Costa Mesa council to address permit appeal by large sober-living facility

The Costa Mesa City Council is set to make the final call Tuesday on a permit for a major sober-living facility. Denial could lead to the five-unit compound shutting down.

The operator of the Ohio House, which houses up to 35 clients and 10 live-in managers, is appealing a 2017 city staff denial of a conditional use permit for the facility at 115 E. Wilson St. that was upheld by the Planning Commission in February.

Staff and commissioners rejected a permit because the establishment is within 650 feet of another, city-approved sober-living home on Wilson.

The appeal of the Planning Commission decision called the city’s regulations “arbitrary and restrictive” in violation of the federal Fair Housing Act. It also indicated that Ohio House operators would be open to reducing occupancy, but it did not specify a number.

Ohio House representatives told the commissioners that the facility has been operating on its site in some capacity since 2012, predating 2015 sober-living home regulations and making it eligible to be “grandfathered.”

The 2015 rules require that sober-living homes, including existing ones, obtain conditional use permits if they have more than six residents and are in multifamily zones and abide by the buffer rule requiring that sober-living homes be at least 650 feet from one another in residential areas.

Needle exchange ban

Also Tuesday, the City Council will consider codifying its ban on needle exchanges.

The item would kick off the process to amend city code and make permanent the temporary prohibitions the council has passed in the past year.

The council last renewed its moratorium in July, extending a temporary ban it put in place last year after the California Department of Public Health’s approval of a proposal from the Orange County Needle Exchange Program to distribute clean syringes and other supplies on West 17th Street in Costa Mesa between Whittier Avenue and the city boundary near Armstrong Petroleum Corp., as well as in parts of Anaheim, Orange and Santa Ana.

Advocates of such programs say they can help prevent the spread of diseases such as HIV and Hepatitis C by providing clean needles and supplies to intravenous drug users.

The city has said the ban is necessary to protect public health, welfare and safety, citing fears that free needles could draw illicit drug users to the city and jeopardize the sobriety of clients in Costa Mesa’s numerous addiction recovery facilities.

If approved Tuesday, the code amendment would need a second vote later for the change to take effect.

Tuesday’s council meeting starts at 6 p.m. at City Hall, 77 Fair Drive.