Costa Mesa City Councilman Gary Monahan's latest campaign pitch for Measure V ("Charter frees Costa Mesa from the state," Sept. 19) is much like the proposed charter document — vague, long on platitudes and short on specific substance.
Let's start with Monahan's central argument: Costa Mesa is somehow under the merciless thumb of Sacramento, and we need to "break free" to recapture local control. Monahan boasts that he knows of several state laws that "impose costly mandates on our city, dictate how we spend our tax dollars or tell us how we must conduct our business."
OK, councilman, please name a few. Or even just one.
And please explain how on earth the other 361 California cities without a charter (75% of the state's municipalities) manage to operate at all under the heavy hand of Sacramento?