The City of Costa Mesa is pleased to announce it will provide the Orange County Model Engineers with a matching contribution of $15,000 to help repair the vandalism of the iconic Goat Hill Junction train station that occurred earlier this week.

Inspired by a request from Council Member Loren Gameros, the Model Engineers will be able to expeditiously restore the train facilities back to normal.

“The Model Engineers and Goat Hill Junction is a Costa Mesa treasure that has created so many memories for our local children,” Mayor John Stephens said. “It’s outrageous that someone would vandalize the facility, but I’m happy the City is able to provide this funding to help restore and repair the train station.”

Hank Castignetti, the Model Engineer’s city liaison, said the funding couldn’t come at a better time since they had to deal with the pandemic and loss of all revenue. They also have to repair the trestle bridge that went out after 30 years.

“It’s phenomenal,” Castignetti said of the funding. “We are so grateful for the City’s assistance in a time of great need. In addition, we have also seen a tremendous outpouring of donations from citizens. The citizens of Costa Mesa realize what an incredible public benefit we provide to the children in this community.”

 Officially known as, Mackerel Flats and Goat Hill Junction Railroad, the non-profit Model Engineers club was founded by a group of local railroad buffs in 1988 and has been operating the trains in Costa Mesa’s east Fairview Park area since 1989.

Since then, several improvements have taken place at the facility that included the creation of the train station and an expansion of the train tracks to five miles that wind through the park.

The club engineers conduct public rides on the third Saturday and following Sunday of each month from 10 a.m. until 3:30 p.m. They give approximately 3,000 free rides each month.

For more information, please visit http://www.ocmetrains.org/

On Tuesday Nov. 30, City leaders held a reception to honor local Costa Mesa artist Valerie Mata, a former Back Bay High School student who created the artwork for a mural that is now displayed in the entrance lobby of the Costa Mesa Bridge Shelter at 3175 Airway Ave.

On hand for the reception were Mayor John Stephens, Mayor Pro-Tem Andrea Marr, District 2 Council Member Loren Gameros, Assistant City Manager Susan Price and Newport-Mesa School Board Trustee Carol Crane. Also attending were the artist’s family as well as her Back Bay High art teacher Cami Marseille and the school’s principal Mike Wagner.

Click here to watch a video of the reception.

Mayor Stephens talked about the success of the Bridge Shelter and presented Mata with a proclamation to thank her for her efforts.

“We’ve created a bridge from homelessness and living on the streets to a better life,” Mayor Stephens said. “And Valerie you’ve taken this ideal and incorporated the arts. And as you know we are the City of the Arts. Your artistry and your gift will give inspiration and will save lives and save souls.”

In January of this year, the City’s Cultural Arts Committee and City partner Trellis formed a committee to choose a mural for the Bridge Shelter entrance.

The mural committee consisted of Assistant City Manager Susan Price, former Outreach Manager Stacy Lumley, Parks and Community Services Recreation Supervisor Ashley Thomas, Outreach team leaders Natalie Basmaciyan and John Begin), Ian Stevenson of Trellis and Cultural Arts Committee Chair Charlene Ashendorf.

The intent for this piece of art is to convey the message, “we’re better together” and illustrate how people experiencing homelessness, volunteers, donors, city leaders/officials, leaders from various organizations, churches, businesses and non-profits work together to make the shelter successful.

The committee reviewed about a dozen entries and unanimously chose Mata’s artwork, which depicts a bridge to the future. She was awarded $500 for the winning mural, which was sponsored by Trellis.

Both Stevenson from Trellis and Ashendorf also spoke about Mata’s mural and what it meant to them and the committee.

Mata thanked her teacher and counselor at Back Bay High and said she can relate to those at the shelter because she and her family have also experienced hardships.

“We went through some really interesting times,” she said. “But I really appreciate going through all that. I don’t regret it at all. And now I’m here. So people like this can also be in better places.”

The artwork was converted to wallpaper and installed on the Shelter wall by Mouse Graphics, a local Costa Mesa business.

Due to the observation of the Thanksgiving Holiday, there will be no residential street sweeping Thursday Nov.  25 and Friday Nov. 26.

No citations should be written on those days.

Street sweeping will resume back to normal schedule, starting the week of  Nov. 29.

As the City of Costa Mesa continues the redistricting process, residents are encouraged to create their own district maps using the online Draw a Map tools on the City’s website.

