Costa Mesa committee member removed over ‘Nazi’ comment to police officer

A member of an inactive Costa Mesa advisory committee was terminated from her unpaid position Tuesday after she publicly compared a city police officer to a Nazi.

Anna Vrska, who had been serving on the Fairview Park Citizens Advisory Committee, was taken off the nine-member panel on a 3-1 City Council vote, with Councilwoman Sandy Genis dissenting. Councilwoman Katrina Foley was absent.

Mayor Pro Tem Jim Righeimer, who appointed Vrska to the committee in 2013, requested last week that she be taken off it because he considered her Nazi remark, made during the Feb. 22 Planning Commission meeting, to be highly offensive.

Vrska attended the commission hearing as a volunteer with Costa Mesa First, a political action committee, and used the public comment period to spread the word about the group’s recently certified initiative that would require some major development projects to go to a public vote instead of just the City Council.

From the speaker’s podium, Vrska wrapped up her comments by saying she disagreed with the council chamber prohibition on clapping, which city officials consider disruptive. She then looked toward the sergeant-at-arms, who helps enforce the no-clapping rule, and said, “We residents have a First Amendment right, and clapping is allowed. It’s not disruptive, so I would appreciate it if you weren’t such a Nazi about it.”

On Tuesday, Righeimer said it was unbecoming for Vrska, as a representative of the city, to compare the officer to a member of the German ruling party of the 1930s and ‘40s that killed millions of Jews.

“For someone to call that person a Nazi is just beyond the pale,” Righeimer said.

Costa Mesa First has distanced itself from Vrska’s comment, saying “her sentiments are not shared by our officers.”

The Fairview Park committee began meeting in April 2013 and was tasked with reexamining the 208-acre park’s master plan. It hasn’t met since April of last year and isn’t expected to reconvene until later this year, when City Hall finishes updating its Open Space Master Plan of Parks and Recreation.

A few council-meeting regulars who routinely criticize the council majority spoke in Vrska’s defense, saying her words were inappropriate but forgivable and that she is a dedicated committee member.

Resident Terry Koken called the mayor pro tem “Ayatollah Righeimer” and a “craven coward” who exemplified “a misuse of overwhelming power, directed at a defenseless target.”

Resident Tamar Goldmann said Vrska could have used the word “thug” to achieve a meaning comparable to Nazi — a comparison Righeimer scoffed at.

“The language that has been used by you councilmen against employees and the audience is much worse than what we’ve heard [from Vrska],” Goldmann said.

John Stephens, a former council candidate and city pension committee member, noted that March is part of Lent, “a time of forgiveness.”

“Using the power of forgiveness is a great thing,” he said.

Following public comment, Righeimer said he didn’t know whether to be “shocked, embarrassed or dismayed” by the words of Vrska’s defenders.

“I can’t believe the Alice in Wonderland you’re living in, that words have no meaning,” he said.

Righeimer called Vrska — who was sitting in the audience and didn’t comment on her own behalf — arrogant because she didn’t ask for forgiveness. He accused her of hiding behind the views of others speaking about her.

“The point is, there are consequences to what we do ... [and] she thinks she can say whatever she wants,” Righeimer said. “She has a massive problem with adult supervision.”

Genis said Vrska’s comment was “not a good thing to say,” but she urged her colleagues to forgive her. To make her point, she used Bible quotations.

“Blessed are those whose way is blameless,” Genis said, later adding: “Let he who is without sin cast the first stone.”

Councilman Gary Monahan said he didn’t approve of Vrska’s appointment in 2013. He accused her of “berating” city staff, many of whom helped her with her numerous public records requests.

Vrska filed 111 of them in 2014 alone. During portions of 2015, staff also set up special times for her each week to review the city’s annual financial reports dating to its incorporation in 1953.

Monahan said Vrska’s behavior exemplifies a general lack of decorum in the council chamber that includes talking, hooting, hissing and “chomping on food.”

“It’s ridiculous,” Monahan said.

Vrska declined to comment about her ouster from the committee following the council’s vote.

In a statement to the Daily Pilot last week, she called her Nazi comment “misguided” and “inappropriate” but said she never indicated that she was representing a city committee when she made it.

As Vrska left the council chamber Tuesday, she clutched a purse bearing a bumper sticker that combined the last names of Righeimer and Mayor Steve Mensinger.

It read, “Mensheimer broke Costa Mesa.”