Guest Op-Ed – Motorcycle Noise Within Laguna City Limits

Posted on October 18, 2017

Laguna Beach Mayor Toni Iseman addressed a group of Wesley District residents on the night of September 20. She shared a proposal regarding restrictions on motorcycle noise on PCH. She then advised us the problem would be enforcement because, “I happen to know that our police officers don’t like pulling over motorcycles because they would rather pull over little old school teachers, (as she gestured to herself), in their cars because that is easier.”

There were three retired police officers in the room. I was one of them. I spontaneously replied, “That’s not true.” Behind me one of the other police officers said the same. Mayor Iseman put her hand up towards us in a gesture to stop, looked elsewhere in the room and continued. None of us persisted. It seemed not the place. Perhaps this is.

The Mayor’s comment came up in our neighborhood the next day. Several residents acknowledged that she was once a school teacher and is probably why she referred to herself? And that perhaps she once received a ticket? I don’t know.

What I do know is that first responders, police officers and fire fighters, do not have the time or luxury to address our critics. Especially another public servant. It goes against our Law Enforcement Code of Ethics. It can also be construed as under color of authority if there is any semblance that we are speaking as a public officer. Minimally it is considered unethical and unprofessional. We would be disciplined.

That night the Ms. Iseman began her talk by reminding all of us that as mayor she has the “Bully Pulpit” and intends to use it to speak on our behalf. Mayor, you used your platform to speak flippantly of our police officers and eluded to them as lazy. It was a reckless statement, true or false. And it was false.

Factually speaking, Laguna Beach officers have shared with me that motorcycle excessive noise and exhaust have been an emphasis of their attention.

My opinion is from a career of law enforcement in the Orange County Sheriff’s Department. That included the honor of being assigned to the Training Division three times, as a deputy, sergeant and lieutenant. Between street assignments I always gravitated back to training because it is what molds the future of law enforcement. And I can assure you that California police officers, specifically Orange County police officers, are the best in the nation.

I was fortunate to retire in the assignment of the Orange County Regional Training Academy Commander. I can pledge to you, with confidence, that the required six month academy to become a California police officer weeds out any “lazy” recruits. To the contrary they are trained daily that law enforcement is a career of service to others. Those who do not grasp that concept do not graduate.

Toni Iseman is entitled to express her opinion. But Mayor Iseman we believe should be more prudent in a public forum when speaking about our city police department. Police officers are not perfect. But we police ourselves. Besides self-discipline, the peer discipline is constant. And at times unforgiving. I’d like to believe the same can be said of our city civilian leadership.

The next day, Thursday, September 21, I watched with sadness and reverence as the Laguna Beach Police Department Color Guard folded the Flag of Remembrance for Officer Gordon French. And for Officer Jon Coutchie, commemorating the anniversary of his EOW, (End of Watch), when he was killed in the line of duty, selflessly serving our city. I also saw Laguna Beach police officers I had the privilege of having an active role in their training several years ago. One has an on-duty injury, temporarily preventing him from working on the street. He told me he is determined to return as quickly as physically possible. It reminded me why we can all sleep peacefully every night.

May we all have appreciation for those who serve in public service. But may we also have a special gratitude in our hearts for those who stand watch, 24/7, between us and our worst fears. And whenever possible, a word of thanks or even a simple nod of recognition can be all it takes to help them make it to the end of that sometimes thankless shift.

Jeff Bardzik
Laguna Beach Resident

* Editor’s Note: LagunaBeachCHAT welcomes guest articles on topics of general interest, from respected sources. If a guest article is accepted as relevant and topical, we commit to making no changes (other than spelling and small technical corrections) and will publish the article in its entirety.

Will Wayfinding Signs take us to Laguna-Land?

On 14 June 2016, the City Council adopted the FY 2016-2018 Economic Development Action Plan. Goal 2 of the plan is to “enhance the customer experience for residents in a way that visitors also enjoy”, and one of the strategies to achieve this nirvana-state is to develop a “wayfinding signage master plan”. In bureaucratic-ese, they officially refer to this as the Citywide Wayfinding Sign Program (CWSP).

So far the City has paid $65,000 to Graphic Solutions (GS) of San Diego for Phases 1 and 2 of this strategy. In their Request for Proposal (RFP) response, GS stated: “We know that a well-crafted wayfinding program will expedite vehicular circulation, direct drivers to parking, reduce trips, encourage bicycle travel and create a pleasant pedestrian experience – for residents and visitors alike. In addition, we have gathered substantial evidence from our clients that functional wayfinding contributes to a community’s economic development and sustainability efforts.” (emphasis theirs – Graphic Solutions, RFP response, pg. 7, 13 July 2016).