Click here to draw your own map.

Currently, there are 10 draft maps available for review, seven are public submittals by individuals and the city’s demographer, Dr. Justin Levitt, also prepared three draft City Council district boundary maps based on the legal criteria outlined in past meetings, including consideration of communities of interest.

The draft maps are intended for discussion purposes only.

The city continues to encourage residents to submit draft boundary proposals, revisions to submitted maps, or offer comments on any maps. The city’s demographer will continue to review all submissions and make revisions as necessary, based on Council direction and community input.

The next steps are to conduct public workshops to seek additional public input on the draft district maps. The following dates are scheduled:

• Wednesday, December 1, 2021, 6:00 p.m. at the City Hall Community Room
• Saturday, January 8, 2022, 10:00 a.m. Location TBD.

Every 10 years, local governments use new data from the Census to redraw their district lines to reflect how local populations have changed. State law requires cities and counties to engage communities in the redistricting process by holding public hearings and doing public outreach, including to underrepresented and non-English-speaking communities.

The City of Costa Mesa is seeking the public’s help to plan and draw new City district maps that will define the six City of Costa Mesa district borders. These new districts will impact how to elect Council Members for the next 10 years.

Learn more about future meetings and how the public can participate at www.redistrictcostamesa.org

Spanish version below:

La Ciudad de Costa Mesa continúa con el proceso de redistribución de distritos, todos los residentes están invitados a crear su propio mapa de distritos usando las herramientas en la sección Dibujar un Mapa, localizada en la página de la Ciudad.

Haga clic aquí dibujar un mapa.

En este momento hay diez borradores de mapas disponibles para revisar, siete fueron entregadas por miembros del público y tres mapas fueron preparados por el demógrafo de la Ciudad. Los mapas del demógrafo fueron basados en el criterio legal detallado en las juntas pasadas, incluyendo la consideración de las comunidades de interés.

La intención de los borradores de mapas es para conversar solamente.

La Ciudad alienta que los residentes sometan borradores de mapas, revisiones a mapas ya entregados, o que dejen sus comentarios en cualquiera de los mapas. El demógrafo de la Ciudad continuará revisando todas las sumisiones y hará los cambios necesarios, basado en la dirección del Consejo Municipal y los comentarios de la comunidad.

El siguiente paso es conducir talleres comunitarios para recibir comentarios adicionales del publicó en los borradores de mapas. Las siguientes fechas están programadas:

• Miércoles 1 de diciembre de 2021, 6:00 p.m. en el Salón Comunitario del Ayuntamiento
• Sábado 8 de enero de 2022, 10 a.m. la locación está por definirse

Cada diez años, los gobiernos locales utilizan nuevos datos del Censo para volver a dibujar los límites de los distritos y reflejar cómo han cambiado las poblaciones locales. La ley del Estado requiere que las ciudades incluyan a las comunidades en el proceso de la redistribución de distritos por medio de audiencias públicas y programas de extensión, también incluyendo a las comunidades insuficientemente representadas y a los que no hablan inglés.

La Ciudad de Costa Mesa solicita la participación del público en planificar y dibujar los nuevos mapas que definieran los seis límites de los distritos en la Ciudad. Los nuevos distritos impactaran como eligen los Miembros del Consejo Municipal para los próximos diez años.

Para más información sobre las próximas juntas y como el público puede participar, visite www.redistrictcostamesa.org

Costa Mesa City Council members were presented with the first 10 draft redistricting maps at the Council meeting of Nov. 16 at 7 p.m.

The community was encouraged to submit proposed maps for the November 16, 2021 public hearing for the City Council’s initial consideration and discussion.

A total of seven public submittals were made by individuals and the city’s demographer, Dr. Justin Levitt, also prepared three draft City Council district boundary maps based on the legal criteria outlined in past meetings, including consideration of communities of interest.

The draft maps are intended for discussion purposes only.

The city continues to encourage residents to submit draft boundary proposals, revisions to submitted maps, or offer comments on any maps. The city’s demographer will continue to review all submissions and make revisions as necessary, based on Council direction and community input.

The next steps are to conduct public workshops to seek additional public input on the draft district maps. The following dates are scheduled:

• Wednesday, December 1, 2021, 6:00 p.m. at the City Hall Community Room
• Saturday, January 8, 2022, 10:00 a.m. Location TBD.

