H.B. green-lights funds for domestic violence services and road repairs; rezoning OKd for waterfront property

A $203,143 state grant the Huntington Beach City Council accepted Monday night will go toward domestic violence services provided by community organizations and local law enforcement. The council also committed $67,714 in matching funds to keep the city’s Violence Against Women program going.

“I’m so pleased that our Police Department applies for this grant and utilizes it to provide for battered women” Mayor Lyn Semeta said.

The grant from the California Office of Emergency Services will pay for two victim advocates contracted through the Waymakers Victim Assistance Program and Interval House, which provides domestic violence services in Los Angeles and Orange counties. The partnership with the Huntington Beach Police Department has been in place since 1998. The grant also will fund two part-time domestic violence investigators through the end of the year.

Also, the council voted to reclassify a Huntington Harbour property for low-density residential development. The property, at 16926 Park Ave., has been the subject of a decade-long attempt to develop it, with two failed proposals for a public marina since 2009.

The waterfront property is surrounded by single-family residences on three sides. No development is currently proposed.

Most recently, in July 2017, the Planning Commission denied a proposed marina after opposition from residents who said it would bring unwanted traffic to the narrow street.

The city entered a settlement agreement with the property owner, Medhat Rofael, in September 2018 that called for the rezoning in exchange for Rofael withdrawing the application for the marina project.

As part of the settlement, the city agreed to process a general plan amendment, zoning map amendment, Local Coastal Program amendment and an environmental assessment for the property at a fixed fee.

The matter will go before the California Coastal Commission before the zoning change is finalized, city staff said.

The City Council also approved without discussion two contracts for road rehabilitation projects throughout the city.

A $2.5-million contract with R.J. Noble Co. will repair 139 street segments that have been been determined to be in “very poor” condition based on a city rating system. The streets, which will be repaved and reinforced, are all north of Slater Avenue and east of Edwards Street.

A $5.1-million contract with All American Asphalt Co. will repair 2.5 miles of arterial streets, including stretches of Slater Avenue, Graham Street, Atlanta Avenue and Newland Street.

The segments have been rated as being in poor or very poor condition and haven’t been rehabilitated since the early 1990s, according to city staff.

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