ON THE TOWN:

It is very encouraging to see two letters from out-of-towners who weighed in on our local issues. This written input is welcome, as we may be able to learn from places and people who have experienced our troubles and may have some good suggestions.

On Aug. 9, two letters appeared from residents of Laguna Beach, both writing to support Costa Mesa Mayor Allan Mansoor’s handling of the city’s illegal immigration population.

Laguna Beach has had its own recent illegal immigration drama and there may indeed be something we can all learn from their experiences.

To the Laguna Beach letter writers and any others who support the mayor who may not be regular readers of this newspaper, it is important for you to understand several points made here.

First, the mayor has created two fronts, both of which lead to a dangerous and divisive us-versus-them mentality.

The first us-versus-them is the legal population versus the illegal population. The second is the strict, law-and-order crowd, which wants the immediate deportation of anyone here illegally, versus the rest of us, who recognize that there are many subtleties to the issue, not the least of which is the effect of such an action on small and medium-sized businesses.

The unspoken rule of the law-and-order crowd is that if you are not with us, you are against us.

The issue for clear-thinking Costa Mesans is not whether the challenge of our illegal immigrants needs to be addressed. Most residents, including this writer, do not like the fact that there are people here illegally, some of them using public services for free.

Of course that bothers us. But we also recognize that the solution to the problem lies not in the hysterical, heavy handed approach advocated by the mayor, but in greater communication and in a careful, considerate, step-by-step solution, particularly one involving a greater voice from the business community.

We recognize what the mayor cannot — that like it or not, the illegal immigrant population is helping many businesses stay profitable.

Those businesses include restaurants, hotels, car washes, landscapers and many other services. The illegal immigrant population is not taking away jobs Americans would take; they have jobs to which no American citizen should aspire.

I don’t know about you, but I have higher hopes for the rest of us.

We also recognize that the illegal immigrant population is a collection of human beings, nearly all of whom came to America not to sponge, but to work — to make a better life for themselves and their families.

That doesn’t make their illegal entry OK, it merely helps us understand their motive, which is essential to a greater understanding of the solution.

We recognize that the wholesale deportation of illegal immigrants — the secret wish of the law-and-order crowd — is not only not feasible, but it may also be too traumatic to the nation’s economy, which has become dependent on this cheap labor in order to hang on by its last finger to anything resembling competition in the world’s marketplace.

We recognize that involving our outstanding police force to any degree with which they are uncomfortable could affect morale, recruitment and effectiveness in other areas of crime.

We recognize what the mayor cannot: that we do not have all the answers, and that this is not the brown and white issue he wants you to believe it is.

We recognize that the mayor’s blundering and blustering is not limited to the illegal immigration issue. The mayor has failed to build the consensus needed for real progress and has instead divided the city.

Finally, we recognize that the mayor and his two City Council enablers, Eric Bever and Gary Monahan, have brought unwelcome attention to a city that heretofore used to be known as the City of the Arts, not ground zero for the nation’s immigration debate.

The Laguna Beach voices are welcome, as are any others that have something constructive to contribute to the discussion.

I.C. Black of Newport Beach wrote to criticize my position on the un-sale of KOCE-TV. Black wrote, “I, and many others, have donated many hundreds and thousands of dollars to keep KOCE on the air.”

Black is entitled to criticize me, of course. But if after raising all that dough and discovering that KOCE still needs about $2 million in public funds to operate, Black and other contributors may want to ask for their money back.

Black also blasted me for the “tiny viewership” term I used. Perhaps he ignored the fact or misunderstood that the term was not my own. As I wrote that day, it was a description of the KOCE audience in a Los Angeles Times news story.

Thanks to David H. Wallace of Newport Beach for highlighting my biggest complaint about sport-utility vehicles: that they are driven very short distances for small errands.

But that is true of anyone in any car.

Folks, if you are of sufficient health, please rediscover your bicycle for such trips. If you are a mother or father with a baby, you’re going to find that your child would much rather be in a baby seat on a bicycle than in a car seat.