Game on for park plans

NEWPORT BEACH — The on-again, off-again plans for a park on 12 acres next to the city’s central library are on again, though they’ll proceed slowly, the City Council decided Tuesday.

Whether this vote will be final, however, remains to be seen.

The council chose, in a 4-3 vote, to create a new concept plan for the passive park — called Newport Center Park — but not to go ahead with construction documents or bidding the work.

Mayor Steve Rosansky and council members Leslie Daigle, Nancy Gardner and Don Webb voted to draw up new preliminary plans.

“This is far from what we anticipated in the original concept plan,” Webb said. “How can you approve something you haven’t seen?”

Council members Keith Curry, Michael Henn and Ed Selich dissented, arguing that a new concept plan really means more unnecessary delays in the project.

“The fact of the matter these plans are substantially completed. We’re talking about phasing them and adding some additional elements,” Selich said. “We’ve certainly not getting into this not knowing what we’re doing or giving a blank checkbook.”

The split reflects a fundamental disagreement over whether the council should consider building a city hall on the park site, with some council members holding that they’ve made a promise they need to keep, and others arguing the circumstances have changed since the land was designated for a park in 1993.

Once the design is ready, the city will seek construction bids for the $4.3-million park, which is expected to include a tot lot, benches and walking paths, and some parking that could be shared by the library.

But the city hall issue still looms. The council has been discussing a new city hall since 2005 but hasn’t picked a site yet, and proponents of building on the park land are planning a February ballot measure to let voters decide.

The council’s vote Tuesday also opted to delay formally granting naming rights to the park to a donor in exchange for $600,000. That was contentious to some council members, who cited the city’s policy of giving naming rights when at least 75% of a facility’s cost is donated. In this case, the donation equals less than 15%.