Week in review

NEWPORT BEACH

Residents pass Measure B; project starts around 2009

Measure B, which requires the next Newport Beach City Hall to be built next to the central library on Avocado Avenue prevailed Tuesday with 52.8% of the vote.

Mayor Ed Selich estimated it would take at least until the summer of 2009 before the city could get the proper environmental and traffic studies completed and break ground on the project.

With an estimated two years for construction, a new city hall might not be open for business until 2011, he said.

The City Council also will have to decide what to do with the site of the current city hall on Balboa Peninsula.

Newport Beach activist Allan Beek said he plans to push forward with a lawsuit aimed at challenging the legality of Measure B.

Rehab home files suit against city; suit could go federal

The drug and alcohol rehabilitation center Pacific Shores Recovery filed a federal fair housing complaint against the city. The complaint could be the first step in filing a federal lawsuit.

The complaint, filed with the U.S. Dept. of Housing and Urban Development, states a city-imposed moratorium from April 2007 on new rehabilitation homes is discriminatory. The moratorium was lifted last month after the City Council moved to impose stricter rules on rehab homes in the city.

Pacific Shores is one of two local rehabilitation homes the city sued in November for allegedly violating the moratorium. The suit claims Pacific Shores opened new residential facilities for recovering addicts while the moratorium was in effect.

EDUCATION

Student punished for BB gun, threats, principal says

A Killybrooke Elementary School student was transferred out after he allegedly brought a BB gun to school and later verbally threatened another student, according to school officials and parental accounts.

Principal Katherine Sanchez mailed a letter to families detailing school guidelines taken when incidents concerning weapons occur. Sanchez and other district officials could not give further details due to confidentiality laws.

PUBLIC SAFETY

USDA investigation prompts ban of school beef products

Newport-Mesa School District will keep beef off the menu through March as the United States Department of Agriculture investigates the Westland Meat Company and Hallmark Slaughterhouse.

The company drew an investigation after allegations that downed cattle at the slaughterhouse were being inhumanely moved around with cattle prods and forklifts, officials said. Inspectors were worried the beef was tainted.

The Food Safety and Inspection Service has suspended all Westland operations until the agency completes its investigation.

The Office of the Inspector General is also investigating.

Schofield was arrested on an anonymous tip and will be taken to county jail by Orange County Sheriff’s deputies, prosecutors said.

POLITICS

Huntington mayor to challenge Rep. Rohrabacher

Huntington Beach Mayor Debbie Cook announced this week she is planning a run against Republican Rep. Dana Rohrabacher this November.

Cook criticized Rohrabacher’s approach to climate change, the faltering economy and the war in Iraq, though she called for bipartisan solutions.

 Rep. John Campbell has introduced a bill that would punish Berkeley for passing a resolution critical of a Marines Corps recruitment center in the city, withholding more than $2 million earmarked for the city in the 2008 Omnibus Appropriations bill.

The funds would be transferred to the Marine Corps, should the bill pass.

The City Council’s resolution declared a Marine Corps Recruitment Center in the city as “uninvited and unwelcome intruders,” and applauded residents who “may volunteer to impede, passively or actively, by nonviolent means, the work of any military recruiting office located in the city of Berkeley.”

Rep. Barbara Lee, who represents Berkeley, released a statement of her intent to oppose the bill.

“As for any attempt to punish the people of Berkeley by stripping much-needed federal funding, I would simply say I will strongly oppose such an effort,” she said in a news release.

The Berkeley City Council will reconsider the motion this week, though Campbell declined to comment on whether he would withdraw the bill should Berkeley retract the resolution.

 While Mitt Romney may have won the Republican race in Orange County this week it was not enough to keep his presidential campaign alive. Still, his local supporters were quick to join Romney rival John McCain in his call for Republican unity, advocating a collective defense against the prospect of a Democratic White House.

“It was the right time, and he [dropped out] in an elegant and graceful manner that will help unite Republicans,” Orange County Republican Party Chairman Scott Baugh said.

Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, who pointed out that he had given the former Massachusetts governor a surfboard, said he was disappointed that Romney had “wiped out,” though he pledged to support the him in November.

“I think, whoever the Republican nominee is, the conservative wing of the party will vote for them,” he said. “The question is: How much energy will be put out? To ensure that the party is activated, he needs to select a running mate who is conservative and is acceptable to the conservative activists in the party.”

Assemblyman Van Tran, who supported John McCain in 2000 and 2008, said that he saw party unity already developing behind the Arizona senator.

“What I’m seeing already is the beginning of the backing of the presumptive nominee — those who formally endorsed other candidates are now joining the McCain campaign,” he said.

“Today already we’ve gotten a number of calls from my colleagues, as well as other prominent Republicans, wanting to help unify the party and realizing full well that the November election will be a tough one,” he said.