The occasion was the Memorial Day ceremony on the proposed site for a new Dana Point Veterans Memorial at the Headlands. Held on the point overlooking the harbor, many of us, veterans and non-veterans alike, were in awe of the majesty of this land. This was the first time that many of the more than 100 people at the ceremony realized how -- if the city council comes to terms with the property owner - a good chunk of this land could be turned over to the people of Dana Point for trails, parks, a lighthouse, and especially a Veterans Memorial.

It was startling. Unlike some parks in the area, this is no odd lot sandwiched between real estate deals. The panoramic spaces we stood upon and from which we looked out over the ocean and harbor could be the nicest public space in Southern California. Even the proposed World War II Memorial in Washington, promoted by actor Tom Hanks, can't rival the Headlands property for its dramatic setting above the Pacific Ocean.

The poignancy of the location was driven home by Dennis Kaiser's editorial in the Dana Point News concerning the USS Indianapolis and survivor Ed Brown of Dana Point. The USS Indianapolis and many other ships and crews have been lost in the Pacific Ocean. So what better opportunity to honor the memory of these veterans than this ocean-front site?

The City Council should be commended for sitting down with the property owners to work out a solution to the long running dispute which divides this city. Especially Council- members Bill Ossenmacher and Harold Kaufman for attending the ceremony honoring our veterans.

At the Memorial Day ceremony, Medal of Honor recipient William Barber remembered that President Kennedy said that 'not only is a country judged by its actions, it is also judged by those the country chooses to remember and honor.' That is why we should never forget those who have given the ultimate sacrifice for this country.

Whatever plan ultimately results on the Headlands, it would almost sinful not to incorporate a remembrance to our veterans on the point overlooking the harbor and Pacific Ocean.

Perhaps if more people drove up Cove Road and saw what it is we have, just waiting there for us to claim it, they would ask their city councilmembers why the nicest park in Dana Point is fenced off from people, covered in weeds and waiting for a park and a Veterans Memorial.

I think I can speak for just about everyone in that I was extremely proud to see our flag waving above the Harbor, honoring our country. I can't wait to see our flag up there every day.

I must respond to Mr. Tristan Krogius’ vitriolic letter criticizing Geof Lachner, and everyone else who does not share his views. Krogius is a member of a tired fringe group that thinks that the Headlands owner should be able to build anything he damn pleases regardless of the consequences. He apparently unaware of the citizens of Dana Point who’ve worked tirelessly for the last seven years to bring a good project to the Headlands. All we want is a project that would compliment our unique city, instead of becoming a burden and an eyesore. This begs the question, where was Tristan Krogius when this battle for the heart and soul of our community was being fought? Hiding behind the gates in his sequestered Monarch Beach compound? Krogius unfamiliarity with the facts indicates that he is a newcomer to the Headlands debate.

Let me describe just whom it is that Krogius is trashing. We are people who truly believe in property rights. The Headlands owner’s original plan was so bad that the citizens had to take to the streets, petitions in hand, and get an initiative on the ballot to decide if the original plan was something that we all could live with. The developer’s plan was soundly rejected in a landslide vote. The people had spoken loud and clear. Krogius should have been there.

The Headlands owner did everything by the book. He had control of the majority on the city council. He submitted a plan to pave over one of the most dramatic promontories in California. His council approved this obscene development in spite of overwhelming objections from the community. Even Krogius’ neighbors in Monarch Beach objected to the old Headlands plan when they learned that 16,000 cars would be routed through one entrance to the project, the intersection of PCH and Selva. This also happens to be the intersection that Krogius and his neighbors must use to get to the outside world. The developer’s plan had the city taking ownership and liability of the sheer bluff faces, and he tried to pass this off as open space. The majority of the voters in Dana Point believed that this plan was a disaster, and made their feelings known at the voting booth. Krogius should have been there.

