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THE STRUGGLE FOR THE SOUL OF COSTA MESA
By H. Millard (c) 2000VCT Web Posted 1/25/01
COSTA MESA, CA. -- Down on the Orange County, California coast there are three cities in a row. On the north is Huntington Beach, which according to FBI statistics, is the safest city with more than 100,000 residents in all of Orange County.
On the south is Newport Beach, which is even safer than Huntington Beach but because it has slightly fewer than 100,000 residents it doesn't show up on the FBI report. Newport Beach is also one of the wealthiest cities in the world. In between these two gems of the Orange County coast is something odd. It's a piece of coal. It's Costa Mesa, a city with slightly more than 100,000 residents. Costa Mesa, again, according to the FBI, is the least safe large city in all of Orange County.
Costa Mesa is full of slums and slum problems. There's something unnatural about this. All three cities should actually be about the same in quality. The three of them share the same cool ocean breezes in the heat of summer that makes them very desirable. The three blend together on a map into a seamless whole.
There's no logical reason why Costa Mesa is a dump when it's immediate neighbors on the north and south are so nice. There's just something fishy about this. So what's the problem? The easy answer is illegal aliens, because the city appears to be absolutely overrun with them. However, WHY is this city overrun with illegal aliens while it's two neighboring cities aren't?
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Many good, decent citizens in Costa Mesa believe they know the answer, and some have begun calling those behind the problems of this city the Charity/Government/Industrial Complex. Others simply prefer the Establishment. Whatever it is called, there seems to be a cohesive effort to keep Costa Mesa mired in slums, crime and illegal aliens.
It's gotten so bad that many citizens of the city have joined together in a loose Improvement Movement. This movement is a a collection of individuals and groups who may disagree on many matters, but who have agreed to agree that Costa Mesa can be a better city. These activists have put aside many personal differences to work toward the common goal of making Costa Mesa as desirable a place to live and visit as Newport Beach and Huntington Beach.
How did this Improvement Movement start? Back when talk of "revitalizing" the worst section of the city--the Westside-- had reached a point where it appeared that the city was seriously thinking of making the Westside into some sort of official inner city illegal alien ghetto, some citizens got together and started several grass roots "Improvement" groups. These groups then presented their visions for what the Westside and the city as a whole should be.
In 1999, when the city first talked of a revitalization, some citizens picked up some subtle hints coming from the city that some in city government wanted to turn the Westside into some sort of Little Tijuana.
The city then hired an urban planning consultant, ostensibly to garner "stake holder" input. However, many citizens believed it was just a PR effort aimed at getting citizens to agree to what had already been decided, and that the city had expected that "stake holders," and "residents" (remember, these are two of the euphemisms use for "illegal aliens) would "vote" for the Little Tijuana concept.
However, the unexpected happened to the PR effort. When the consultant held public meetings, "to learn what the stake holders and residents wanted--wink, wink," these meetings were filled to capacity by non-Latino citizens, but very few Latinos. Instead of rolling over and agreeing that they wanted the area to be a Little Tijuana, the citizens overwhelmingly said, in various ways, that the Westside should be more like Newport Beach.
Then City Councilwoman, now Mayor, Libby Cowan apparently wasn't pleased with this. She sent out a letter dated Sept. 8, 1999,co-signed by Ms. Cowan and by Maria Elena Avila (of Avila's Ranchito Restaurants) who actually lives in Corona del Mar (an expensive part of Newport Beach), not Costa Mesa, to various high profile Latinos--more than half of whom also don't live in Costa Mesa.
This letter, on official City of Costa Mesa stationary, invited those addressed to form a Latino group to give input on the Westside. After this letter was sent, it was claimed that a Latino group was formed (the city then denied it had a hand in the formation). This group then said it had held meetings with hundreds of Latino "stake holders" in private (not public) living room dialogues. It was later said that these "stake holders" were "shy." No kidding.
On January 19, 2000, Ms. Avila commuted to Costa Mesa from her expensive Corona del Mar home and appeared at the regularly scheduled City Council session and (surprise!) told the City Council of Costa Mesa (a city where she doesn't live and can't vote) that the Westside should be turned into a new Huntington Park (an inner city 50 miles away in Los Angeles County near Watts), because that's what the shy stake holders had said in the private living room dialogues.
After this, the urban planning consulting firm and (surprise, again!) it mirrored the report brought in from the shy stake holders and totally ignored the wishes of the hundreds of citizens who had attended the public meetings.
Citizen anger reached a feverish level and the Improvement movement called a meeting at a local school on short notice. This meeting was standing room only and citizens let it be known that they wouldn't let the Westside be turned into an official ghetto.
The citizens also said that illegal aliens should have no say in the future shape of Costa Mesa and that to consider their opinions would be a little like asking a burglar who had broken into your house how you should redecorate. Many of those using the terms "stake holders," and "residents," however, apparently want illegal aliens to have a veto vote on plans for the city. To defuse the criticism of citizens who don't want illegal aliens to out vote them, those who do want illegal aliens to be included, switched the conversation from"illegal aliens," to "Latinos" and then screamed "racism." So far this hasn't worked and those who are screaming racism are being seek as the phony race hustlers that they are.
Behind the illegal aliens and feeding off them is the Government/Charity/Industrial Complex at work in the city that has developed a symbiotic relationship among the various elements of this Complex. What keeps this Complex going is a constant infusion of poor--mostly illegal alien--people. To attract them, there are various "magnets" drawing people to the city who can't afford to live in Costa Mesa.. Once they're in the city, they pack themselves into tiny apartments. Then, to make ends meet they receive various charity handouts, often paid for with citizen tax funds that the City Council gives them.
