Rigonomics:

I attended the Costa Mesa City Council meeting Tuesday, and, as expected, they voted 5 to 0 to provide direction to the city attorney and the Development Services Department to place a ballot initiative on the June ballot to lock in the zoning and land use for the Orange County Fairgrounds.

It was very important for the city to move quickly and put everyone on notice, including the state, that the citizens of Costa Mesa have the ultimate say on what happens at the fairgrounds when it comes to land use.

I find it almost comical that the state sent the city a somewhat strongly worded letter with the concern that the city might “severely restrict the future land uses,” and therefore negatively affect the commercial value by allowing it to be used only as a fairgrounds. Let’s be clear, the city is not lowering the value of the property by locking it in as a fairgrounds use. They are only keeping it from going up in value with another use.

In another twist, a new group was formed called Derail the Sale. Their Facebook fan page asks readers to “Let your state legislator know the ‘For Sale’ sign on our fairgrounds must be taken down NOW!” Their goal is to stop the sale to anyone; whether it be the city, county or a nonprofit. They want the state to continue to own the property.

They also are asking people to show up to the informational hearing regarding the pending sale of the fairgrounds. The hearing is being sponsored by Costa Mesa Assemblyman Van Tran and Santa Ana Assemblyman Jose Solorio. According to the Derail the Sale site, they are asking people to show up and tell their legislators to stop the sale. So I ask myself, who is behind this group?

It did not take too much work to find out who set up the Facebook fan page. His name is Brian Lochrie. Lochrie’s Facebook page says he works for Faubel Public Affairs. If the name Faubel seems familiar, it should. Faubel Public Affairs is owned by Roger Faubel, whose previous firm Waters and Faubel was a main player behind closing down El Toro Airport and bringing us the Great Pork — I mean, Great Park.

According to their website, Faubel Public Affairs is a full-service public relations firm that specializes in “grass-roots organizing.” You gotta love those “grass-roots” organizations set up by professional public relations firms.