ON THE AGENDA Here are some items...

ON THE AGENDA

Here are some items to be considered by the Newport Beach City

Council tonight.

RECOVERY HOME ZONING

The council will hold a second reading of new zoning regulations

that govern drug and alcohol recovery homes, which residents say are

scattered around the Balboa Peninsula and can cause problems such as

noise and litter. At their July 13 meeting, council members voted 4

to 2 in favor of rules that require some recovery homes to apply for

Federal Exception Permits, which will be granted by the Planning

Commission.

Most of the public comment at the previous meeting was from people

supporting the recovery homes and in some cases opposing the new

regulations. Because of their comments, council agreed to drop the

consideration of a recovery home’s turnover from the new permit

criteria. Recovery home proponents said the homes shouldn’t be

penalized for quickly achieving their goal of getting people back

into society after kicking a drug habit or booting disruptive people

from programs.

WHAT TO EXPECT

No major changes to the regulations have been proposed since the

first reading, when enough council members voted for the regulations

to pass them.

ROCKY POINT SEWER PUMP STATION

The Orange County Sanitation District wants to replace its pump

station at 1575 W. Coast Highway with a higher-capacity station

across the street at 1700 through 2000 Coast Highway. The council

will vote on whether to forward comments from the Environmental

Quality Affairs Committee to the sanitation district.

The new $9.4-million pump station would increase waste-handling

capacity from 5 million gallons per day to 23.6 million gallons per

day and would help decrease the risk of sewage spills by working with

three other pump stations in the city. Construction is scheduled to

begin in 2005.

WHAT TO EXPECT

The pump station project is not a controversial one, and council

is likely to approve sending on the comments, which ask for more

information about traffic, the construction schedule and other

issues.

UNDERGROUND UTILITY DESIGN

The council will consider two requests to pay for design work to

bury utility lines. One area is on Pacific Drive, where the design is

expected to cost $18,060. The other is bound by L Street, Balboa

Boulevard, Channel Road and Ocean Boulevard, and that design project

would cost $105,500.

The city has had many recent requests to create tax assessment

districts to pay for utility burial. To start the process, residents

sign a petition and bring it to the city, which fronts the money to

design the utility burial work and taxes residents to pay for the

design and construction of the project.

WHAT TO EXPECT

The council is likely to approve funding for the design work,

since the city will recover the money once residents vote to create

the assessment district.

-- Compiled by Alicia Robinson