Letters to the Editor
Blom had a chance
Noah Blom has a lot more time left on the city council and Joy Brenner has served with distinction for several years. It’s a shame that Noah Blom could not bring himself to do the honorable and gentlemanly thing, and the right thing, by backing Joy Brenner for Mayor Pro Tem.
Barbara Peckenpaugh
Newport Beach
There’s lots of discussion going on in and around the City…What does it all mean?
Fall has been an eventful and stressful period for City Council and the residents of Newport Beach. First came the vote on the charter amendment to Elect the Mayor and, secondly, the decision over the selection of the Mayor and Mayor Pro Tem. Both events elicited a considerable number of opinions expressed in the local news sources and on the City’s Public Portal.
The City Council’s two votes were a mirror reflection of each other, both ending in a tally of 4-3. For the selection of leaders there is no “redo,” while the election of the mayoral issue will be decided by the votes of the residents in 2022.
Regarding the expression of opinion on these two issues, I learned something interesting which may not be new to those who are active in city government. In previous years when I attended council meetings the letters of the residents were often printed in a packet that one could pick up at the entrance to the evening meeting. Not so now.
When I talked to the City Clerk about the printing of my letter, she said that because of the vast number of opinion letters, the letters were printed only on the Public Portal the day of the meeting and were accessible to the public as well as the Council.
My first wish was that the Council would read those letters carefully, because I learned a lot when I perused those of the October 26th meeting. The first surprising thing that I learned was that you don’t have to live in the city to express your written opinion on the Portal, nor do you have to be to speak at City Council meetings. I thought back to those Council meetings where I saw myriad people line up to express opinions. I wonder now how many did not live in Newport Beach.
The same is true of the Portal. Councilmember Diane Dixon came to the same conclusion as I after scanning those letters when she stated at the beginning of her prepared speech at the October 26th meeting, that the letters written in favor of the election of the mayor consisted of formulaic letters written over and over, while the letters in opposition were written, for the most part, with thoughtful ideas which contained deep knowledge of the subject matter. (Her speech is available on YouTube.)
I found upon reading the support letters that many did follow formulaic structures. There were about 3 or 4 letter formats which were repeated over and over, sometimes as many as 25 times. There were also at least 25 copies of a preprinted petition and a final batch of letters with gargantuan type designed perhaps to take up space.
Many of the letters from both sides were very short; there were some long
detailed and thoughtful letters however, written in opposition to electing the mayor.
In conclusion, I would say that the letters and speeches showed that this topic is very much on people’s minds. But when it comes to voting, only the residents’ opinions will count.
Lynn Lorenz
Newport Beach