HUNTINGTON BEACH : Ballot Measure Seen as Threat to Pierside

Because of the Planning Commission’s deadlocked vote this week on Pierside Village, a city growth-limit initiative on the Nov. 6 ballot will now be perceived as a referendum on the controversial proposal, supporters and opponents of the project said Wednesday.

The commissions’ 3-3 split late Tuesday on the planned restaurant complex postpones the City Council’s final consideration of the project until after the election because the Planning Commission will not readdress the matter until its Nov. 6 meeting.

Supporters of the project fear that passage of one of the two rival measures on the city ballot, Measure C, could jeopardize Pierside Village.

Measure C is a proposed City Charter amendment that would prohibit the city from selling or leasing any beach or parkland without voter approval. If it passes, and the City Council next month approves the Pierside Village plan, the project would still probably require approval of city voters before it could be built.

Planning Commission Chairwoman Geri Ortega, a longtime Pierside Village opponent, said, “Measure C is our hope now” for blocking the project.

Jonathan Chodos, the project developer, said Tuesday that he had hoped that the council would approve his plans before the election, partly because of the potential threat Measure C might pose.

Pierside Village calls for the city to lease 3.5 acres of the parking lot immediately south of the Municipal Pier to be developed as a complex of restaurants, plazas and promenades.

The competing City Council-sponsored Measure D would require a popular vote before any sales but would permit leasing of beaches and parkland. Some voters may perceive that a vote for Measure D and against Measure C will be a nod of support for beachfront development, officials said.

“There certainly is a potential for (measures) C and D to pose a figurative referendum” on Pierside Village, Councilman John Erskine said Wednesday. Erskine, a proponent of the project, joined four other councilmen in placing Measure D on the ballot to compete with the citizens’ initiative.

However, Mayor Thomas J. Mays, a leading supporter of the project and Measure D, said he doubts that passage of Measure C would block Pierside Village.

Mays said Measure C would not be binding on contracts involving park or beach land that were in place before Jan. 1, 1989, and the city agreed to a lease with the Pierside developer in 1986.

However, because that lease has since been amended, many city officials, as well as Chodos, agree that approval of Measure C could throw a roadblock in the path of the development.

If both the initiative and Pierside Village are approved, the fate of the project would probably have to be determined by the courts, leaders on both sides of the issue said.