Now, to bring Mr. Krogius up to date. The city staff and planning commission held numerous meeting to hammer out a compromise on a new plan. The Headlands owner and/or his representatives were present at every one of these meetings. If Mr. Krogius were truly interested, he could have also attended these meeting, and made his opinions part of the public record as many of us did. The planning commission and the developer finally decided on Plan A. Hello, Mr. Krogius, this was the compromise that you insist must take place. Plan A was not perfect, but it was a pretty darn good effort to satisfy all parties.

Mr. Krogius is rightfully concerned about Headlands owner’s property rights. His property rights extend to the point where his project has a negative impact on the community. This is true for all of us. I could not open a dog pound in my back yard because it would have a negative effect on the community. The Headlands owner should not be allowed to build a project that will harm our quality of life for the same reason.

Mr. Krogius has talked the talk, but he has not walked the walk. Let him spend seven years trying to bring plan to the headlands that is beneficial to the community and the owner before he criticizes those of us who have.

Barbara Frieberg
Dana Point

WHAT PART OF NO DON’T THEY UNDERSTAND?
Submitted to Dan Point On-Line
November 24, 1998

Although Geoffrey Lachner finished a resounding 8th in the recent Dana Point City Council election, his views apparently still hold sway with the city council and city manager. High-priced, out-of-town lawyers have now been retained in a desperate attempt to legitimize the City’s untenable and fiscally irresponsible position on the development of the Headlands.

Lachner has been the most visible -- if not the most virulent -- critic of any plans to do anything with the Headlands other than let it sit fallow, a hang out for those who like drinking beer without having to put their empties in a trash can. After almost a decade of anti-development appearances in public meetings and commentary in local papers, Lachner's views were put to the test earlier this month in local ballot boxes as well as in Superior Court.

The city apparently isn’t listening to the fact that his views have failed both with the public and the Court.

For all of Lachner’s and his suppoerters’ efforts at haranguing the public in local supermarkets, his fliers, and his ads, he was only able to garner seven percent of the voters of Dana Point to support him.

But if Lachner took a thumping at the ballot box, they really got beat in the courtroom. There a judge ruled that this city may not plan on how to use the Headlands without the consent and participation of the owners.

Lachner and his gang for years have said they will oppose anything that anyone wanted to do there. But recently, a new strategy evolved from this bunch: force the Headlands landowner to accept a plan that cannot be economicallybuilt. An Orange County judge saw through the ruse and told the city that the landowner did indeed have right to process his plans for his own land.

This bit of common sense was enormously expensive. The City has spent more than $500,000 on plans for the Headlands that now are nothing more than paper weights. Not that this recent ruling has deterred the city. Rather than accepting the suggestion an independent legal opinion be obtained on the wisdom of its course, the City has, apparently, retained advocates for its own rejected approach. It has hired lawyers from Kansas City and Los Angeles to to try to overturn on appeal what Lachner could not convince the voters of Dana Point: That the Headlands is somehow something other than private property which the City has a right to preserve as open space.

The political reality is few would have noticed that the City ran rough shod over a few property rights if the City had crafted a great plan. But the City's plan is downright lousy. The City wants to put a hotel at Strand Beach, favors high-density condos over estate homes, and wants to place a huge drain pipe right on the beach.

The landowner wants to put a European-style spa on the bluffs, with larger residential lots, and more public open space. The City is not only in the unenviable position of convincing an appellate court that it must suspend property rights in Dana Point, it also must convince the people of Dana Point that almost all the open space that it wants for the Headlands will actually be closed to the public.

Maybe the City will get the message before we spend another half a million dollars with silk-suited lawyers. And, maybe those sitting on theCity Council will wake up to the fact that their political futures will be increasingly jeopadized by continuing to pander to a raucous minority at a cost which the silent majority is no longer willing to accept.

Just Say NO

Here we go again with illegally obtained evidence by an illegal wiretap being used as if it were okay. How is it that the police on a daily basis utilize illegal wiretaps, illegal bugging devices on citizen's cars, knowing it violates our rights, but yet trivialize the illegal act by saying other police agencies do it, the FBI, the DEA: They all do it. Why, to listen to them, it is standard law enforcement practice to break the law while enforcing the law, and it's okay, especially if you can get a conviction.

