Mailbag: We want our say on Village Entrance

In reference to the proposed Village Entrance Parking Structure:

A July 5 Los Angeles Times story, “The O.C. Tollway needs to refinance debt,” is about the tollway going deeper into debt to avoid bankruptcy. The State Treasurer is backing the $2.2 billion new bond sale to avoid a possible default on its current bond payments, since the toll road has not lived up to ridership projections. Many predicted this right from the beginning.

I believe the Village Entrance Parking Structure will not be sufficiently revenue-generating and the city of Laguna Beach will be forced to ask for more revenue bonds, just like the OC Tollway, digging our community even deeper into debt to avoid bankruptcy.

With no money set aside for maintenance and operating expenses this parking structure will become just a bottomless pit of endless funding — and that’s frightening.

Nobody would buy the Village Entrance Project with their own money — $15 million down payment, plus $2.1 million per year for 25 years. What you get is $300,000 projected gross income (no expenses considered) annually.

Don’t let financing that seems to good to be true distract you from the bottom line. The taxpayers will be left holding the bag and we will have to bail out the Village Entrance Project. If we, the taxpayers, will be taking the risk we need to have our say.

Let us vote.

Charlotte Masarik

Laguna Beach

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Maybe South Laguna should go back on their own

With a quick look in phone book I found that many of the writers of letters to the editor regarding the proposed new view ordinance are from South Laguna.

Given how they are quite vocal about trees — as that is what predominantly makes up their vegetation and few properties having views — I have a suggestion. How about seceding from Laguna Beach? I remember when South Laguna was unincorporated and had to rely on the country fire department and I believe the sheriff’s department for services. It was a contentious time.

Perhaps they would be happier being on their own once more and let those who live in Laguna — the original part of Laguna — take care of returning our views that have been decimated by thoughtless individuals and in some cases, from what I understand, by vindictive people who do not want to be friendly neighbors. This would at least give a better representation of the view issue.

I am sure that these are the same folks who want the city to pay for the undergrounding of their wires. There are many parts of Laguna whose residents have paid out of their pockets and in some cases put themselves into debt to go underground. Now the rest of the city wants us to pay for their undergrounding?

I think that the city should think that over carefully. Why are we, those who had taken on the responsibility for doing this, pay for others who haven’t taken that responsibility. Perhaps a special tax can be put on those areas where people want to go underground and not burden us twice financially. If they like the trees then they should like the telephone poles as well — they were once trees you know.

Ganka Brown

Laguna Beach

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Let’s vote on Village Entrance

On June 11, 2013, in a packed City Hall meeting devoted to the proposed Village entrance, three City Council members voted to strip $15 million from the city’s general, parking, and sewer funds and put residents in debt for more than 25 years. Many residents, such as I, were at this meeting to propose that the citizenry have an opportunity to vote on the Village entrance and the costs to complete such a project.

It was a 3-2 vote of the council, with members Kerry Boyd and Toni Iseman voting no, and the majority of the council, Elizabeth Pearson, Steve Dicterow and Bob Whalen, voting for a revenue bond to finance the proposed Village Entrance Project.

As I discovered, a resident vote is not a requirement for revenue bond so, three members of the council voted for the revenue bond to circumvent a vote by us, the residents. A revenue bond has to pay for itself, legally, so these three council members have promised to institute a $1 per hour parking meter rate increase, as well as promising the taxpayers, us, that residents would back up any short fall with the General Fund. Our money.

So, as I understand the decisions made by Pearson, Dicterow and Whalen, Laguna will spend $81 million — $29 million in bonds which with interest comes to $81 million plus $15 million cash — to add an additional 200 new parking places. The bond will cost us $2.1 million a year for the next 25 years and this will be paid for by promised parking revenue generated by raising our existing parking rates $1 per hour. If this doesn’t work we the taxpayers are somehow obligated.

When you think about this vote by Dicterow, Whalen and Pearson, it seems quite risky to me. Are there no other solutions to our congested Village such as satellite parking and trams?

Other residents I am sure might not agree with me but shouldn’t we all have a say? We did not elect these City Council members to spend our $15 million on hand and put Laguna Beach in debt for the next 25 years. As a resident, and a home owner, I am more at ease with putting our city’s future in the hands of my fellow residents.

Shouldn’t we all have a vote on the Village Entrance, in light of the tremendous costs and the time spent with construction leaving and entering our canyon?

Please permit the residents to vote. It is our tax dollars at stake...and much more.

Jahn Levitt

Laguna Beach

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Why the fear about voting for Village Entrance?

The refusal of our City Council majority to allow a citizen vote regarding the Village Entrance project seems to confirm that the council acts more like a private club than duly elected representatives of the residents of Laguna Beach.

What is the council majority afraid of? Is it that the voters in Laguna will overwhelmingly reject spending tens of millions of dollars on a huge, un-needed parking structure and a park that, considering the proximity of the beach, will seldom be used?

Without the right to vote on the biggest single taxpayer expenditure in city history, we will have no say in whether we choose to further divert funding from more than a dozen public works projects that have already been delayed for more than 10 years.

We live near Moss Beach. Our neighborhood’s public improvement project was to be completed, after delays, by 2011. Now, we’ve been told that the rebuilding of crumbling public beach stairs and neglected planters, as well as view site improvements, will be delayed again until 2019. This is unacceptable.

Paul Merritt

Laguna Beach