Yes on Measure C, No on Measure D : Huntington Beach Must Protect Its Shoreline

There are four things voters in Huntington Beach can do with city Measures C and D on the Nov. 6 ballot, and three of them are bad. They would be bad not only for Huntington Beach residents, but for everyone, because the issue to be decided involves the use of, and access to, the public’s beachfront.

However, one option, passage of Measure C, would be good. It was put on the ballot as an initiative sponsored by residents and would require a public vote and majority approval on matters involving the lease, sale, transfer or exchange of park and beach land.

Measure D, put on the ballot by the City Council in response to Measure C (and, some suspect, only to confuse voters and scuttle the initiative effort) would require the same public vote--but only for the sale of city park and beach land.

Because the city is most likely to lease, not sell, its beachfront, Measure D would be far less restrictive.

So here are the four possibilities:

--Residents can approve both Measure C and Measure D.

--They can reject them both, which would leave things as is, with the City Council free to wheel and deal and allow the development of those environmentally sensitive beach areas.

--They can pass Measure D.

--Or they can pass Measure C, which would truly be in the public interest.

We ordinarily look askance at attempts to bog down local representative government with restrictions written into a city charter that keep a council from operating smoothly by requiring it to submit every little decision to a public vote.

But this case doesn’t involve just any little thing; it has to do with the potential loss of shoreline to public access, use and view. That is a danger that must be avoided, and requiring a vote on the sale and lease of beach and parkland is not unreasonable considering two things: Huntington Beach is dripping with developer influence, and once coastal land is leased, it is essentially lost.

Huntington Beach is a city undergoing development, redevelopment and growth. Through it all, however, the public has held one area inviolable: its irreplaceable shoreline. Oil has fouled it, but builders have not been able to leap Pacific Coast Highway and gain a real beachhead --at least not so far.

In such a growth-oriented climate, where city councils are under constant pressure from developers-- and where history has shown that the developers have a strong influence with city officials--it makes sense to put in checks and balances. Residents need veto power over the sensitive decisions on coastal property. That property is merely held in trust by the city, and its actions affect everyone, not just for today but for generations to come. That is an awesome responsibility, and if the council is showing signs of administering it irresponsibly by allowing private use, safeguards are needed.

The Huntington Beach shoreline, through sale or lease, must not be allowed to become another Miami Beach and wind up cluttered with hotels, restaurants and apartments. Measure C is a needed protection to repel developers and efforts to privatize the public beachfront.

Because the two ballot measures appear so similar, there is concern that some voters could become confused. One way to keep them in perspective, as some environmentalists have noted, is to think of Measure C as being for the “community” and Measure D as being for “developers.”

It is a distinction Huntington Beach voters should remember in voting Yes on Measure C and rejecting D.