Mailbag: Be Well’s mobile health vans will be missed in Huntington Beach

As we begin 2026 and the reverie of the New Year fades, Huntington Beach faces new challenges due to numerous lawsuits it has lost in recent years. Unfortunately, these losses extend beyond litigation. We have also lost critical services that once supported our community, most notably the city’s contract with Be Well OC.

For nearly five years, the bright blue Be Well vans provided crisis intervention and mental health services — with follow-up care — to residents, including schoolchildren, as well as visitors. On more than one occasion, I observed a person sleeping behind a bush with a walker protruding nearby. When I called Be Well, trained professionals responded promptly, assessed the individual and arranged emergency medical care.

Be Well staff responded to roughly 15,000 calls per year, and I have seen firsthand how clients’ lives improved after receiving appropriate mental health support. Police officers have also shared that when no law is being broken, they prefer crises be handled by public health professionals with specialized training.

The elevator in the downtown city parking structure has been broken for months. On several occasions, I encountered a young man blocking the stairwell, sitting with his head in his lap. I wanted to call Be Well, but, without that option, I hesitated to involve police, uncertain whether they could refer him to appropriate care. Referring people in crisis to trained professionals is not only more humane — it is more fiscally responsible.

I long for an accountable, transparent city government where budget cuts like Be Well are discussed openly. While rising costs challenge every municipality, cities such as Laguna Beach reduced Be Well’s hours rather than eliminating the program entirely. Removing Be Well risks higher long-term costs through repeated emergency responses. All residents, housed and unhoused, deserve the care and dignity that Be Well provides.

Jenny Braithwaite
Huntington Beach

Unwinnable lawsuits

In Trumpian fashion, the Huntington Beach MAGA City Council continues to rely on performative tactics to force its culture-war disputes down residents’ throats. The result is predictable: Huntington Beach taxpayers are left footing the bill for costly, unwinnable lawsuits.

The most recent example is the council’s 7–0 vindictive appeal of the ACLU’s “freedom to read” lawsuit, which the city lost in September 2025. That appeal has kept the youth-restricted area in our public library in place, despite strong public opposition.

As of this week, roughly 10 popular puberty-related books are effectively being held hostage on the library’s fourth-floor adult section because the current council believes they are inappropriate for preteens and teens seeking information about their changing bodies.

This council is ignoring the will of the people. In June 2025, 60% of Huntington Beach voters — across the political spectrum — approved a measure to stop the city from imposing library book restrictions. The council is also violating state law. The California Freedom to Read Act clearly states that access to library materials may not be restricted due to sexual content unless that content qualifies as obscene under Supreme Court precedent. That law applies to charter cities, including Huntington Beach.

To make matters worse, the city was recently hit with a bill from the ACLU seeking a minimum of approximately $1.2 million in legal fees, with a requested multiplier of 1.25, bringing the potential award to roughly $1.5 million. That figure could climb even higher due to the appeal and ongoing disputes over the fee amount.

The City Council never should have appealed this case. It should have accepted the court’s ruling, abolished the restricted area and restored the teen section. Instead, it ignored hundreds of residents who attended council meetings and sent emails for months opposing the council’s book-banning schemes. The special library election alone cost taxpayers more than $1.3 million.

Now, this lawsuit is on track to cost a similar amount — or more. With additional multiyear lawsuits looming, the financial penalties will only grow. How many losses can Huntington Beach afford before its budget reserves are exhausted?

Carol Daus
Huntington Beach

Protecting our grandkids

There is a direct connection between Grandparents for Grandkids, the organization other Laguna Beach residents and I created last summer, and the conduct of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents in America today. It is not abstract or theoretical. It is real, visible and happening in plain sight on our streets.

Grandparents for Grandkids was founded on a simple belief: that Donald Trump’s sustained attacks on judges, law firms and the courts threaten the rule of law. When a president undermines judicial independence and treats legal constraints as optional, the damage does not stop with today’s headlines. It reaches forward — into the lives of our children and grandchildren — shaping the rights they will, or will not, inherit.

That concern is no longer hypothetical. You do not have to be a grandparent to recognize when the rule of law is being ignored. Orange County police officers and sheriffs do not conceal their identities behind masks, operate without accountability or seize American citizens without a warrant or probable cause. Yet ICE agents are now doing all three on a daily basis.

This is not a partisan argument. It is a civic one. A nation governed by laws cannot tolerate a double standard, in which constitutional protections apply selectively. When enforcement authorities are allowed to operate in secrecy, the rule of law does not bend — it breaks.

Grandparents understand instinctively what we tolerate today becomes the inheritance of the next generation. The future is watching.

Denny Freidenrich
Laguna Beach

Politicians and teachers

If you are as interested in politics as I am, you get inundated with political emails on a daily basis. Everybody wants and needs money for their campaigns, and most of the requests are genuine. I started small donations to candidates in 2008, which was a big year for me in terms of political involvement. I had just retired from 38 years of teaching French 1-5 at the high school level and French and U.S. history at the junior high level.

I see parallels between the two professions of politics and teaching. Both are demanding because they require constant interaction with other people. For teachers, it means working with parents and colleagues as well as hundreds of students. For Congress, it means working with and trying to please constituents without compromising their own values. Congressional representatives face pressure and constraints from many angles —colleagues, members of the executive branch and their constituents.

During this last difficult year in our country, I was able to follow vicariously some of our state’s congressional representatives, mostly local ones, who learned how hard it is to lead when you are the minority party. Two locals, Rep. Dave Min (D-Irvine) and Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Long Beach) made major efforts to reach their constituents by holding town hall meetings and communicating constantly about their jobs, their goals, their successes and their failures.

Garcia, who is in his second term, has been amazingly strong in speaking out and has been selected as the top Democratic ranking member on the powerful House Oversight Government Reform Committee. Min has been working on securing federal funding for Orange County infrastructure projects and focusing on environmental domestic violence and economic issues. On a personal note, I must say that when you hear Min speak, you can tell he has been a college professor. He speaks entirely without notes for long periods of time discussing complex issues as they pertain to governance.

Year No. 2 of the current administration means lots of work ahead for our legislative body if it hopes to have a significant impact on governance in 2026.

Lynn Lorenz
Newport Beach