New, united tenor likely in Newport

When Newport Beach’s new City Council is seated in December, don’t expect fireworks.

Voters elected three appointees, gave one incumbent a second term, and chose two new members at the polls Tuesday. Mike Henn and Nancy Gardner are the first-timers; Keith Curry, Leslie Daigle and Ed Selich are appointees who won election; and Don Webb was elected to a second term.

Although the council is about to lose its most experienced member, termed-out Councilman Tod Ridgeway, some insiders think it will gain valuable expertise and perhaps harmony.

“I think it’s going to be a council that’s going to be able to work well together,” said District 2 Councilman Steve Rosansky, who holds the one seat out of the seven that wasn’t on Tuesday’s ballot. “Tod was always kind of doing his thing and Dick [Nichols, unseated by Gardner] was never in sync with the council.”

Nichols could not be reached for comment Thursday.

The new council faces a long to-do list, including a decision on where to build a new city hall, and members will certainly bring their own agendas.

Henn, now a planning commissioner, said he wants to tackle traffic congestion and continue to fight any future expansion of John Wayne Airport. Improving water quality in ways such as cleaning up the Rhine Channel is also on his priority list.

Residents have clearly expressed their concerns over drug rehabilitation homes, Henn said, and he wants to address the issue as soon as possible. Some residents have questioned how much he can do because he recused himself from a planning commission vote on a sober living facility. Henn’s explanation has been that he’s a business advisor to one of the owners of a pharmacy that sells prescriptions to clients of the sober living home.

He said Thursday he will fight for residents on the issue, and it’s not clear that he even has a conflict.

When residents questioned him earlier, he said, “I commented that in the event that there was a conflict that would prevent me from being effective in this regard, I would eliminate that conflict…. I was crystal clear about that, and that remains the case.”

For Curry, top priorities on the council will be replacing and renovating older city facilities, starting with the Oasis Senior Center. He also wants to apply for county transportation funding under the renewed Measure M tax so the city can synchronize traffic signals and carry out water quality projects, he said.

The way residents voted, both in the council election and on two city ballot measures, shows they’re happy with the way things are going in Newport, Curry said.

“They’re pleased with the initiatives that we’ve had over the last year and the level of constituent services, and I think it reflects confidence that we’re going in the right direction,” he said.

And for appointees who won election, it was a vindication. Daigle, who overcame a campaign of support for an opponent who had quit the race, said the election restored residents’ trust in the council.

“The incumbents were responsive to the needs of residents,” and that’s why they won, she said.

Ridgeway, who’s not sorry to be leaving the council after eight years, said the new council will get several new perspectives, and that’s a benefit. Gardner helped depolarize different factions in the general plan update process, Henn brings a corporate perspective as a former executive of major companies, and Curry has financial expertise, for example.

The new council members will likely work well together, he said, because “they’re team players.”