CM PRESS # 328

THEY DON'T WANT TO BE PART OF COSTA MESA--CAN YOU BLAME THEM?

According to the Daily Pilot, the folks over by the misnamed Santa Ana Country Club want a sit down with Supervisor John Moorlach to try to convince him to stop blocking their application to become part of Newport Beach. LINK

Now, why would these folks not want to be part of Costa Mesa--a city that is full of Latino gangs, slums, a high violent crime rate, lower than they should be home values, failing schools, 60 acres of industrial buildings on our Westside Bluffs, illegal aliens and magnet charities drawing even more illegal aliens here and then making them nice and comfortable so they'll bring their whole villages here?

Why would these folks not want to be part of a city with a dumbed-down City Council that knows or should know about all the problems in the preceding paragraph but still holds City Council meetings every two weeks where these idiots tell us their highest priority is filling potholes?

Of course, these folks who want to be part of Newport Beach, if they follow the precedent set by their neighbors who have already escaped the clutches of Costa Mesa's downward mobile policies, will tell Supervisor Moorlach, that the reason they want to go to Newport is because that city will fight hard to keep John Wayne Airport from growing. They won't anger him (he lives in Costa Mesa) by telling him the real reasons as I outlined above.

Look folks, smart people with a choice don't want to be stuck in a slum with a City Council that has no backbone to make the necessary changes to make things better for the middle class citizens of the city.

If Costa Mesa's City Council would start doing what it should be doing, we wouldn't see whole neighborhoods wanting no part of this city and we wouldn't have to fight to keep neighborhoods in Costa Mesa against their will.

Come on City Council. Fix Costa Mesa, it's broken.

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Those are our opinions. Thanks for reading them.

CM PRESS # 208

PEOPLE MAKE A CITY WHAT IT IS

There's an article in the Daily Pilot today about how residents in various areas that have been traditionally in Costa Mesa's sphere of influence want to be annexed not to Costa Mesa--that has been supplying the areas with all their infra-structure support over the years (police, fire, sewer, water, etc.)--but to Newport Beach.

Now, the quick surface answer as to why these folks prefer Newport to Costa Mesa is because their property values will increase with the new brand name. Hey, they're trading an old Chevy logo for a new Rolls Royce logo.

But, the deeper question is why has Newport become so much more desirable than Costa Mesa, and how can Costa Mesa close the gap so that it becomes the place to be and not the place to flee?

Again, the quick answer is that Newport is more desirable because it has all that ocean front property and Costa Mesa is completely land locked.

And, while that is a good answer, it's not the whole story. Beverly Hills has no ocean front property and it's desirable. Now, don't get us wrong, we at the CM PRESS believe that Costa Mesa needs to get an opening to the sea and that this will change things in major ways, but we're trying to make the point, here, that a city can be top drawer without an ocean.

The deeper answer about why Newport Beach is more desirable than Costa Mesa is because that while Newport has constantly upgraded itself over the years, Costa Mesa has not been as quick to do so.

Newport has developed the amenities that attract upwardly mobile people who have spendable income and who, by their very nature, take pride in their community and who work to make it nicer. If you want to attract bees, you put out honey. Newport has done this. Costa Mesa has not.

It's been many small decisions over the years that have caused the gap between the two cities to grow ever wider. For example, Newport has put homes on its bluffs. These homes attract people with the money who can afford to live there. Their presence in Newport is a plus for that city.

Costa Mesa, by contrast, has kept 60 acres of prime ocean close land on the Westside Bluffs mired in industrial uses. Instead of attracting upwardly mobile people to the Westside Bluffs, Costa Mesa has attracted paint shops and similar businesses--often owned by people who live in Newport Beach.

But, there's more...

Costa Mesa seems to have a love for slums that are chock full of people who work in the industries on the Westside Bluffs and in some of our shopping centers and office buildings.

Costa Mesa is too tolerant of gangs, of illegal aliens, of downscale conditions.

Costa Mesa is too full of people who are willing to defend things such as failing schools and other negatives. You've seen the letters, and even columns and editorials, from such people in the Pilot. They try to put a happy face on low student scores by saying that they're higher than they used to be or even that the kids have a good school spirit. What they fail to say is that these scores are below scores in schools in Newport Beach, which is in the same school district.

We should not be lowering the bar, but raising it.

The CM PRESS has talked to many people on the streets of Costa Mesa and we've found far too many who have a slum mentality. They actually take pride in having a down scale city. They won't put it that way, but they'll inadvertently reveal their slum mentality when they couch their feelings about the two cities in terms such as that they don't like "snooty" Newport Beach or the "phonies" who live there.

