Newport Beach takes a deeper look at Civic Center as possible police HQ site
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The Newport Beach City Council this week approved roughly $1.5 million for study, design and outreach contracts related to the Civic Center Park as a possible home for a future police headquarters.
As a newly formed advisory committee is currently looking at multiple locations to build a modern station for the Newport Beach Police Department, Tuesday’s votes drew protests from residents who felt elected officials were giving special advantage to the Civic Center site over others.
One councilmember echoed their sentiments in stating that the council put the “cart before the horse” in considering the contracts.
“We haven’t selected a final site,” said Councilmember Robyn Grant. “It’s premature for an architect to be hired. Construction is years away. Architectural plans will almost certainly be outdated. Investing in them now is just premature.”
Police union President Joe DeJulio opposes any plan to stay at the current headquarters site and backs the work of an advisory committee to find a new station location.
During a March 10 study session, a majority of the council directed city staff to focus solely on Civic Center Park as the future home of the police headquarters. Grant lodged a straw vote against the directive.
Newport Beach followed up by soliciting proposals for architectural services and suggested Irvine-based LPA for a $713,000 contract for a conceptual design. The total cost of a complete architectural design could top $12 million.
The city also solicited proposals for an environmental study of the site and will spend $346,000 on one.
Councilmembers also approved about $315,000 to hire a public relations firm to conduct outreach, including town halls, on the process of selecting a new home for the police department.
But after the March study session, the council reorganized a committee on the new police headquarters to include resident members, who were seated in June. The new advisory committee is considering alternative sites, including a city-owned property on Dove Street in the airport area.
Critics of the Civic Center Park location pounced on the contracts in comments to the council.
“What are we really doing here?” asked Denise Oberman, a Newport Beach resident. “Are we evaluating several sites and comparing those for feasibility and suitability … or are we really just trying to slam one site through?”
At the onset of the discussion, City Manager Seimone Jurjis argued that the Civic Center Park site warranted the added evaluation.
“The challenge for staff is there are a lot of questions for the Civic Center site that we cannot answer,” he said. “It is a complex site with habitat, with species. There are a lot of topography issues. We did state to the City Council that if you want us to consider the Civic Center site, we’re going to need some help.”
Fewer condos and other future units for sale in an airport area overlay will be required to be affordable after the Newport Beach City Council lowered the threshold to under 10%.
Councilmember Joe Stapleton looked at the conceptual design and environmental study contracts as following up on a directive given by council in March. He didn’t believe that approving them signaled that the Civic Center Park would be carved up for a new police headquarters
The study and design work may even find the site unfeasible.
But Stapleton wasn’t sold on the need to hire Westbound Communications to handle community outreach on the process.
“We have an incredible public information manager,” Stapleton said. “I have six incredible colleagues sitting around me. I, myself, would be more than happy to go into my district, have a town hall and have a conversation with the residents in my district about where they want to see a police headquarters, what they think is the best, but I want to do that once we have all the information in front of us.”
Councilmember Noah Blom supported the approval of all three contracts.
“There are no foregone conclusions, but there are ideas we have, and those ideas aren’t built out of malice,” he said. “They’re not built out of some idea that we want to destroy the city we were born and raised in, that we raise our families in. We have to know what is possible, probable, and pragmatic if we want to move forward.”
A council majority approved all three contracts with Grant voting against them. Stapleton joined her in voting against hiring the public relations firm.