How is it that murders took place at Corcoran, and our governor and attorney general wouldn't even investigate? But the president makes a few mistakes in a civil deposition involving illegally obtained evidence, and now is impeached. How is it Newt Gingrich got off with a small rebuke. It seems to me, as well as many others I've talked with, what is good for the Republicans and law enforcement from the top to the bottom, is a completely different standard, than what seems set in stone for everyone else, including us Democrats.

The Republicans kept insisting the president is the top law enforcement official of our great land. If they impeach and now it looks as if they will, then every member of law enforcement must stand to the same standard, if you lie under oath you must be fired, because no one's life is in the balance with the president, but with the law enforcement agencies people's freedoms and people's lives are often in the balance. Fair is only fair, when the same standard is applied to all, that is what the Republicans keep saying. So lets just see if their words are as just as their actions.

I highly doubt if anyone in law enforcement will be fired for lying or hiding the facts or misrepresenting the truth. Why then this railroading of our president? I believe history will call it a political coup. I believe the master plan called for impeaching the leader, impeach or remove the vice president, and slip in Gingrich. Thank God the Democrats united; and that our vote spoke in the last elections. But that only infuriated them and in their anger and their vengeance we now see what an out of control Republican train looks like. But we will speak again, and I sincerely hope that in the year 2000 you will not be able to find a Republican streetsweeper, let alone a winning Republican politician. We spoke our outrage in the last elections. We will speak our vengeance and our sense of justice in the next.

Sincerely,

George Griffin
Capistrano Beach

Re: Capo-By-The-Sea "Millenium" Plan

Dear Editor:
The litmus test for candidates for the upcoming city council election must be the question of re-zoning the 25 acre, Community-Facility zoned, parcel known as Capo-By-The-Sea. Every candidate should make their position clear on this vital issue BEFORE the election and, those elected, must be held accountable for their decision. With the Headlands planning nearing completion, this beautiful piece is our last parcel of Community Facility & open space. The very last thing we should consider is re-zoning it for yet another fifty homes and losing, forever, the potential of this most valuable community asset. Any council member or commissioner who votes to rob future generations of Dana Pointians of this vital zoning and parcel should be recalled. While privately owned, this CF parcel is nevertheless a type of hybrid zoning with many of the characteristics of publicly-owned property. Anyone buying a parcel with this designation, and noting the allowable uses in the code, is aware of this fact. Nevertheless, Capital Holdings bought it on the come - knowing it was zoned as community facility - and simply betting they could obtain a zone change here and/or major concessions on their Monarch Beach project. Worse, before any indication of the community’s willingness to consider a zone change, they have now closed down the facilities, thrown the tenants out, and erected a fence around this entire "community" facility. Neither the Council or Planning Commission are currently spearheading any type of effort to get the community’s imput and plans for this parcel. Clearly, what we need is a "Millenium" plan for Capo-By-The Sea. Indeed, the potential for a truly great community facility/Getty-type art museum/theatre complex/senior center on this site is awesome, and THIS is what "our" council members and commissioners should be doing rather than their lame, irresponsible, and non compos mentis roll over on this extraordinary piece. Dana Point voters must make it clear to all candidates they will not vote for anyone who supports rezoning and giving away this most valuable, and last, of our land bank assets and community facilities. As for the developer, there are thousands of acres now available in San Clemente for another fifty homes.
Sincerely,
Kent Welton

I had to laugh at Harold Kaufman’s latest campaign mailer where he suddenly is interested in "fixing the city’s image." Kaufman goes on to say that the "council is in disrepair," and we deserve a "rancor free environment." Why the sudden reversal, Kaufman? I regularly watch the council meetings, and it has been Harold Kaufman, even when his people were in the majority, that was vitriolic, negative, and constantly picking fights with members of the audience, and his fellow council members.

I do, however, agree with Mr. Kaufman. We should have a rancor free council, where the members are more interested in doing the city’s business than pursuing their personal vendettas. That is why I will not be voting for Harold Kaufman.

Sincerely,

Barbara Frieberg
33792 Blue Lantern
Dana Point 92629
Phone: 493-6752