Mathis Winkler
NEWPORT BEACH -- With little sleep and a major victory under their
belts, supporters of the slow-growth Greenlight measure said Wednesday
they plan to work with city officials on guidelines for putting the
initiative into place.
The city's voters overwhelmingly approved the measure with 63.4% of
the vote in Tuesday's election.
Greenlight will put before a citywide vote any development that allows
an increase of more than 100 peak-hour car trips or dwelling units or
40,000 square feet over the general plan allowance.
An opposing initiative, Measure T, which would have added parts of the
city's traffic phasing ordinance to the City Charter, was rejected by
64.9% of Newport Beach's voters.
When Greenlight becomes law once the county's Registrar of Voters
certifies the election results, council members will face the burden of
deciding how the measure will actually work.
Several council members said Wednesday that they expect to get legal
advice from City Atty. Bob Burnham on what they could and should do to
put Greenlight into action. Burnham could not be reached for comment
Wednesday.
"We'll figure out a way to make it work," said Councilman Gary Adams,
who called supporters of the initiative to extend an offer to cooperate
on implementing the measure. "We need to sit down with the people that
formulated [Greenlight] and do what's consistent with their original
intent. ... We need it to be defendable, and it's hard to say at this
point what it's going to be."
City Manager Homer Bludau said he planned to bring the matter before
council members at their Dec. 12 meeting, when the newly elected
officials will be sworn into office.
"I wouldn't be surprised if it would take more than one meeting,"
Bludau said. "We're really going to have to put our heads together and
come up with a list [of sections in the initiative that need
interpretation]."
Councilman-elect John Heffernan said he expected challenges from the
measure's opponents.
"Clearly I'm the lone ranger as the only Greenlight guy on this
council," he said. "I think this is an unusually bitter defeat for the
Measure T people. I don't think they're done. The money still exists.
They'll still try to dilute Greenlight or knock it out entirely."
But outgoing Councilwoman Jan Debay, one of the principal supporters
of Measure T, said she thought a legal challenge to Greenlight from the
opposition was unlikely.
"I think the challenges are going to come when we try to interpret