We find it comical how both the City and the consultancy firm continuously strain themselves to point out the benefits of the CWSP for residents. It is comical because we believe that any resident of Laguna Beach who has lived here for more than several months would find these signs to be of little use. Think about it: once you have located City Hall, or the HIP district once, don’t you feel you’d be proficient to find either again regardless of your starting point?

More significantly, the visual effect of the signs will be to ruin a good amount of the remaining ‘quaintness’ of our town in favor of a highly commercial, amusement-park like atmosphere. If you’re still not convinced of the actual intended beneficiaries of the program consider that the Laguna Beach Chamber of Commerce (LBCoC) and Visit Laguna Beach (VLB) have both been involved in the project from the start (they each helped vet the firms responding to the RFP) and VLB has expressed its willingness to contribute funds to the project’s implementation.

The City formed a steering committee consisting of two City Council members, a Planning Commission member, an Arts Commission member, a VLB representative, and a LBCoC representative (NOTICE: no resident representative) to vet the possible wayfinding sign designs. So let’s be clear. The CWSP is intended to benefit commercial interests in the city by helping tourists better locate city attractions, using general fund tax dollars (to which local property tax payers contribute the lion’s share) to fund it. Full stop.

As for the steering committee’s preferred sign design: I’ve placed a small red arrow atop the winner in the image below.

At the February 17, 2017 mid-year budget update City Council meeting, the council decided unanimously to set aside an additional $300,000 in funding to move the CWSP forward. So, together with the $65,000 spent on GS consultant services, local tax payers could potentially contribute an additional $300,000 for a total of $365,000. We’re still awaiting VLB’s determination of how much (if anything) they will contribute to the program.

History

10/4/16 – Unanimous vote by council to approve up to $65,000 for phases 1 & 2 (out of 4)of the wayfinding project

11/15/16 – Council members Iseman & Zur Schmiede to represent the council on steering committee

2/17/17 – Unanimous Mid-year budget update; item 11 – additional funding of $300,000 for CWSP.

Next Steps

How is City Hall planning to unleash the CWSP on us? For the pilot phase, 7 to 8 new wayfinding signs will be installed from Broadway to Legion Street along Coast Highway. If the drawn mock-ups are scaled correctly, the wayfinding signs will apparently be 9 to 10 feet tall, with multiple horizontal “chevrons” pointing to the various “attractions” nearby. Clearance under the lowest horizontal chevron should be no less than 7 feet.

Baseline Measurements

As LagunaBeachCHAT has repeatedly pointed out to our elected officials, sound management principles demand collection and analysis of data. Only by collecting data and analyzing the changes in the data that result from actions taken, can one hope to make sound decisions. In the case of the CWSP the city has collected no baseline data relating to the behaviors that the program is intended to affect. Recall, “enhancing the customer experience” was the non-tangible/aspirational goal and hence not measurable in a meaningful way. If we cut them some slack and try to measure some of the more defined outcomes they hope for: expedite vehicular circulation, direct drivers to parking, reduce trips, encourage bicycle travel and create a pleasant pedestrian experience; then by all means please collect baseline data on all of these metrics. But they have not attempted to collect any baseline data for these metrics and so how can our decision-makers hope to discern any positive or negative results from the pilot phase?

Let Your Opinion Be Heard

LagunaBeachCHAT is planning a direct action to educate residents about this program and what we believe are its shortcomings. Please be on the look-out for us near the Farmers’ Market on 29July17 and 05Aug17 from 08:00-10:00am where we will be collecting signatures from those who wish their opinion against the program to be counted. For those unable to make it to the Farmers’ Market, we will be posting an online petition which we will collect and present to the Council once this program comes before them again for further consideration.

To go to the online petition click here

Michael Morris is a retired Software/Technology executive, living and owning a property in Laguna Beach since 2013. He served on the Orange County Grand Jury for a 1-year term during 2015/2016. He currently sits on the Board of Directors of the Grand Jurors Association of Orange County.

Public Pressure works! – BoS authorizes $5m in new housing for homeless people with serious mental illnesses

Posted on June 10, 2017 (Updated: February 12, 2024)

Building public pressure does work to influence our elected representatives, as seen in the BoS’ increased attention to issues of homelessness in the County. Most recently, they have voted to spend $5million in new monies targeted at services for mentally ill homeless. Most of the attention is directed at the “riverbed homeless” and those in North Orange County (as we have mentioned before). Its too bad that our City officials don’t seem to engage with the County on this issue, giving Laguna no seat at the table when public monies are directed towards this problem.

