Costa Mesa holds off on mobile restrooms, saying more study is needed

A proposed partnership with the Costa Mesa Sanitary District to provide mobile restrooms to help serve local homeless people needs additional study and outreach before it’s ready for prime time, Costa Mesa City Council members decided Tuesday.

The council voted 3-2 — with Mayor Pro Tem Allan Mansoor and Councilman Jim Righeimer opposed — to direct staff to continue working on the concept with the sanitary district and to talk with local businesses and identify possible locations for portable restrooms.

“I don’t know whether this bathroom thing is an answer to any major issues, but I certainly hope it will provide some relief for our merchants who come out in the morning and have to clean up poop,” Mayor Sandy Genis said. “I believe we need to think it through a little more and come up with more details.”

Councilman John Stephens had asked his colleagues to support committing $21,500 to cover half the estimated cost of a six-month pilot program in which portable toilets would be placed on a trailer so they could be stationed wherever they’re needed.

The rest of the money would come from the sanitary district, whose board voted unanimously in November to put up its share of the funding.

During several meetings last year, sanitary district officials said such a program would give homeless people a safe and hygienic place to relieve themselves and would help improve sanitation and public health by reducing public urination and defecation.

“This is an effort to solve a problem that exists in our community,” Stephens said. “We can study it until the cows come home, but the bottom line is, until we get something out there and start to collect data, we’ll never really know. … This is a way to end the speculation and collect some data.”

Councilwoman Katrina Foley said , without other options, homeless people have no choice but to relieve themselves in public.

“I know that the nice new restaurants that are opening up on 19th Street don’t want to have to come every morning and clean up poop from their property. ... I know that the residents I’ve talked to don’t want to have people defecating on their front yard anymore. So what’s the answer?” she said. “This is at least a creative way to address what is an immediate concern.”

Righeimer, however, was vehemently opposed to the concept.

“I don’t know if this is the dumbest idea I’ve ever heard in my life, but it’s right up there,” he said.

He called the sanitary district officials who supported the proposal “freaking idiots.”

“Anybody who thinks that if you’re going to give more services to [homeless] people you’re going to get less of them, you’re not thinking right,” he said.

In an interview Wednesday morning, sanitary district General Manager Scott Carroll said Righeimer is entitled to his opinion but called his comments “unfortunate.”

“To call the sanitary district and fellow elected officials ‘idiots’ is unprofessional and disrespectful,” Carroll said. “We hope he will take the high road by issuing an apology.”

Carroll said the sanitary district is open to additional dialogue to refine the mobile restroom concept and try to find a solution to people relieving themselves in public.

“This might not be a silver bullet, it might raise some issues, but we won’t know unless we try,” he said. “That’s always been our position.”

On Tuesday, some council members and residents expressed queasiness about an outline the sanitary district provided for how the program could work.

The district proposed to have the mobile restrooms open initially from 6 a.m. to noon Sundays through Fridays and rotate them among the intersections of 19th Street and Meyer Place, Anaheim Avenue and 18th Street and 17th Street and Pomona Avenue.

An attendant would be present at all times to make sure the restrooms are clean and used for their intended purpose.

Carroll told the council that the locations and hours could be adjusted as needed. Staffing them, he added, would provide an opportunity to connect with local homeless people and refer them to available services.

Some speakers, however, questioned whether it would be better to have the restrooms open at night rather than in the morning. Others objected to posting them solely in the city’s Westside, which already is home to several resources for the homeless.

“The Westside has clearly done their part, and this is going to make it worse,” Mansoor said.

Several residents warned that the portable restrooms might have “unintended consequences” by attracting additional homeless people and negatively impacting nearby businesses and residents.

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