Crowd delays Westside talks

Deirdre Newman

A large, emotional crowd of industrial property owners gathered

Monday night to voice fervent opposition to the city’s preliminary

effort to add more than 400 acres to a proposed redevelopment area.

But the crowd was a victim of its own success as the overwhelming

number of people posed a fire hazard and forced the city’s

Redevelopment Agency to postpone the meeting until March, when the

rowdy throng can be accommodated in a larger space.

More than 250 people converged on the auditorium in the Police

Department to express their concerns and find out what the city has

in mind for their properties if they are included in the downtown

redevelopment zone.

With the Redevelopment Agency -- City Council members acting under

a different title -- grossly underestimating the amount of people

that would show up, its members were forced to postpone the meeting

based on the fire marshal’s assessment.

On Jan. 27, the Planning Commission approved the temporary

boundaries, including the new 40 acres, for an odd-shaped area

roughly bordered by 15th Street, Whittier Avenue and West 19th

Street.

While the property owners were disappointed that the issue was

postponed, many said they were heartened by the robust turnout

“The whole thing has been really quiet and getting people out and

making the city aware that they have a constituency that doesn’t like

this is really good news,” said Roger MacGregor, owner of MacGregor

Yachts on Placentia Avenue.

Many of the property owners oppose being included in the

redevelopment zone because they do not feel their property is

blighted. Blight is gauged based on physical and economic criteria.

If property is deemed blighted, it is vulnerable to the city taking

it through eminent domain.

Westside property owners who are against the plan have mobilized

opposition and created a Web site to spread the word about the city’s

tentative plans. If the Redevelopment Agency had approved the

preliminary boundaries Monday, it would have provided an impetus for

the city to start shaping its vision of how to redevelop the area, a

vision opponents charge is sorely lacking.

“The city has not come out and said what this is going to do for

us,” MacGregor said. “What they’re setting up is this elaborate

structure that’s getting locked in. It’s like ‘ready, fire, aim’ and

it’s terrorizing the hell out of these people because all they see is

the misery [of the plan].”

Mayor Karen Robinson said she was impressed to see the magnitude

of concerned constituents who turned up Monday night.

“I was happy to see the turnout,” Robinson said. “This is an

important process for the community and what we want to know is what

the community’s thoughts are, so I was pleased to see the turnout.”

* DEIRDRE NEWMAN covers Costa Mesa and may be reached at (949)

574-4221 or by e-mail at [email protected].