About Us

Laguna Beach CHAT
City Hall Accountability and Transparency

Mission

Laguna Beach CHAT Citizen Coalition Group desires to advance our community governing system by advocating city government accountability and transparency.  We serve residents by providing them with an open and honest platform to gain knowledge about City functions and decisions that impact their quality of life and our local community.   

Vision:

Laguna Beach is a City where residents place a priority on government accountability and transparency, and become more actively involved in its growth, future and destiny.

Introduction and Background: 
 
Welcome to Laguna Beach Chat.  We hope the information we provide is valuable to you and that we quickly become a resource for obtaining factual data on local city and county government issues that are of interest to you.  We welcome input about the site so please feel free to send us suggestions or comments.  You may also submit your own factual information related to our city and county governments for posting consideration.  
 
LBCHAT was developed by several civic-minded residents of Laguna Beach who came together after individually experiencing a lack of information and/or comprehensive information from LB City Hall.   The volunteers are dedicated to creating a more informed and involved public.  Committed volunteers monitor city business activities and bring topics of interest forward for in-depth research, fact checking and public data posting on topics we identify as having substantial and lasting impacts to all City residents.  This is no small task!   Our once sleepy little city of approximately 23,500 residents is besieged with issues consistent with much bigger cities due to our popularity and extensive promotion as a coastal destination spot.  At the end of the day, for every resident of this city, every decision made at every level of our city government impacts each of us in some way.  This requires our attention.  
 
We believe that it is important to know the facts and to exercise our right to speak up, and when the time comes, to vote with knowledge and understanding of the issues.  We want to assure the public that the information we provide is based upon factual information we obtain from the City of Laguna Beach, The County, other coastal cities and the public as long as it is considered public knowledge.  We are NOT a news organization and we do NOT accept monies for advertising or ask for financial support from any city or county agency.  We are not paid to provide information and we are not affiliated or represent any political groups.   
 
We are newly formed and growing.  Our focus will continue to address topics that arise out of vocal interest and concerns shared by LB residents.  We invite you to join us in this effort.  Please send the LBCHAT advisory volunteers your contact information if you are interested in becoming a volunteer of LBCHAT.   
 

Thank you for taking the time to visit our website.  We update regularly, so please keep us in mind in your quest to become better informed.  We love Laguna Beach as much as you do.

LBCHAT Website Development and Maintenance Core Advisory Volunteers: 

  • MJ Abraham is a retired former City Government Communications Manager & Principal Management Analyst and Art Museum Director living in Laguna Beach since 1970.    
  • Stefanee Freedman is a local journalist with more than 20 years of community news reporting experience, who has worked at the Laguna Beach Independent under Stu Saffer. Stefanee is a long time Laguna Beach Resident graduating from Laguna Beach High School in the late 80s. She also is a freelance web designer and has a monthly column in OC Jewish Life magazine.

Contributors:  Residents of Laguna Beach.

We Welcome All Residents:

Do your due diligence and learn the facts about City Hall operations and City Council decisions that impact our community.  Factual supporting public documents are available here on LagunaBeachCHAT.com.

*We reserve the right to look over all comments in the comment section before posting. We encourage the general public to give their comments and opinions to the facts posted on the LagunaBeachCHAT website in this section. The opinions posted on this page are not the opinions of LagunaBeachCHAT.com and the site is not responsible for the expressed opinions on these matters about the City of Laguna Beach. LagunaBeachCHAT accepts no paid advertising nor does it conduct any fund-raising and is therefore independent of outside influences.

Thank you,
Laguna Beach CHAT