City demands plan hearing

After waiting more than a year for the California Coastal Commission

to act on a land-use plan for coastal Newport Beach, city officials

are getting tough.

A letter Newport Beach City Councilman Tod Ridgeway sent to the

commission July 22 demands a September hearing on the plan so the

city can finish it.

The land-use plan is half of a local coastal plan that every city

is required, by state law, to have. It describes what development can

occur and what resources need to be protected in the coastal zone.

Newport Beach has racked up monthly fines since missing a July 2003

deadline to have a coastal plan in place.

Newport officials are upset because they turned in a draft

land-use plan in July 2004 but got little or no feedback from Coastal

Commission staffers for more than six months, Newport Beach Planning

Director Patricia Temple said. The commission finally suggested 147

changes to language in the plan, and the city gave detailed responses

to those last month.

Now everyone is up against an Oct. 21 deadline, after which the

commission forfeits its ability to request changes and the plan is

considered approved.

“We think we have a right to a hearing in September,” Temple said.

“We think the statute actually requires it.”

But at the moment, the commission is shooting for an October

hearing on Newport’s plan, said Deborah Lee, senior deputy director

of the Coastal Commission. Revisions to the city’s draft land-use

plan have been delayed because the planner working on it went on

maternity leave and the commission is short-staffed, Lee said.

“We have been working with them, but I’ll acknowledge it hasn’t

moved along as we would have hoped,” she said.

Officials are still hashing out some parking standards and how

much development can occur on bluffs and other environmentally

sensitive areas.

Even after the commission holds a hearing on the land-use part of

the plan, the city’s work isn’t done. Newport must also create a plan

to enforce the coastal land-use rules, similar to how the zoning code

fleshes out what’s in the city’s general plan.

The enforcement plan could be finished by early next year, but a

Coastal Commission hearing is required for that also. It could be

anywhere from a month to more than a year before the commission takes

that up, said city planner Patrick Alford.

“We don’t have too much confidence in them, because they said

they’d expedite this application,” he said.

QUESTION

Is Newport Beach adequately protecting the shoreline with its

local coastal plan? Call our Readers Hotline at (714) 966-4664 or

send e-mail to [email protected]. Please spell your name and

tell us your hometown and phone numbers for verification purposes

only.

* ALICIA ROBINSON covers government and politics. She may be

reached at (714) 966-4626.