Staying active in the city’s trenches

Deirdre Newman

She quotes James Madison and George Santayana at City Council

meetings. She is as comfortable referencing the California

Environmental Quality Act as a City Council ordinance. And she has no

qualms about calling earlier decisions of hers “stupid.”

Former Mayor Sandra Genis may not be on the council anymore, but

she is a vocal presence at City Council meetings. She often acts as

the council’s long-term memory, reminding them of decisions and

policies previous councils have made.

She remains an outspoken champion of one of her key tenets from

her days on the dais: open government.

“I have a philosophical thing -- I don’t like to say I’m a

populist, but really making sure the public is part of the process,

keeping them informed and giving them every opportunity to speak and

make a difference as opposed to just having these pro forma hearings

where everyone knows what’s going to happen before it happens,” Genis

said.

Genis was on the council from 1988 to 1996. She was drawn to run

after being involved in the Home Ranch controversy, which lasted for

almost 20 years before the City Council finally approved a project in

November 2001. Her opposition to one of the earlier incarnations of

the project and what she perceived as disrespectful treatment by the

council of those they opposed inspired Genis to join the fight.

“If you were on the side they liked, you could ramble on forever,”

Genis said. “If you were on the side they didn’t like, they would cut

you off.”

After a successful lawsuit and referendum, the opposition

succeeded in getting C.J. Segerstrom & Sons to revise its project

again, Genis said. The final project called for a 308,000-square-foot

Ikea store; 791,050 square feet of office space; 252,648 square feet

of industrial use; and 192 homes.

She ran for council because she had all the necessary qualities to

get elected, she said.

“Who’s going to hang in there and not be seduced by being invited

to this and that?” Genis said. “That was one of the primary

qualifications: Who’s really stubborn? Who’s going to be able to deal

with all these issues? And who’s electable?”

One of her proudest achievements was the 1990 general plan. She

favored a residential community with low-density plan but wasn’t sure

how many others agreed with her until one of the final meetings,

which attracted a standing-room-only crowd.

“I walked in and almost cried,” Genis said. “Sometimes you start

thinking, ‘Maybe I’m nuts. Maybe I’m the only one who stands for

this. Maybe I’m just stupid. Maybe I am part of a whining minority.’

I looked at the room and thought, ‘People want the same kind of city

I do. We are on the right track.’”

The council ended up unanimously approving the low-density plan.

She is also proud of her councils’ ability to balance the budget.

“We weren’t waiving $600,000 in traffic fees and giving $1 million

back on this and that,” Genis said. “You don’t do that when you’re

going into your reserves [as City Manager Allan Roeder has

suggested]. That’s really irresponsible. [These council members]

should be so ashamed of themselves. They bill themselves as fiscally

responsible and they’re like drunken sailors when it comes to

spending public dollars.”

She recounted an anecdote about a time when she went to a

conference that the city paid for and the room she was staying in was

so small and spartan that people from other cities came to take a

picture of it to illustrate that some cities know how to be frugal.

Former Mayor Peter Buffa said Genis was an intelligent colleague

who always did her research on the issues.

“We agreed on some things, fought like cats and dogs about other

things, but we always got along well personally,” Buffa said. “She

was a lot of fun both to work with and fight with.”

When she left the council, she thought she would get involved only

in Fairview Park/Talbert Park issues and the Gisler Avenue bridge.

But then the high-density 1901 Newport Boulevard project appeared on

the scene, and Genis couldn’t resist.

“I thought, ‘That’s the other part of town, and we need more

housing,’” Genis said. “But then I looked at how the shadowing was

going to work out and thought it was really arrogant -- just so you

can make some money and so other people can have a place to live,

you’re going to put [the neighbors across the street] in the dark for

half a year. That’s crummy.”

City Councilman Allan Mansoor said he is receptive to Genis’ input

on city issues.

“I’m always open to hear what she has to say,” Mansoor said. “She

makes a lot of good points. She has a lot of energy.”

Genis works as a planning consultant -- she spent 11 years working for Newport Beach’s Planning Department -- and the expertise comes in

handy when dealing with Costa Mesa issues, she said. She has taken

the council to task for putting some of its recent decisions into

council policies instead of ordinances, which are easier to change.

“I think it’s a combination of being on the council and being a

planner, where we had a city attorney that’s very, very careful,”

Genis said. “Bob Burnham is like my ideal city attorney. His idea was

you can always get where you want to be, but you have to go through

the right hoops. You can’t take shortcuts because that can get you

into trouble.”

When she’s not working or speaking before the council, Genis

enjoys gardening and is training her sheep dog in herding.

“I learned way more about power dynamics from having this dog than

I ever did in my eight years on the council,” Genis said. “I did it

backward. I should have done the dog thing first.”

* DEIRDRE NEWMAN covers Costa Mesa. She may be reached at (949)

574-4221 or by e-mail at deirdre.newman@latimes.com.