Update! Guest Article – Pitiful Settlement, By Michele Monda

Posted on June 10, 2017 (Updated: February 5, 2018)

Update on Airplane Noise Issue – February 2018

City Hall, specifically those who run the city and not City Council, are at it again. They have been deceptive about the wonderful “new” settlement to make it look like they got a win and make it seem like the tens of thousands of dollars that we just spent with our city attorney’s law firm, Rutan and Tucker, were well spent. What’s worse is that City Council did not know anything about the details of the settlement until it was presented to them for their signatures. All this was done behind closed doors. And what a pitiful settlement this is for Laguna residents.

What they got has already been in place since NextGen was implemented in March 2017. Their “negotiated” flight path change to south of Laguna (or really to over my head IN South Laguna and north of Three Arch Bay) – they’ve been doing that for the past 3 years but it really intensified after March. That’s their NextGen Flight path. The fact that the overflights over much of Laguna have decreased 80 percent in the past year – well YES, because they are all now on the laser beam flight path right over my house as mandated by NextGen. The altitude at crossing land of 10,000 ft – that’s their normal flight trajectory after they hit the last way station in the ocean at 7,000 ft. on the NextGen flight path. They’ve already been doing that. City officials are excited that the FAA has agreed they will not take short cuts over Laguna (well, Laguna north of me in So. Lag). But there are so so many exceptions that the FAA put into the settlement that basically they can still take short cuts whenever they want.

So all that was accomplished with this settlement is that Laguna Beach has formalized and legitimized what the FAA wanted all along and has been doing since March 2017. They didn’t negotiate anything – they gave away any possibility of getting what all of us wanted – to have them fly the planes farther out in the ocean and cross land higher up like they used to before NextGen was developed. They got nothing that wasn’t already being done with NextGen.

So what’s the next step for those of us STILL under the flight path in Laguna? We will be redoubling our efforts legislatively, appealing to Laguna Niguel officials to join in the fight and take the issue directly to the airlines. The City of Laguna Beach is now officially out of their nightmare of having to look like their doing something for their residents. They can point to this worthless settlement and say “See, look what we did for you.” Bah.

Michèle Monda

Update on Airplane Noise Issue

The regional Town Hall meeting held in Laguna Niguel in May 2017 on airplane noise did in fact create a whole lot of noise. We had OC Supervisors Bartlett and Spitzer attend as well as Congressman Rohrabacher and major representatives from every south county city and Citizens for No Plane Noise.

As a result of that meeting Congressman Rohrabacher wrote a letter to the FAA. He requested that the planes fly higher and fly farther out in the ocean before turning back to cross land. As predicted, the FAA sent him a boiler plate, pabulum, pat on the head letter saying that there is ongoing legal action and they can’t (read won’t) do anything about it. Plus, it’s just so complicated . . .

So after this fell on deaf ears at the FAA, Congressman Rohrabacher followed up with legislative action. He introduced two amendments to HR 2997, the 21st Century Aviation Innovation, Reform and Reauthorization Act. These amendments pertain to coastal overflight procedures and the concomitant inclusion of community concerns to flight path changes. And the best news is that it specifically calls out the California Metroplex and our concerns. The bill is currently in the House Rules Committee – stay tuned for progress.

Laguna Niguel passed a city resolution supporting the limitation of the negative impacts of air flights over Laguna Niguel on August 1, 2017. The mayor of San Juan Capistrano sent a complaint letter to the FAA Administrator in Washington requesting a review of the environmental impact now that NextGen has been implemented.

Currently, Newport Beach, Laguna Beach and the County of Orange are involved in a lawsuit against the FAA and it’s supposed environmental impact report (that was computer generated and not based on reality). They are currently in mediation behind closed doors about which no one seems to be able to get information. The FAA has requested a 45-day extension on the stay for mediation, which is set to expire on November 17, 2017. I sure would love to know what’s going on.

I’ve saved the best news for last. The city of Phoenix, Arizona sued the FAA AND WON!!! It took 2 years for the case to be heard (FAA is all about delay, delay, delay) and Citizens for No Plane Noise is currently digging into the case to see what we can use for our case. There are many similarities and points that we can use in our lawsuit, as their issue is identical to ours minus the ocean!

