EDITORIAL:Costa Mesa must move beyond letter

Will the president of the United States pay any attention to the letter the Costa Mesa City Council wrote him regarding immigration reform?

Obviously, we have no answer to that.

What we do know is the letter is an attempt on the part of the council majority to make a political statement about illegal immigration, and the truth is, that’s fine.

There are those critics of the council, and members of the council minority, who tend to disagree. They question the content of the letter and wonder if it’s an appropriate use of the council’s time.

Those who disagree with the council majority need to come to terms with the fact that Allan Mansoor, Eric Bever and Wendy Leece are the majority.

The voters didn’t elect the Return to Reason candidates, they reelected Mansoor and elected Leece, who ran alongside him last November.

Those who voted Mansoor and Leece into office knew what they were getting. They expect them to make strong statements about illegal immigration, and this letter does just that.

But let’s also be clear about something else.

The letter doesn’t break any new ground in the nationwide debate over illegal immigration and what to do about it. It simply rehashes old arguments and ideas, and probably will get tossed in the White House round file the minute it arrives.

And that’s OK also. Mansoor stated as much when he said his hope from the letter was not so much to change the president’s mind but to spark debate at the local level.

That obviously has happened and most likely will continue to happen.

Drafting a letter and sending it off to President Bush doesn’t take much effort at all. The City Council is a political entity and making political statements like those in this letter are certainly appropriate. It’s done all the time, on all sorts of issues.

But now that it’s done, the council needs to get back to the business at hand and go to work on city issues, like fixing traffic congestion, stopping gangs, finding more playing fields and cleaning up the Westside of Costa Mesa.

Maybe then the council will do something that truly improves the quality of life of its residents.

Now that would be something to write home about.