Bills would keep homes at El Morro

Alicia Robinson

The eviction process underway at the El Morro Village mobile home

park would be halted and residents would be allowed to stay up to 30

more years under two alternate bills introduced Thursday by Newport

Beach Assemblyman Chuck DeVore.

The land where the mobile home park sits was purchased by the

state in 1979 to be turned into a park, but residents were given

20-year leases. A five-year extension ended last year, beginning the

eviction process.

The state Department of Parks and Recreation plans to spend $12

million to raze the mobile home park and convert the site to a public

park, with a 60-unit campground, a 200-space parking lot with access

to the beach and nature trails, and restrooms and a lifeguard tower

on the beach.

Either of DeVore’s bills could stop those plans. Both would

prevent the state from spending bond money to create park facilities,

and both would raise El Morro Village rents to market rate, earning

the state an estimated $3.2 million a year.

The difference in the two bills is where the money would go. One

would give residents a 30-year lease in exchange for a $50-million

payment to go to the state’s budget deficit, estimated at more than

$8 billion.

Under the other bill, residents could get a lease of up to 30

years, and the rent money would go to the state Parks Department to

help pay for a $466-million backlog of park maintenance work.

Spending the money now to develop park facilities that were

planned when the state had a financial surplus is “fiscal madness,”

said DeVore, who is in his first months in office.

“We have a tremendous problem in our state with a budgetary

imbalance, and to proceed on a 23-year-old plan as if the financial

conditions are the same today as they were 23 years ago is

irresponsible,” he said.

State parks officials have not taken an official position on the

bills yet, but funding for the El Morro project was included in the

governor’s budget and is a “top priority for the department,” said

Mike Tope, superintendent of the state parks’ Orange Coast District.

“This was all agreed to back when the state purchased the

property,” he said. “We’re not meeting demand now with the existing

parks that we have.”

El Morro Community Assn. President Jeanette Miller could not be

reached for comment.

Proponents of the park conversion aren’t likely to welcome the

bills, and Fern Pirkle certainly doesn’t. She spearheaded efforts

that led to the creation of Crystal Cove State Park.

“Definitely it’s against the best interests of the people of

California and against the best interests of most of Mr. DeVore’s

constituents, who I’m sure would like to be able to go to the beach

there and would like to be able to spend the night camping there,”

Pirkle said.

If residents stay another 30 years, taxpayers who paid for the

bonds the state used to buy Crystal Cove may never get to fully enjoy

the park, she said. Pirkle doesn’t expect the bills to have much

state-level support, but DeVore is touting the bills’ co-author,

Assembly Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy.

The reason there are two bills is to provoke discussion in the

legislature and the governor’s administration, DeVore said.

“I’m showing what you can do with this money,” he said.

* ALICIA ROBINSON covers government and politics. She may be

reached at (714) 966-4626 or by e-mail at alicia.robinson

@latimes.com.