Every 10 years, local governments use new data from the Census to redraw their district lines to reflect how local populations have changed. State law requires cities and counties to engage communities in the redistricting process by holding public hearings and doing public outreach, including to underrepresented and non-English-speaking communities.

The City of Costa Mesa is seeking the public’s help to plan and draw new City district maps that will define the six City of Costa Mesa district borders. These new districts will impact how to elect Council Members for the next 10 years.

Learn more about future meetings and how the public can participate at www.redistrictcostamesa.org

City Manager Lori Ann Farrell Harrison presented IT Programmer Analyst II Phoebe Jin with the City Manager Leadership Award winner for the month of October.

“Phoebe’s dedication to her job has resulted in better IT systems for both City employees and the residents we serve,” City Manager Lori Ann Farrell Harrison said. “Additionally, Phoebe has a positive attitude and always treats everyone with respect. She genuinely loves helping her co-workers and these are always traits that we value here in Costa Mesa. We are so thankful she is part of our team.”

Jin works on a variety of programming projects, collaborating with multiple City Department. Her projects include the intranet system, the Homeless Information System, IT Inventory, Waitwhile, and SeamlessDocs.

Every year, Jin participates in the support of the City’s Open Enrollment. For a long time, employees submitted their enrollment forms manually to HR. But, in 2020, she collaborated with HR and designed an online submission process through SeamlessDocs.

For this year’s Open Enrollment, Jin designed a new process – Employees can now submit their forms through an online system, greatly reducing HR’s workload.

Jin started to work for City of Costa Mesa IT Department in June 2013 as an intern and later was promoted to Programmer Analyst I. In April 2015, she and her husband, Shiji (she-gee) moved to San Francisco. They relocated back to Orange County in May 2019, and she was rehired as Programmer Analyst II.

Originally from Shanghai, China, Jin finished her Master’s degree in Computer Science from Cal State Fullerton in 2014.

The City of Costa Mesa will present the first draft redistricting maps at the Council meeting of Nov. 16 at 7 p.m.

Every 10 years, local governments use new data from the Census to redraw their district lines to reflect how local populations have changed. State law requires cities and counties to engage communities in the redistricting process by holding public hearings and doing public outreach, including to underrepresented and non-English-speaking communities.

The City of Costa Mesa is asking for your help to plan and draw new City districts.

The finalized maps that the public will help create will define the six City of Costa Mesa district borders, and these new districts will impact how to elect Council Members for the next 10 years.

The first workshop on redistricting was held on Saturday Oct. 23. The next workshop will take place Wednesday, Dec. 1, 2021 at 6 p.m. in the City Hall Community Room at 77 Fair Drive.

Learn more about future meetings and how the public can participate at www.redistrictcostamesa.org

In case you weren’t able to attend the first community workshop, you can watch the meeting in its entirety here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZufwTL-IK_Y

After a distinguished 31-year career with the City of Costa Mesa, Public Affairs Manager and Costa Mesa TV legend Dane Bora announced he is going to retire from the City as of Dec. 3, 2021.

“Dane’s departure is a big loss not only for the City Manager’s Office but for the entire Costa Mesa organization,” City Manager Lori Ann Farrell Harrison said. “He has been the leader of the City’s award-winning CMTV team, and his Costa Mesa Minute has made him a familiar face with the whole community, of which he has multiple ties and connections. Dane is a trusted colleague of ours in the City Manager’s Office and he will truly be missed.”

In addition to running the TV station and video team, he oversees the City’s website and social media channels and is a critical member of the City’s outreach and public information efforts.

“I have had the pleasure of working my entire professional career for the City of Costa Mesa and am blessed to have worked alongside many amazing people,” Bora said. “I will always cherish my time with the City and am grateful for the support I have received from the community and the organization. Costa Mesa will forever have a special place in my heart.”

Bora was hired full-time in August of 1990 after a few months as a part-timer, and he was promoted from Video Production Coordinator to Public Affairs Manager in July of 2015.

He has many, many achievements in his 31 years, most recently instituting the technology upgrades in the City Council Chambers. During his tenure CMTV has earned 88 awards, including placing in the top three 21 times for the coveted Overall Excellence in Government Programming Award and First Place in the Talk Show category four out of five years for City Talk.

