RECIPE FOR SUCCESS:

There are certain hot-button issues in every city. For Newport Beach, the location of a new city hall and the proliferation of rehab homes are passionate topics. In Costa Mesa, immigration issues bring out concerned citizens by the droves to council meetings.

But how can we tell when appropriate concern is about to turn deadly?

The national news was full of horrific images of the shooting at a City Council meeting in Kirkwood, Mo., a few weeks back.

A disgruntled resident opened fire in a crowded council chamber, killing two police officers, two council members and the public works director, while wounding the mayor and a reporter before the police shot him. Reports stated the shooter was a local “gad fly.”

According to the online encyclopedia Wikipedia, Plato wrote that when Socrates was on trial for his life, he pointed out that dissent, like the tiny gadfly, was easy to swat, but the cost to society of silencing individuals who were irritating could be very high. His role was that of a gad fly, “to sting people and whip them into a fury, all in the service of truth.”

No matter which city you live in, there are folks who attend almost every city council meeting to complain their city isn’t listening or doing enough.

These gad flies often do have valid points, but when you see them over and over again, do they lose their effectiveness and are council members just dismissing them as irritants?

No one likes to be dismissed, and in an era when lawsuits take years, some people feel violence is the last resort to getting a message across. How concerned should we be about the safety of our own council meetings?

No one talks about it, but our cities are very much aware when meetings will be hotly contested. They beef up police presence as inconspicuously as possible. Many would argue metal detectors at council meetings are the next logical step, while others say we’re taking security too far.

At a recent Newport Beach City Council meeting, a rather ominous individual took the podium for public comments late one evening. He stated there were underground meth labs in Spy Glass Hill that were part of a CIA conspiracy.

It wasn’t funny. He was dead serious, and I spoke with several council members afterward who had moments of concern.

During the rehab issue discussions, one angry resident verbally attacked Steve Rosansky with personal accusations. Unnerving as it was to watch, free speech protected the diatribe.

At a Costa Mesa City Council meeting a few years back, a man with a Nazi swastika on his arm sat a row behind me.

With a new city hall on the horizon for Newport Beach, we need to create a recipe for success to effectively protect the public and city employees at this new facility.

Large cities like Los Angeles already have security measures in place at council meetings and in municipal buildings. We need to get proactive.

In the wake of Kirkwood, cities across the country are reexamining security at public meetings. They’re all asking the same haunting question: Could it happen here?

BARBARA VENEZIA is the chairman of the Santa Ana Hts. Redevelopment Project Advisor Committee and was the co-creator of the cooking show “At Home on the Range” with John Crean.