Nichols is the sole victory for Greenlight slate

June Casagrande

Despite losing in three races, Greenlight enjoyed a significant

victory in Tuesday’s election as the slow-growth movement will now

have two representatives on the City Council. Joining John Heffernan

on the dais will be District 6 winner Dick Nichols, the Greenlight

candidate who defeated Bernie Svalstad.

Yet the Greenlight dynamic of the next council remains to be seen.

Heffernan and Nichols are barely acquainted. Like Heffernan, Nichols

is loosely affiliated with the slow-growth movement, running on a

platform of Greenlight’s main principles.

“I’m looking forward to seeing how he will vote and what that will

mean for the council,” said Heffernan, whose status for two years as

the only Greenlighter and a distinct outsider has in the past pushed

him to the point of announcing he would quit the council.

“I’m not aligned with any one person on any specific issue, so I

will be making my decisions on an issue-by-issue basis,” Nichols

said. “In general, I think his ideas and mine are close, so I think

we would be in agreement much of the time.”

Though Nichols was the only member of the Greenlight slate to win

a seat on the council, Allan Beek was the biggest vote-getter on the

slate. The District 3 candidate received 9,995 votes to Nichols’

9,853. But within his district, Beek took a back seat to Don Webb’s

11,572.

Nichols and Webb will be the two new faces on the council

beginning sometime next month; the city clerk’s office has not yet

set the date for swearing in the new council members and selecting a

new mayor. Incumbents Tod Ridgeway and Gary Adams, who defeated

Greenlight candidates Madelene Arakelian and Rick Taylor,

respectively, will begin their second four-year terms at that time.

Taylor was cheerful in the wake of his defeat, offering praise for

all of the 11 candidates in the election.

“You couldn’t have asked for 11 better people,” Taylor said.

Taylor, who vowed to continue working to fight John Wayne Airport

expansion, said his work with the Greenlight Committee has given him

a newfound appreciation of the movement.

“I want to continue working with Greenlight. I think it’s a really

outstanding organization and they’ve really proven their mettle to

me,” Taylor said.

Arakelian said the election was disappointing because it gave an

advantage to the candidates who raised the most money and, in her

opinion, the ones who will allow more development than the city

should permit.

“People buy elections nowadays, and I think that’s terrible,”

Arakelian said.

* JUNE CASAGRANDE covers Newport Beach and John Wayne Airport.

She may be reached at (949) 574-4232 or by e-mail at

[email protected].