Bora is a past Board Member for Travel Costa Mesa and currently the staff liaison to the Costa Mesa High School Foundation and Estancia/TeWinkle Schools Foundations.

On a fun note, he has hosted 2,229 episodes of the Costa Mesa Minute, 120 episodes of the Community Report and took part in more than 750 City Council meetings.

He was also the play-by-play announcer for 20-plus Battle for the Bell games and hundreds of youth flag football and basketball games.

On Thursday Nov. 4, the City of Costa Mesa held a dedication ceremony for Neth Park, named in honor of former Police Chief Roger Neth, Costa Mesa’s second chief and the longest tenured chief at 22 years.

Neth also was one of the city’s first three sworn officers.

Mayor John Stephens emceed the event joined by District 3 Council Member Andrea Marr and current Police Chief Ron Lawrence.

Click here for a slideshow.

“It’s thanks to Chief Neth that Costa Mesa’s Police Department has a reputation of being one of the finest in the state and it was his accomplishments and innovations that set the stage early on,” Mayor Stephens said. “Chief Neth we are so grateful for your leadership and dedication and this seems like this is the least we could do honor your incredible legacy.”

Chief Neth implemented the use of video cameras for DUI arrests, the first in nation, and put in place Police Officer Standards of Training for all Costa Mesa Police Officers

Under his leadership, Costa Mesa PD was the first department in U.S. to place computer terminals in police cars

He created the SWAT team, scholastic achievement and tuition reimbursement programs, a helicopter program, youth services program, motorcycle program, Cop on Campus program, and the Area Policing concept

He helped develop the CAD/RMS system, employed the first handwriting expert in Orange County and in his spare time, became a licensed helicopter pilot.

He was also a distinguished marksman and was named the top gun in Orange County three times.

He is a Charter Member of the California Police Chiefs Association, a former President of Orange County Police Chiefs Association and a member of the Golden West College Orange County Police Training Academy Advisory Committee.

On hand to congratulate Neth were City Council Members Manuel Chavez and Jeff Harlan, City Manager Lori Ann Farrell Harrison, Assistant City Manager Susan Price, Second District Supervisor and former Costa Mesa Mayor Katrina Foley and multiple members of the City, Police and Fire Department staff.

Also in attendance were former Chiefs Dave Snowden, Tom Gazsi and Bryan Glass, former City Managers Fred Sorsabal (who flew in from Idaho or the event) and Allan Roeder and former mayors Mary Hornbuckle and Arlene Scheafer.

The city’s maintenance service crews have made sandbags available at City Hall in case of flooding.

Sand bags are available for free to Costa Mesa residents in the southeast corner of the City Hall parking lot at 77 Fair Drive. The location is self-service and bringing your own shovel is suggested as supplies could be limited. The number of sandbags is limited to 15 sandbags per household.

No commercial use please.

Click here for instructions on sandbags.

Additionally, the city crews will patrol potential flooding spots to make sure catch basins are clear of debris and operational. Crews are also ready to respond to other weather-related incidents.

Please report flooding issues to 714-754-5252.

The City of Costa Mesa held its first public hearing on Tuesday Oct. 19 to discuss the official 2020 Census data (State-Adjusted), the redistricting process and permissible criteria to be considered to evaluate district boundaries.

The Council heard from redistricting expert Dr. Justin Levitt, who presented the city’s 2020 estimated total population. He noted that the redistricting goal is to have all districts the same (or as close to) a population of 18,690.  Currently Costa Mesa has a deviation of 11.52%.  The City needs to bring that down to under 10%.

Click here to see the data.

To accomplish that, the City is seeking the public’s participation to redraw boundaries for City Council Districts 1 through 6.

The City of Costa Mesa will also hold its first public input workshop on Saturday Oct. 23 at 10 a.m. at the Norma Hertzog Community Center. Members of the public will have an opportunity to learn about the redistricting process, data and mapping tools.

Every 10 years, local governments use new data from the Census to redraw their district lines to reflect how populations have changed. State law requires cities to engage communities in the redistricting process by holding public hearings and doing public outreach, including to underrepresented and non-English-speaking communities.

Subsequent meetings will be scheduled in December of 2021 and January of 2022.

For more information on redistricting or to draw a district map, please visit: https://redistrictcostamesa.org/ In addition, the City has created a dedicated email address for the public to submit questions or comments regarding the City’s redistricting process. The email address is redistricting@costamesaca.gov