MAILBAG - Nov. 10, 2006

Sad election, but maybe there’s hopeIn Newport’s city election every measure and every candidate I believed in was defeated.

My most sincere wish, at this time, is to hope I was wrong and to hope the future character of our city will develop sensibly. Especially when it comes to the appointed incumbents, who have now been elected, I hope a newfound confidence will help you to question more, speak up and not just go along for the ride with the tide.

Congratulations to all the good people who volunteered on both sides of every issue. All of us should appreciate the efforts of those who, unselfishly, work for our town’s future.

GILES ALLISON

Newport Beach

Fearful of what awaits Newport BeachI mourn the passing of common sense in Newport Beach.

For the last couple of years there has been great battle waging within the city. One group of residents has been fighting to preserve the unique characteristics of Newport Beach while improving those things that needed it. The second group believed that “newer, bigger, better” is what Newport Beach should stand for.

With the passing of the new general plan, they have approved massive build-outs of the airport area and other areas without any community approval needed. They gave away their voice by defeating Greenlight II, Measure X, because the new general plan was a way around the original Greenlight initiative, which will no longer have any standing. Beyond that, they failed to reelect the only council member who was not on the “newer, bigger, better” bandwagon.

I work in Newport Beach and was a longtime resident, and I fear what will become of the city. City hall will probably be built in Newport Center, thanks in no small part to Dick Nichols, but it will cost every resident thousands more than it needs to.

Traffic will only get worse with no major plans to update the roads or make them safer; adding medians and flowers does not help traffic.

City Hall will continue to spend money on every project that will make the image of Newport Beach shinier, while residents foot the bill and suffer the inevitable consequences.

Common sense tells you that “newer, bigger, better” is not always the best course of action in the long term, but politics and money have control, and I fear the results.

KATHY OBERGFELL

Trabuco

Sadder election, and no hope seenI weep for Costa Mesa. Candidates lie to us. Candidates tout programs that will waste money, time and precious city resources. Candidates pander to our worst fears for their selfish gain. Candidates cynically tear our community apart. And we the voters sit on the couch and let them do it. In our city of about 110,000 people we let 7,765 voters control the election. That is about 7% of the people in our city. And the rest of us let them get away with it.

I weep for our city.

STEVE DZIDA

Costa Mesa

Politicians need to offer solutions, not gripesIn his commentary of Nov. 5, state Sen. Tom Harman criticizes Washington for not taking the steps necessary to control illegal immigration. As politicians are wont to do, he states the problem, criticizes others for not solving it and offers absolutely no suggestions to solve the problem. Not very helpful.

Harman considers the 700-mile wall to be built along the U.S.-Mexican border to be a small start. I doubt that it will have much effect. Does he suggest that we extend the wall for the entire length of the U.S.-Mexico border? That would not be a final deterrent because of the probability of tunneling under the wall and of circumnavigating it to one of our many unprotected harbors or stretches of beach. Does he believe that a substantial increase in our Border Patrol would be a solution? Partial perhaps, but with what we can afford, not total. Would significant foreign aid to Mexico specifically to alleviate the poverty, the root cause that compels their citizens to come to the U.S. to support their families do the trick? It might, over time, if properly implemented and controlled. Has Harman studied other countries’ practices for controlling illegal immigration?

I’d like to see the finger pointing stop and some well-thought-out analyses of the problem accomplished followed by proposals of some viable solutions. I challenge Harman and other finger-pointers to do this and report their results.

JOHN W. KRAUS

Newport Beach

Campaign information as white noise overloadThank goodness it is over! But as Mae West put it, “Goodness had nothing to do with it.”

My wife and I spent two hours going through, in detail, five pounds of election mailers numbering some 141 items, before addressing the printed material contained in the California and Orange County ballots and state information guides, to say nothing of the “advisories” picked up in both the Daily Pilot and the Los Angeles Times.

If this example of democracy at work is what lies ahead for us, then the sooner we export it to Iraq and other countries, the better.

Talk about voter burnout. This will do it.

I will not comment on the scurrilous attacks in much of the material; nor will I concentrate on the removal of the street signage prior to the voting date, or the over abundance of these signs (and I hope they are all swiftly removed by their sponsors after the election).

But I would like to think that it will be a good idea to invest in the companies that produce all this “stuff” in future elections and, at the same time, tell our future political candidates that we, as a couple, are fed up with elections like this, and we will just possibly withdraw from the process in the future and spend our valuable time reading a good book and not waste it on the “democratic process” as it is being presented to us today.

DAVID and SHELAH YOUNG

Newport Beach