structure is already full? So that means

we just lose that revenue from parking, they’re not going to go over

to the structure now to park. No. 4, isn’t it a fact that there are

people who have not parked inside the parking structure, they will

only park outside? No. 5, don’t we have promenades already? We have a

huge beach path, we have a huge pier, we have plenty of outside

shopping like Five Points where you can walk. No. 6, wasn’t the

Promenade that you are comparing this to in Santa Monica a place that

needed redeveloping completely? Wasn’t it a place that was the lowest

rent area in L.A. and they had to do this to make it the highest rent

area? Aren’t we the highest rent area now? And No. 7, this has to be

done through planning. Planning needs to give the city a report. Not

how to close it down, but the effects of closing it down. I’m going

to say this again, planning cannot be bought, planning doesn’t do

people favors. Planning will give you the facts whether you like them

or not. They’re not going to take sides and they will not be put

under political pressure from anybody. Give this to planning, give it

to the staff, the staff will give them a report back. That research

will be quoted, because if they do lose revenue, that means more city

fees are going to go up and they have to recoup these losses

somewhere. We can’t afford to lose them. And on Danette Goulet’s

column, about comparing our street to Las Vegas, I hope that she

realizes, the part of north Las Vegas that she’s talking about is a

promenade. That’s the failing part.

JINX VARONA

Huntington Beach

New administrator should fix the streets

I think the new city administrator should look into the street

situation in Huntington Beach. They’re terrible, full of potholes,

cracks, just generally in disrepair. They’ve been this way for years

and it’s deplorable. Anyway, I think that the city administrator

should look into it. I had read the report done by an outside firm

done on the streets of Huntington Beach. They averaged about 6 1/2on

a scale of one to 10. The problem was that interior streets get a

rating of approximately nine, whereas the arterial streets such as

Yorktown Avenue and Newland Street only got a rating of 1 1/2 to 2

1/2. And I have met with the mayor in the past about this and they

were supposed to look into this and not much was done. Yorktown and

Newland Street are two examples of terrible street conditions in

Huntington Beach.

WAYNE FORD

Huntington Beach

Use of sports complex shameful

I could not believe Chuck Beauregard’s praise for the new

Huntington Beach Sports Complex. As founder of Save Our Kids, he must

know that our kids will never play on those $18-million fields. True

they can now play on the Murdy, Edison, Greer and Worthy Park fields,

but those fields should have been given to the kids long ago. The

adults who want to play city league sports should pay for their own

club fields.

Last Sunday as I was out riding my bike, I stopped to watch men

playing baseball and drinking beer. What percentage of Huntington

Beach residents will actually use that park? It was a crime to

disguise this project as a benefit for children and then use

community funds for a handful of adults who were unwilling to fund

their own recreation. I say give the new complex to the kids, let the

adults fund their own fields.

SUZANNE STAHLBUHK

Huntington Beach

Priority check needed in the city

Originally I was not going to respond to the question regarding

the Sports Park, but the more I thought about it the more concerned I

am. This is another example of being led down the primrose path by

underestimating the eventual cost of a facility and suddenly waking

up to realize that it is now more than $15 million. The city

government can find resources for showcase projects that benefit a

few but cannot find the money to repair the streets and sidewalks

that would benefit all its citizens. It’s time the city learns to set

priorities.

PETER CLARK

Huntington Beach

Crosses don’t belong out on the beach

I am objecting to your article glorifying putting the crosses on

the beach. I think this is a political statement, and these people

are not genuine, exactly. They also do not have a permit. They had a

permit for one day on March 31. And they told me that their permit

was open-ended, but that’s not true. You need to check the facts a

little bit on how they got there and why.

Also, I do think it’s political and I don’t think politics belong

at the beach, or you’re going to have PETA there, you’re going to

have anti-abortionists there, you’re going to have all the people

that are going to chase people away from the beach that’s so glorious

in Huntington Beach. And, as the young man said who was quoted in the

article, if you don’t stand up and say how you feel about things you

accept the status quo. So I’m just doing what he said, I’m standing

up and objecting to his being there.

JUDITH MARSH

Huntington Beach

Low attendance at prayer event

It was disheartening to see the low number of participants that

turned out for the National Day of Prayer held on the steps at the

civic center the evening of May 6. Perhaps it was due to a lack of

communication by local churches and newspapers. We live in a country

where grass roots were founded on the freedom to exercise our faith

and trust in the almighty. This is not only a privilege but a duty to

exercise this right before it is taken away from us. Hats off to the

city of Brea, which did not stand idly by and allow the American

Civil Liberties Union to take away their right to hold the mayor’s

prayer breakfast. The Kiwanis Club and the ministerial association

sponsored this event at a private hotel where hundreds were in

attendance.

Wake up, Huntington Beach. This is just the “not care at all”

attitude that took prayer out of our schools and out of the

Huntington Beach City Council meetings. Thanks to Mayor Cathy Green,

it has been reinstated.

MARY BIAS

Huntington Beach

City needs to fix water problem

I am writing in regard to the state of our city in comparison with

other cities nearby. When you call to ask for something to be done

you get the same answer from our Public Works Dept. “So, sorry, we

only have two people in the whole city working on that type of job,”

or, “Our budget would not enable us to fix that problem because there

are so many others in the city with the same problem.”

I have received one of these answers every time I call regarding

the standing water in front of my house. When I stand out and try to

catch the street sweeper, he tells me he can not pick up the water.

In the meantime the stagnant water remains year after year. When I

found out there was a fairly inexpensive solution, concrete lifting,

I wondered why our city could not afford to fix this eyesore once and

for all. Standing water is a hazard to us all.

MEG WATSON

Huntington Beach

Administrator raises could benefit faculty

So, Kristina Bruning, president of the Coast Community College

faculty union, called the administrators’ raise appalling (“College

district gets new leader,” May 13.) Let’s watch and see where she and

her faculty union line up when it comes time to elect new board

members for her district. You see, it is simply one of, whose “ox is

being gored.”

Bruning and her union will undoubtedly use the increase in

administrators salaries to demand more money for themselves,

regardless of the “tight budgets that have forced the colleges to cut

the number of classes to students.”

It really hearkens back to “you scratch my back and I’ll scratch

yours” in defining the relationship between boards and faculty

unions. I mean come on, who controls the elections of school board

members? It is the faculty.

I agree, the administrators salary increases do seem a little out

of place in today’s economy, but I’m willing to bet that the faculty

won’t be incensed enough to seek a recall.

ED BUSH

Huntington Beach