City, Neighbors in Pooper Role : Purportedly Pesky Parties on Peninsula Face Curbs

Tenants and owners of “party houses” on the Balboa Peninsula have received letters in the past several weeks, warning them to stop having such a good time or face criminal charges.

The letters are the first step in a campaign by the city to discourage loud, late-night parties, often by short-term vacationers in rental units. The next step, under a proposed ordinance, would make those who received one letter subject to misdemeanor charges if they continued to party too enthusiastically.

At their meeting this week, City Council members heard complaints from homeowners about the parties. And City Atty. Robert Burnham said Wednesday that he will soon finish a draft of the ordinance.

Every summer, many of the houses squeezed onto the peninsula become what police officers call “party houses,” rental properties with new tenants weekly, usually college age, who split the $1,000 fee four to 10 ways.

Dozens and Dozens

Newport Beach Police Officer Howard Eisenberg, in charge of investigating party house incidents, said: “You start off with a dozen people who invite a dozen friends, and they invite a dozen more, and then you’re dealing with an uncontrollable situation.”

But this year, he said, “we’re trying to formulate a way to resolve the problem more as a long-term thing rather than in a reactionary way we’ve been dealing with the immediate problem” by arresting people, he said.

Eisenberg’s office sent the letters to several tenants, property owners and rental agents of identified party houses, and received a “very cooperative response.”

“Many of them (homeowners and agents) have been calling me and saying, ‘How can we best go about resolving it,’ ” Eisenberg said.

In Eisenberg’s office, a wall map of Newport Beach is dotted with colored pins indicating the precise locations of known party houses, concentrated between 34th and 47th streets.

He estimated that officers respond to between 10 and 15 party-disturbance calls each night. In the last two weeks, he said, a total of about 20 partygoers have been arrested.

“The vast majority of people down here are upstanding citizens,” Eisenberg said, “but there is that element that wants to party without rules, and they do things in these weekly rentals that they would never consider doing in their own homes.”

Although Eisenberg said this summer is no worse than most, some residents disagree.

Jerry Bernheim, who lives near 35th Street between the oceanfront and Balboa Boulevard, said it is not unusual for him and his wife to awaken to the sound of beer bottles being smashed in the gutter and the din of partygoers at 2 or 3 a.m.

After a riot broke out on the Fourth of July, Bernheim became involved in the West Newport Assn., a coalition of homeowners’ groups in west Newport Beach, and joined a committee expressly concerned with the party house issue.

“There isn’t a week that goes by that I don’t call the police, or at least have to go out there and tell some jerk to stop skateboarding up and down the street at 2 a.m. in front of my house,” he said.

Sidney Bickel, who lives near Bernheim, said: “These kids drink a lot of beer, and if it’s going to go in, it’s got to come out. Most every weekend there is some guy letting loose in my flower bed or up against the wall, and that’s not very pleasant.”