Mayor busy as attorney, father, leader

Now into his second term on the Newport Beach City Council, John Heffernan takes firm grasp of gavel.When he became mayor of Newport Beach in June, John Heffernan moved from the far end of the dais to the middle.

But he hasn’t abandoned the rugged individualism that often left him standing alone in his early days on the council.

Heffernan, 55, was first elected in 2000, when he beat incumbent Councilman Tom Thomson and popular former City Manager Bob Wynn. He had rarely set foot into the City Hall and might not have run for the council if he’d been given the planning commission seat he wanted.

“I turned 50, and I decided: ‘This is nuts. If the city is this backward, and they’ve got these political appointments, I’m going to run for office,’” he said.

Now into his second term, Heffernan is taking his first grasp of the gavel. He believes he wasn’t chosen as mayor earlier because he initially ran with the backing of Greenlight, the slow-growth advocacy group that has tried and mostly failed to get its supporters elected.

Some council members had little patience for what they saw as Greenlight’s attempt to control development through the ballot box.

“I was lucky if people talked to me the first year,” Heffernan said.

Now he’s hardly got time to talk, with two teenage sons who play four varsity sports, a full-time job as an attorney and all the work of a mayor with no assistant.

It was the sudden resignation of Mayor Steve Bromberg, who was appointed to an Orange County Superior Court judgeship, that left the mayor’s seat open. The council debated whether to give someone an extra-long term or pick a council member to finish out the year as mayor.

He took the post right when everything started to hit the fan in Newport -- the council finally resolved the dispute over St. Andrew’s Presbyterian Church’s expansion, it made major decisions on the general plan update, and it’s working on whether to build a $46-million civic center.

Heffernan has been the loudest voice of skepticism on the council regarding the civic center project. He voted against keeping it on the Balboa Peninsula, and he’s criticized the process the city has gone through to develop the project.

But he said his main concern is whether building a well-appointed city hall will help the city serve residents better or faster.

“What does this do to improve the service,” he said. “That’s the key, and that’s what I’ve not had answered.”

A number of the council’s most frequent critics have praised Heffernan’s performance as mayor, including Dolores Otting, who ran against him in 2004.

“I think that he’s had to confront some very difficult issues and that he’s tried to work openly and with the public to form some type of a win-win decision,” Otting said.

Greenlight spokesman Phil Arst said Heffernan’s votes may not always agree with his own preferences, but as mayor, Heffernan has ushered in positive changes.

“The meetings are run with decorum; the people testifying are not insulted if they have a different opinion; and their opinions are solicited,” Arst said.

Though they’re sometimes on the opposite side of votes, even Councilman Tod Ridgeway thinks Heffernan has handled the gavel well. Heffernan has flip-flopped in the past -- for instance, in 2002 he announced he would step down from the council but then changed his mind and finished his term -- but he’s done less of that as mayor, Ridgeway said.

“He said in the beginning that in that position, he felt he needed to be a centrist. I think he’s uncomfortable in that role. I think he’s more comfortable being a contrarian,” said Ridgeway, who is termed out in 2006.

Maybe it’s that individualistic streak that led Heffernan to distance himself from the Greenlight group. He admits he sought the endorsement because “it was politically expedient,” but he didn’t take campaign money.

“They tried to keep a handle on me pretty tight, and I’m just not a guy that does well with that,” he said.

Otting lamented that serving a shortened mayor’s term doesn’t give Heffernan much time to make changes, but it hasn’t daunted him.

He’d like to see the city take over running the harbor patrol and improve its disaster preparedness plans, and he wants to get rid of the feeling of distrust some residents have toward the council.

“I think that disrupts so much of what you do,” he said. “People say you’re on the take, you’re not to be trusted. That’s very divisive.”

Despite having a to-do list as long as your arm, Heffernan doesn’t think being mayor has given him much more power to set the city’s agenda.

That’s why he believes Newport Beach should elect its mayors -- his suggestion is an instant runoff among the council members.

“I think it would give the mayor more authority,” he said, adding that the way things are now, “you’re just sitting in the middle of the room.”

* ALICIA ROBINSON covers government and politics. She may be reached at (714) 966-4626 or by e-mail at [email protected].