Protecting the bay’s future

As children play on a small beach with no surf, near homes, docks and

the mobile homes of Marinapark on Balboa Peninsula Tom Billings

unrolls a large city map of Newport Beach and points out the green

sections.

Those sections, he said, are defined under the city’s general plan

as public recreation and environmental open spaces that should remain

just that. But Billings and others see them as threatened.

In the past two months, Billings and several other local residents

have banded into Protect Our Parks, an organization Billings founded

and that has quickly grown to a membership of about 50 people. The

driving force behind the group is to preserve the green sections.

Right now, that means stopping developer Stephen R. Sutherland

from building a 110-room resort hotel at the site of the Marinapark

mobile home park and Las Arenas Park.

Sutherland’s project is ambitious. It includes reconfiguring Las

Arenas Park, removing the mobile homes and developing a

6,200-square-foot community center/Girl Scout House. But Billings and

nearby residents see the project as a magnet for hotel guests,

traffic snarls and hindered bay views that will drastically change

the residential character of the neighborhood. Sutherland argues that

other similar developments are much larger than his, and cater to

business travelers. He envisions a luxury resort built -- in the case

of his planned ballroom, for instance -- to satisfy local residents’

need for space for events such as small weddings, anniversaries and

other celebrations.

Billings, who is also a vocal member of the controlled-growth

Greenlight bloc, and others aren’t buying it.

Tuesday’s City Council public hearing on the issue should present

a showdown as the City Council ponders approval of the project’s

environmental report -- a document already recommended for approval

by the Planning Commission -- and allowing a general plan amendment

to be put to the voters on the November ballot.

The Pilot’s Ryan Carter spoke with Billings about Protect Our

Parks and the project.

Tell me why you are opposed to this project? And, do you oppose

all of it?

Marinapark is a public community asset and the last public

waterfront beach park of its kind on the Balboa Peninsula. The

proposed project is to convert a public asset to a privately owned

hotel for a developer’s private profit. Yes, we are opposed to it.

Marinapark is a “window on the bay” for all residents and the general

public.

It must be preserved for our families and children to use and for

public enjoyment, not just a few hotel guests and a developer’s

private profit. In addition, we are opposed to the timeshare hotel

project because of its impact on increasing density and pressure in a

small area. It will exacerbate traffic in the peninsula’s already

heavily trafficked areas of Lido Marina Village, Cannery Village,

South Coast Shipyard and the peninsula corridor.

What is at stake for this area and the residents living nearby?

How does Newport Coast development, in general, play in to all of

this? What do you see the area being in 10, 20 years?

What is at stake for this area are several significant things:

One, loss of access to the water and use of the bay for residents

and families from all parts of the city.

Two, the conversion of public parkland to a private hotel that

will increase density in a small residential community, and

exacerbate traffic and congestion.

Three, the public’s interest is at stake, because essentially, the

city is converting the use of public parkland to hotel development.

We do not need more hotels; we need public parkland and open space.

The city is allowing, once again, a private developer’s interest to

prevail instead of the public’s.

Four, we have a new opportunity to shape the future of Marinapark

with community residents’ input and to have an Aquatic Center, where

residents from Newport Coast, Eastbluff, and Harbor View can keep

kayaks, sculls, rowboats, sailboats, or other small craft and share

the pleasure of our harbor. Aquatic Center will provide for public

use and enjoyment. Families and children who don’t have access to the

beach and bay will benefit with such a marine-oriented use, versus a

timeshare hotel.

Five, what is ultimately at stake is, residents want to protect

our parks, and we are taking action because the city has failed to do

so and is not doing what is for the public’s interest. In 10 to 20

years, if this hotel and others like it will be allowed, we will lose

all our public parkland and open space, and Newport Beach will turn

into Miami or Hong Kong, losing the high quality beach-bay treasure

we have now.

Do you feel the project should go before voters, and that the

environmental impact report should be approved?

For the city to have allowed public parkland and open space to be

given away for private development was clearly not in the public’s

interest in the first place. The EIR [environmental impact report]

that is before the council is a badly written report. It completely

ignores the major proposals for public use of this public property

such as an Aquatic Center. It fails to include the major impacts on

density and traffic patterns that the proposed hotel will bring. The

only honest thing about it is that it frankly admits its purpose is

to make money. Should the EIR somehow be approved on Tuesday, the

project should go before voters, and we are confident that it will be

rejected in November.

How did you get involved as a leader of this effort against the

project?

I am the spokesperson for Protect Our Parks. Our group is driven

by the leadership of many community residents, and I am the

facilitator for that process. This is really a wonderful example of a

community’s advocacy efforts to protect the public interest versus

those of a developer’s. “Protect Our Parks” is community leadership

and democracy in action.

Why is this effort so important to you personally?

I grew up in Newport Beach and experienced first-hand how special

Newport’s beach-bay heritage is. Newport’s public, beach parks gave

me the opportunity to kayak, canoe, and sail, relax at the beach or

just enjoy our incredible coastal views. The wake-up call came when I

realized that we might lose one of these -- Marinapark -- forever.

If voters pass the proposal to build, will locals continue the

fight against it? Or, is there a certain point where you throw in the

towel?

We will never throw in the towel because this project is just

plain bad for the individual residents, families and children of

Newport Beach. If the EIR is approved on Tuesday, we will lead the

charge in “the mother of all battles” to prevent development

interests from taking away this public parkland from the residents.

If the ballot measure were to pass, we will continue our fight and go

to the Coastal Commission. However, we are seeing a depth of

opposition to more hotel development along our coastal waterfront

from residents citywide.

The developer has cited several improvements to the area, which he

says the resort will bring. They include a new community center,

improved water-run-off systems. Would you agree that a development

could actually help the area?

There is no way that turning precious public recreation and open

space over to a private developer for private profit can be

beneficial to our residents and their families. One need only look

across the bay at the Balboa Bay Club Resort to see how the public’s

access and views have been blocked. The developer’s claim that a

timeshare hotel is a “better choice environmentally” than a park or

community marine use, or that the hotel will actually reduce traffic

and improve water quality in the bay totally fly in the face of

reason.

Are there any points of compromise with Sutherland?

Public use and private profit are such opposite ideas that it is

hard to see what the word “compromise” could mean.

How and when was Protect Our Parks formed?

The Harbor Committee has been developing the idea of an Aquatic

Center over the last couple of years. Marinapark, as public property

that belongs to all residents, and for the benefit of all residents,

is the most appropriate location for the Aquatic Center. The threat

that this publicly owned land is being diverted for a developer’s

private profit is an example that our public officials are not

looking out to preserve the public interest. Thus, the community has

united to accelerate planning and development of an Aquatic Center

there. Protect Our Parks is an urgent action by the community to

preserve Marinapark for open space and the public interest. Protect

Our Parks just naturally grew out of the effort to save the land for

use by the residents, their children and for future generations to

come.

*

BIO

WHO: Tom Billings, founder of Protect Our Parks

* RESIDENCE: Newport Beach for 40 years

* PROFESSION: Mortgage Lender