If we want upwardly mobile people to move to Costa Mesa and if we want whole neighborhoods wanting to be annexed to our city, then we have to make our city a desirable place to be.

There's no other way. We can't hold people captive here who want the best for themselves and their families and who know that it's important to be around others with similar attitudes. We need to attract the best and the brightest to our city and provide them with the things that will make them want to stay here.

In other words, we need to improve Costa Mesa and make it more upscale. Period.

And, know this, we can't stand still. The flow of time doesn't allow that. We either move up or we move down.
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Those are our opinions. Thanks for reading them.

CM PRESS # 175

WAR WITH NEWPORT?


It was a bad day for Costa Mesa at the Orange County Local Agency Formation Commission (LAFCO) on Wednesday.

We may have to go to war against bikini clad Newporters.

They're a watery eyed, vicious lot who have ocean domination as their mad dream. If it's wet, the Newporters want it.

LAFCO ruled on Wednesday that West Santa Heights, which is east of Costa Mesa but in our sphere of influence, should be annexed to Newport Beach.

But, here's the real bad news about this, compadres. When it so ruled, LAFCO separated the West Santa Ana Heights issue from the Banning Ranch one and may not rule on Banning Ranch for six months.

The CM PRESS has long argued that annexation issues to our east and to our west should be discussed at the same time so that Costa Mesa would have some bargaining power and might be able to end up with less than the short end of the stick for once.

The CM PRESS believes that Costa Mesa should give up land to our east to Newport Beach --the aforementioned West Santa Ana Heights and even (to sweeten the pot) the Santa Ana Country Club on Newport Blvd. if necessary.

In exchange for those valuable pieces of land, we'd like to see Newport give up any claims it might have on some parts of Banning Ranch (on our west) that could be annexed to Costa Mesa so that our presently landlocked city would end up with some land close to the Pacific Ocean or at least close to the brackish water where the Santa Ana River almost meets the ocean. This would allow Costa Mesa to develop a small pocket beach for our residents and at the same time doff a captain's hat or two and take a chair at the table of coastal communities.

But, with LAFCO separating the east from the west the way it did, we've lost much of our bargaining ability and will now have to slug it out with Newport for Banning Ranch.

Have no doubt about this, my fellow dry-landers, Newport wants Banning Ranch--all of it. They figure it's their manifest destiny to have all land that has water near it. It's a wonder they haven't taken over our City Hall because of the small fish pond in front. Maybe that's why City Staff drained the water out of that tiny pond. They weren't concerned about mosquitoes, but about Newporters setting up camp there.

We swear, as surely as Katrina Foley is a conservative, that we were watering the weeds in front of the CM PRESS skyscraper the other day and before you could say jiggling flesh, a bunch of Newporters showed up, put down towels and started a volley ball game. As soon as we turned off the hose, they left. It's uncanny. They're like flies and garbage. If there's water nearby, they're there.

Costa Mesa is welcome to all the dry dirt we can find, it seems, but add a little H2O and the Newporters are suddenly there with their little string bikinis, surf boards and tanning oil. They're a water greedy lot, those Newporters, and they want to parch Costa Mesa into a bone dry desert.

It's time we used our natural advantage of being up above most of Newport's beaches to show the Newporters that we're not going to take it anymore. Now that Gary Monahan is on the Costa Mesa Sanitary District Board of Directors we may be able to appeal to his sense of Costa Mesa patriotism to help our city.

We figure the next time Gary and the 15 or so other Sanitary District employees and board members, who we pay to sit around the Sanitary District office on 19th Street thinking of ways to raise our rates, are down in the sewers fixing the pipes, that they can divert a couple of our sewer lines so they drain directly into Newport Harbor.

That'll show the smug First World Newporters we mean business and that we want some of our land to be close to the ocean too. Where is it written that Newport owns the entire coast and can block us from just a tiny little sliver of waterfront property where we can dip our toes in the ocean?

Of course, the better alternative, that we've floated before, is to try to trick Newport Beach into annexing all of Costa Mesa.

Newporters have been good stewards of their city, and Newport improves every time we look.

Costa Mesans, on the other hand, have not been such good stewards of our city and we see this in our failing schools, our slums, our gangs, our huge illegal alien population, our lower than they should be property values, and in our lower quality of life.

If Costa Mesa were annexed to Newport Beach, that city would get our tax revenues from South Coast Metro and we'd get Newporters who probably wouldn't stand for the Third World conditions in the then former Costa Mesa, and who would make sure their new section of Newport Beach is improved--like, right now, Dude.
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Those are our opinions. Thanks for reading them.