ELECTION 2008: Council hopefuls to meet in forums

Two forums for City Council candidates have been announced.

Candidates Jane Egly, Cheryl Kinsman and Verna Rollinger have been invited to speak. Egly and Kinsman are incumbents. Rollinger is a former city clerk, running for the council for the second time.

Mark your calendars.

SEPT. 30

Local branches of the American Assn. of University Women and the League of Women Voters, the Laguna Beach Woman’s Club, Laguna Beach Seniors, the Laguna Beach Resource and Relief Center and the Interfaith Council will host a forum Sept. 30 in the City Council Chambers.

Each of the nonpartisan host groups will submit questions to the candidates pertaining to particular interests of the organization. Questions also will be taken from the audience, screened to prevent duplications, forum veteran Jean Raun said.

The forum will begin at 7:30 p.m. It will be televised live, Bette Anderson said.

Katherine Lowey will moderate. She is on the Coastal League of Women Voters Board of Directors and was a professor of public administration at USC, a past president of the Capistrano Bay League of Women Voters and a member of the Charter Commission formed after the county bankruptcy.

“This is usually a well-attended forum,” Raun said. “Get here early. Seating is first-come, first-served.”

OCT. 4

The Laguna Beach Alliance for the Arts will present a forum from 10 a.m. to noon Oct. 4 at the Laguna Playhouse.

Past Festival of Arts President Anita Mangels will moderate. The alliance has framed a series of questions related to art in Laguna Beach, but the public may submit questions on other issues.

Doors will open at 9:30 a.m. Seating is on a first-come, first served basis.

The Alliance is a partnership of 20 Laguna Beach organizations: Art-a-Fair, CaDance, the Arts Commission, Community Art Project (CAP), Festival of Arts, First Thursdays Art Walk, Gallimaufry Performing Arts, the art museum, the craft guild, Laguna Beach Live!, the Visitors and Conference Bureau, Laguna College of Art & Design, the Community Concert Band, Laguna Outreach Community Arts (LOCA), Laguna Playhouse, the Plein Air Painters Association, No Square Theatre, Pageant of the Masters, Sawdust art Festival, Seven Degrees and the Southern California Artists Assn.

No on Prop. 8 activities

Opponents of Proposition 8, which would change the California Constitution to allow only marriage between a man and a woman, will meet at 11 a.m. Saturday at Democratic Club Headquarters, 1401 S. Coast Hwy., to hand out signs and prepare to stand at intersections until 3 p.m. propounding their views. On Sunday, volunteers will be trained from 2 to 5 p.m. for nightly phone bank duties at the same place.

For more information, call (949) 715-4747.

Information on election activities is welcomed. E-mail coastlinepilot@latimes.com or call the Laguna Beach office at (949) 494-4321.

BARBARA DIAMOND can be reached at (949) 494-4321 or coastlinepilot@latimes.com.