INSIDE CITY HALL Here are a few...

INSIDE CITY HALL

Here are a few of the items the council considered Tuesday night.

MEASURE S GUIDELINES

Council members agreed to postpone changing the Measure S

guidelines, which tell the city when to apply the slow-growth law.

Greenlight committee spokesman Phil Arst and Newport Beach resident

John Buttolph each asked council members to set a separate meeting

for the discussion, which centers mainly on how expected traffic from

hotels and theaters is estimated. Traditionally, the city has

measured hotels by the number of rooms, but Greenlight leaders have

pressed for factoring in a facility’s square footage also.

WHAT IT MEANS

Council members in March postponed voting on guideline changes

because they wanted more time to understand the technical issues

involved, and they still had questions Tuesday. A meeting to discuss

the guideline changes will be set by city staff members.

BALBOA BUSINESS DISTRICT UTILITY LINE BURIAL

Balboa Village business owners voted to tax themselves to pay for

putting utility lines underground at a cost of $1.2 million. They

rejected the same tax in January.

Mayor Tod Ridgeway, a major proponent of the project, was able to

convince property owners to agree to pay assessments between $979 and

$54,393 over 15 years for the work. Construction is scheduled to

begin in September and will take about a year.

WHAT IT MEANS

The utility line burial is part of the third phase of a

multi-million-dollar improvement project in the Balboa business

district. After hearing the tabulation of business owners’ votes,

which were 55.54% for the project and 44.46% against, council members

voted to create the tax assessment district and hire a contractor for

the work.

City officials are still seeking grant money to pay for

renovations to Balboa streets, sidewalks and gutters that they hope

to do concurrently.

HEIGHT REGULATIONS CODE AMENDMENT

Council members unanimously agreed to form an ad hoc committee to

initiate the process of amending the code pertaining to building

height restrictions, because current regulations are ambiguous when

it comes to how height is measured. Although code requires height to

be measured from the unaltered natural grade of the ground, in most

parts of the city that condition no longer exists.

WHAT IT MEANS

The Planning Department will create an ad hoc committee to review

the height restrictions and recommend changes. The suggested changes

will then go through the public hearing process with the Planning

Commission and, if approved there, the City Council.

COAST HIGHWAY TAKEOVER

Council members approved an agreement with Caltrans, which will

relinquish the stretch of Coast Highway and pay the city $3.5 million

for maintenance and repairs.

WHAT IT MEANS

As far as the city is concerned, its work is done on the transfer

of Pacific Coast Highway between Newport Coast Drive and Jamboree

Road from state control to the city’s hands. Now all that’s left is

for the state to finalize the agreement on its end and pay up, which

the city expects to happen by October.

WATER POLLUTION INSPECTION FEES

People who apply for construction permits will be charged fees

ranging from $105 to $560 to cover the costs of checking runoff from

construction sites.

City staff members proposed the fees to cover the cost of the

time-consuming inspections, and council members agreed with the

recommendation. Fees are based on the value of the permitted project.

WHAT IT MEANS

Under the city’s National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System

permit, which is required by the federal Clean Water Act, the city

must make sure urban runoff isn’t getting into storm sewers. The city

began inspections last year and to date has performed more than 280

of them.

LIMITING SHORT-TERM LODGING PERMITS

Council members unanimously approved an ordinance to prohibit new

short-term lodging permits after June 1 for areas zoned for

single-family. The city attorney’s office proposed the regulation to

maintain the character of residential neighborhoods that have lower

densities and typically offer fewer weekly or monthly rentals than

neighborhoods with zoning densities of R-1.5 or higher.

WHAT IT MEANS

Homeowners whose property is in an area zoned for single-family

units will not be able to rent their property out as vacation rentals

or on any other short-term basis. The ordinance will come back before

the council for final approval on May 11.

PURCHASE OF LIFEGUARD VEHICLES

Council members agreed to spend $232,050 to purchase seven of the

vehicles from General Motors, buy two new vehicles and outfit four

previously mothballed city vehicles with lifeguard equipment. Money

for the unbudgeted expense will come from a vehicle replacement fund.

WHAT IT MEANS

City lifeguards will keep on rolling, though some of them will be

in different vehicles by next month. Since 1998 Chevrolet has lent

the city lifeguard trucks, but it will take back 13 of them when the

promotional agreement ends on May 10.