Man declares council candidacy for Newport’s District 2

About a year from the 2012 election, a Newport Beach businessman has announced his candidacy for City Council District 2.

Tony Petros, a partner at Irvine-based transportation and planning firm LSA Associates and a longtime civic actor, will seek to fill the seat held by Steve Rosansky.

After more than eight years on the council, Rosansky will be termed out. District 2 includes upper West Newport, Newport Shores, much of Newport Heights and potentially Banning Ranch.

Petros, 51, and his family have lived in Newport Beach for about 12 years; they presently reside in the neighborhood west of Newport Harbor High School.

A Huntington Beach native, Petros said he has “bounced up and down the coast.”

He lived on the Balboa Peninsula while attending UC Irvine.

An avid triathlete and cyclist, he serves on the city’s Bicycle Safety Committee. Petros is also on the West Newport advisory panel for the Neighborhood Revitalization Committee.

For much of his adult life, he has served in civic organizations — from school board bond committees to a county housing commission. In Costa Mesa, where he lived before Newport, Petros was the president of the Chamber of Commerce.

That business perspective, combined with his outdoor pursuits, shape his views on local environmental issues. He says that maintaining high water quality is key for tourism.

Newport’s beach and bay neighborhoods, along with the rest of the Westside, have been overlooked recently, Petros said, as the city’s attention shifted east to Corona del Mar and Newport Coast. Capital reinvestment in the area would be one of his priorities.

“Why don’t we maintain our eye on all of our city’s assets?” he said. “The attention’s going to be going back down to the peninsula.”

mike.reicher@latimes.com

Twitter: @mreicher