Anonymous inspiration ends Redondo Beach Council sniping

Redondo Beach Councilman Bill Brand. Photo
Redondo Beach Council members Bill Brand and Martha Barbee. Photo

A debate between Redondo Beach City Council members over the right way to set up a General Plan Advisory Committee was ended when Mayor Steve Aspel borrowed an idea from an impassioned resident on Tuesday night, scrapping an increasingly complex plan.

“I want people who have long term futures in Redondo…it’s got to be a long-term project, not just something about development today,” Aspel said.

The City Council was set to discuss the formation of a General Plan advisory committee after adopting a plan to update the City’s existing 24 year old General Plan.

A General Plan is, in essence, a city’s long-range roadmap and handbook that represents its view of the future. The existing plan includes elements discussing Land Use, Housing, Senior Citizen and Child Care Services, Transportation and Circulation and Parks and Open Space. The focus moving forward, according to City Staff, is to update the Land Use, Recreation and Parks, and Open Space elements.

At issue on Tuesday was the number of people to appoint to the committee, which is designed to be made up of Redondo Beach citizens from across the city’s many varying neighborhoods, organizations and businesses.

A report from staff suggested, based on the existing resolution approved by Council, a total of 37 appointed members, ranging from the school district to business associations to youth sports leagues to city commissions.

Councilman Christian Horvath wished to widen the net, looping in representatives for LA Metro, renters associations, marijuana advocates and information technology experts, all with the idea of dealing with future-proofing the General Plan in a changing world.

“We have to be futurists,” Horvath said. “We need to look at where we’re at, where we’ve been and understand where we’re going and what the trends are — our neighborhoods may change as a result of where we’re going.”

But Councilman Bill Brand was left in the cold by Horvath’s decision to leave out the South Bay Parkland Conservancy, an organization that advocates for increasing parkland in the region. Brand founded the organization in the early 2000s.

“Why would you eliminate them?” Brand asked.

“They haven’t done anything,” Horvath said.

That kicked off a fight on the dais between the two, as they debated both the merits of the Conservancy and Horvath’s selections.

Brand railed against Horvath’s proposal to include Southern California Edison and the South Bay Galleria, believing the organizations to have significant conflicts of interest. Horvath argued that the two, as major landowners in the City, deserved to be included in the discussion.

Over the next hour, the debate raged and waned as other council members and residents offered their ideas. A group of activists from Save the Riviera and Rescue Our Waterfront, allies of Brand, took aim at Horvath for their exclusion as well.

“There’s a difference between special interest and conflicts of interest,” Brand said. “We’re all special interests to some degree.”

Then one member of the audience, without offering her name to the Council and seemingly unaffiliated with any group, spoke up.

“I think you need to have almost entirely citizens on this panel…the people’s voice needs to be heard,” she said.

That inspired Aspel.

“I’m always wary of these advisory groups; no matter what group we put on here, someone’s got to come off, and someone’s going to be pissed off about it,” Aspel said.

He proposed a 27 member group, composed of five people nominated by each Council member, and two nominated by the Mayor. Three members from each of the Council nominees must be residents and registered voters in their district.

The motion, adopted by Brand, passed quickly and unanimously.

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