Chamber sides in favor of resort

Alicia Robinson

With the battle lines drawn over the proposed Marinapark resort

project, the Newport Beach Chamber of Commerce has officially taken

sides in favor of the resort. Voters will decide in November whether

to change the city’s general plan to allow development of the resort.

Opponents have argued that the luxury hotel and time-share units

will be a profitless boondoggle that robs the public of waterfront

space. On the front page of the chamber’s August/September

newsletter, the group’s board of directors came out as a strong

proponent of the Marinapark project, touting it as a financial

benefit to the city and one that will improve public facilities. As

part of the project, developer Stephen Sutherland has promised to

build a new facility for the Girl Scouts, rebuild some public tennis

courts and help finance remodeling of American Legion Post 291.

The chamber often takes positions on legislative matters and has

stated its views on other November ballot issues, chamber President

Richard Luehrs said.

“By and large, we think the project has some merit,” Luehrs said.

“It’ll be a nice little boost for the Balboa Peninsula, and it

deserves serious consideration.”

Sutherland has done a good job explaining how public access to the

beach will be maintained, Luehrs said, adding that it’s questionable

how much access people have to the area now because of the mobile

home park that occupies part of the property.

“In my opinion, [there’s] not very much [access], because you’ve

had a trailer park there with fencing and signs up that say ‘private

property,’” he said.

DeVore bones up

on debating skills

Republican 70th Assembly District candidate Chuck DeVore spent

last week with like-minded conservatives, learning about the

principles of our nation’s founders at the Claremont Institute’s

Lincoln Fellowship program, held at the Four Seasons Hotel in Newport

Beach.

DeVore and nine other Lincoln fellows attended eight days of

seminars on topics such as the issues at stake in the Lincoln-Douglas

debates of 1858 and the origins of contemporary political thought.

“There are certain ways that I came out on issues that I kind of

instinctively or by tradition came out on,” DeVore said. “Now I

understand much more firmly the philosophical underpinnings that

resulted in those opinions that I held.”

The nation’s founders believed it’s not the job of government to

solve the world’s problems, DeVore said, but he does not have a

problem with the U.S. war in Iraq.

“There’s a difference [between] being free from anarchy or tyranny

or despotism and having the government provide for your every need,”

he said.

Calling for better information-sharing

Thomas H. Kean, chairman of the Sept. 11 commission, and J. Cofer

Black, federal counterterrorism coordinator, were among panelists at

a hearing Tuesday held by Rep. Chris Cox to discuss the commission’s

recommendations on information-sharing.

Cox, who chairs the House Homeland Security Committee, opened the

hearing with a speech praising the commission for its work and noting

that Congress has made a strong bipartisan effort to respond to the

threat of terrorism, according to his published remarks. The

commission’s report was critical of Congress for resisting

reorganization to handle international terrorist threats and for

allowing oversight of security issues to weaken, criticisms Cox said

Congress should now address.

“The failure to share information and to collaborate against

terrorism, the report asserts, also resulted from a broader failure

to align priorities between the federal government and the Congress,”

Cox said. “As I view it, that is not so much a condemnation of the

past as a call to reform for the future.”