Now, it must be understood that many charities are big businesses. Although many of them are non- profit corporations and can't, by law, make a corporate profit, those who head up these charities often make very attractive salaries. In order to grow, the charities, like any other businesses, must attract many new customers or clients. The Community Development Block Grant report issued by the City of Costa Mesa shows that charities are growth businesses in Costa Mesa because there are more charity "clients each year than the year before.
But, there are more pieces to this Complex than just the charities. There are Slum Lords who make a profit by charging high rents for slum apartment buildings and who get the rent they want by allowing fifteen or more people squeeze into tiny apartments and share the rent. These people then often use the Job Center to make their portion of the rent. Businesses that need cheap labor find it at the Job Center. Thanks to the City of Costa Mesa which pays more than $ 130,000 per year of tax payer money for the Job Center, these businesses have a one stop hiring hall. According to records seen by the CM PRESS, about half of the people hiring day laborers from this Costa Mesa tax supported facility are actually from other cities. In fact, the City of Newport Beach, which has its city yard right down the street from Costa Mesa's Job Center, sends trucks to pick up day laborers to clean the beaches. However, the City of Newport Beach doesn't pay one cent toward the bill for the Job Center.
The day workers don,t make much money from what are often under the table jobs where they are paid in cash by some employers who often don,t pay taxes as they should. Also the employers don't have to pay medical and other benefits. But what about medical and dental needs of the day laborers and their families? Don't worry dear souls. The Community Development Block Grant mentioned above has the answer. In 1999-2000, 2,215 Hispanics received free (to them) dental care from one charity in the city. Also during that period 1999-2000, a grand total of 25 whites received free dental care (that's not a typo). See a pattern here? Read on.
But, how can these day laborers afford to live in Costa Mesa? Easy. Remember, many are squeezed into tiny apartments where they share the rent. Figure it out with simple math. Each of ten people sharing a $900 per month slum apartment only has to pay $90 per month in rent. Food? It,s free from the charities. Medical and dental care? Free to them. We pay for it. Clothes? Free or cheap from the charities or from the second hand stores that always open in such environments. Welcome to the slum cycle. If this cycle isn't broken, the Westside as it is today may be the future of all of Costa Mesa.
Part of this Government/Charity/Industrial Complex includes the single unified school distric
t that encompasses both Newport Beach and Costa Mesa. It's one district, yet one school in Costa Mesa has a Stanford 9 score that is almost 500 points lower than a virtually identical school in Newport Beach. What's going on? Some activists believe that as with the Job Center, Newporters are taking advantage of Costa Mesa and are using our city as their other side of the tracks. In addition, because of the unified nature of this school district, the district as a whole can say, on paper, that it is diverse. However, all the diversity is actually located in the Costa Mesa part of the district.
Who is harmed by this informal Government/Charity/Industrial Complex? The good decent citizens of Costa Mesa who have to live with the crime, the failing schools, the slums, the gangs and all the rest. The actions of this Complex act like a cap on the improvement of Costa Mesa and explains why Costa Mesa--which sits between Huntington Beach, the safest large city in Orange County, and Newport Beach, one of the richest cities in the world--is so different from both of those cities, and why Costa Mesa has urban inner city problems that its two neighboring cities do not have, and which are being artificially maintained in Costa Mesa.
Without the machinations of this informal Government/Charity/Industrial Complex, Costa Mesa would quickly and naturally rise to a level of quality that is very close to that of Newport Beach. Such a prospect has some members of the Government/Charity/Industrial Complex worried that citizens will catch on and demand that this merrygo-round that is keeping Costa Mesa mired in slums and crime end. Thus do we see shrill, hysterical and absurd cries of "racism" and all the rest aimed at those who want the city to be improved. It's a desperate attempt to stop the improvement of Costa Mesa with the usual all-purpose smear word "racism, and it,s cousins "bigotry, "hate, "prejudice and "xenophobia.
One of the major players in this Complex appears to be Mayor Libby Cowan. A look at Ms. Cowan's campaign literature from the last election reveals the names of many of the charity leaders in the city. It also reveals some of the names of have been vocal in hinting at "racism when talk of improving Costa Mesa comes up. This isn't to say that all the people who supported Ms. Cowan are of like mind, but among them are those with an agenda that is not good for the stable citizens of Costa Mesa.
Was it any surprise then, that when citizens said at a City Council meeting that there were too many charities in Costa Mesa that Ms. Cowan defended the charities? Is it any surprise that Ms. Cowan votes to take tax money and give it to the charities? Is it any surprise that she wants to keep the Job Center? Is it any surprise that she doesn't want citizenship to be a requirement for the commissions and committees appointed by the City Council?
The Government/Charity/Industrial Complex doesn't want the Westside to really be improved through a genuine Redevelopment, because if it is, they'll be out of business. They need the slum conditions to survive.
One of the Government/Charity/Industrial Complex,s other tactics is to make some minor improvements on the Westside such as planting trees, while keeping the slums, the charities and all the rest. This gives the illusion of improvement when there isn't really anything meaningful done.
Oh, you may also have heard that Costa Mesa's Police Department announced that it doesn't check for proof of auto insurance on routine traffic stops. One rumor in the city about this is that the police department doesn't want to get into a position where it has to arrest illegal aliens and take them to the city jail where the INS has an agent stationed.
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Fullerton resident and new insider at
city hall Tony Dodero |
Did I mention that Costa Mesa's police chief lives in Newport Beach and that only about 18% or so of his officers actually live in Costa Mesa? Did I forget to mention that photos of the police chief handing out free food to "Latinos" in Costa Mesa also often appear on the front page of the local ultra-liberal DAILY PILOT ?
