MAILBAG - Oct. 12, 2007

Save Goko’s and save Laguna’s true soul

“Don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone...”

Where’s Joni Mitchell when you need her?

C’mon, fellow Lagunans! We need to show that we feel strongly about Goko’s, one of our favorite local haunts, being sacrificed on the altar of profit and “market rents” — which we know is code for “exorbitant” by any other standard.

It seems like [property owners] Richard Zona and Cary Glenn have really put themselves on the wrong side of this one.

Goko’s Café is truly one-of-a-kind — one of the last of a dying breed here in our town — a true original that actually offers healthy food and a thriving social scene for the groms and the grown-ups!

Why would anyone want to trade that in for a Quiznos?

Even if you don’t have kids or patronize this local restaurant yourself, all of us will be affected by this loss.

Not that it might feel like such a big loss right now, it’s just one little restaurant. But that one little restaurant and its location are very symbolic to our town.

It happens to be smack-dab in the middle of Laguna’s own locals’ beach scene at Thalia Street.

Laguna is known for its individuality and its village atmosphere.

When we sacrifice the intrinsic things like Goko’s that really make us unique, we end up sacrificing our soul. No argument about market rent can ever answer that.

BARA WATERS

Laguna Beach

Laguna sees more traffic, day laborers

Regarding your question on traffic; it has definitely become worse in the canyon and through town. If often takes up 20 minutes and more to go the six miles between town and the school at the El Toro Y. At the Y you can often see traffic lined up both ways. It only takes one slow driver on these single-lane roads to start a chain reaction that brings traffic to a crawl for hours. I think the only solution is make that stretch into a four-lane road.

The data published ignore the fact that many of us do everything we can to avoid leaving town, at least via the canyon.

Regarding the illegal Day Labor Site, I have been here since 1964 and was a frequent visitor here since 1939 to visit my sister so I have pretty much seen it all.

Yes, day laborers roamed the town before the labor site, but it was only a handful compared to the huge numbers we have attracted into town to use the Day Labor Site. No way to know for sure, but I suspect in the old days most were legal citizens and probably many of them lived here.

Without the Day Labor Site most of them would not even come into town and if some did and became a nuisance, all the city would have to do is follow Costa Mesa’s excellent example of law enforcement and problems resolved.

Laguna Beach