Yes, this is a slow process. But in the meantime we need residents affected by the noise to write letters and more letters. I personally am woken every morning at 7:02 when the planes start roaring over my once quiet house. In 2012 I NEVER had a plane. Now it’s constant. To learn how to write a complaint letter and to whom to write please go on our website NoPlaneNoise.us and look for the Laguna Beach tab.

Together we can make a lot of noise – we need to help our legislators help us!!

Michèle Monda
Citizens for No Plane Noise
Laguna Beach

To a packed house of over 500 residents on May 15 in Laguna Niguel Town Hall, Supervisors Bartlett and Spitzer and Congressman Rohrabacher presented the airplane noise situation. Since the FAA implemented the NextGen flight path realignment in April south county homes have been under attack day and night with noise. Elected officials from Laguna Beach, Laguna Niguel, Dana Point, San Juan Capistrano and Mission Viejo attested to the noise increase and the number of residents complaining.

As a result of the noise, a grass roots organization called Citizens for No Plane Noise was formed. They helped organize this meeting to educate the public and let them know how to complain to the FAA to stop the low flying planes.

Supervisor Lisa Bartlett said the solution is easy – fly the planes farther out in the ocean so they gain higher altitude before they turn back over land. 20,000 feet would mean very little noise. Citizens for No Plane Noise has documented planes as low as 8,000 ft. crossing over. The FAA has slowly implemented this change of flight path and lower altitudes since the fall of 2015. When you complain they tell you nothing has changed. BUT IT HAS. Where before planes would fly out to Catalina before turning, they are now turning right after take off from John Wayne and following a very precise flight path thanks to satellite based navigation versus ground based navigation. They are now on a super highway in the sky and if you live under it you are besieged.

Additionally, with the realignment of the airspace, when John Wayne shuts down at 10 pm for their curfew, LAX takes over the airspace. Those are the planes that you now hear at 3 am. They are coming up from South America and Mexico and instead of flying over the ocean as they used to they are now flying over the coastal land area.

Why is this happening??? To save fuel and time in the air. This is the goal of the airlines and since they were instrumental in the design of NextGen these new flight paths serve their interests without taking into account the people under the flight path. Newport Beach, Laguna Beach and the County of Orange have lawsuits against the FAA saying that they did not do a proper environmental assessment of their new flight paths. Imagine the increase in pollutants from the jet fuel – and you are now breathing it.

What can you do about this? Write letters complaining of the noise and pollution!! Go on Citizens for No Plane Noise’ Website and write as many letters as you can to the FAA, city officials, and Congressman. Sample letters and the addresses are available. The more letters they receive, the more they will take notice. The website is www.NoPlaneNoise.us.

If you are bothered by the airplane noise, please write, write, write! Only in numbers will they listen and change their flight path – fly farther out in the ocean and cross land higher up!!!

Michele Monda
South Laguna
Michelemonda@aol.com

Homeless in the OC

Posted on April 5, 2017 (Updated: February 12, 2024)

In Orange County, new research from UC Irvine estimates an overall savings of $42 million per year if every chronically homeless person is provided permanent supportive housing. The solution to this growing problem will require that all of our leaders work together, County, Cities, non-profits, communities of faith and the homeless themselves (those not suffering from mental illness) to break the cycle that sees up to 15,000 people a year experiencing at least 1 incident of homelessness, in Orange County. Read more from the Voice of OC here.

81-Year-Old Tax Payers’ Watch Dog Uncovers County Misspending

Posted on November 6, 2016 (Updated: February 12, 2024)

An article in the Voice of OC shows local activists bring attention to County’s mishandling of Tax Dollars. The article reports on a complaint that Ms. Shirley Grindle filed with the FPPC against OC Supervisors Andrew Do and Lisa Bartlett (who is OUR district 5 supervisor and current Chair of the OC BoS). According to the allegations, Do spent almost a quarter of a million of taxpayer dollars to send out campaign flyers disguised as District 1 resident outreach. Do is in a tight race to retain his seat on the BoS.

Similarly, Ms. Bartlett (from Dana Point) spent $137k of taxpayer dollars sending out District 5 flyers which broke the rules and amounted to taxpayer-funded campaign materials. I’ve provided a link to the Voice of OC article and the actual complaint that Ms. Grindle filed with the FPPC. Shirley is a treasure and every OC taxpayer owes her a debt of gratitude for her >40 years of dogged attempts to minimize political corruption in OC. She’s 81 years old, and slowing down a little but still every bit as feisty as in years gone by.

Read the full article here