Permits OKd for Dana Point Golf Resort

A Newport Beach home builder won approval Tuesday from the Dana Point City Council to extend development permits for a 225-acre site where the company wants to build a Pebble Beach-style golf resort and five-star hotel.

Capital Pacific Holdings Inc. wants to build the hotel and expand Monarch Beach Golf Links into a championship course. The project would include a gated community of 238 luxury homes.

“No project is perfect,” said Councilman Harold Kaufman, who voted with the 3-1 majority to approve the request. “But this is a good project.”

Councilwoman Karen Lloreda added that having no development of the property “is not helping the city. We are looking at a window of opportunity now.”

The dissenting vote was cast by Councilwoman Ruby L. Netzley, who expressed concerns about how much control the city would maintain over the details.

The builder wants to buy the property, just inland from the Ritz-Carlton, from a unit of Nippon Shinpan Co., a Japanese credit-card company. Capital Pacific has said in letters to the city that its completion of that transaction is contingent on having city development permits in place.

Nippon Shinpan had plans to develop the site and was set to proceed with city approval in 1992. But its financing fell through when the economy suffered a downturn.