DANA POINT : Headlands Ballot Arguments Available

Ballot arguments and rebuttals in the upcoming referendum on the Headlands development now are available at Dana Point City Hall.

On Election Day, Nov. 8, Dana Point voters will be asked to cast either two yes votes to approve the hotel and residential plan or two no votes to reject it.

At stake is a $500-million development plan approved by the City Council in April that would allow the landowners to build a 400-room hotel and 370 homes on the 121-acre blufftop parcel above Dana Point Harbor.

City Clerk Sharon L. Waits said the referendum will consist of two ballot measures because the council action came in two separate votes that amended both the city’s General Plan and a specific plan for the Headlands.

The ballot arguments and rebuttals also will be published in sample ballots that will be mailed to voters sometime this fall, Waits said.

For more than three years the development plan has been the focus of an increasingly bitter debate. A petition drive launched immediately after the council approved the plan April 5 forced the council to place it on the ballot.

The plan’s proponents claim the property already is partially developed and that the city needs the revenue a resort development can generate. Its opponents claim the proposed development is too massive and that more of the property should be saved as a natural resource.

Since the 1940s, the Headlands has been owned by the M.S. Sherman Co. and Chandis Securities Co. Chandis Securities, a firm that oversees the financial holdings of the Chandler family, is a major stockholder in Times Mirror Co., which publishes the Los Angeles Times.