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City Council considers $1.9 million shortfall

After more than five years of planning, the community center slated for Newport Coast may take a big step toward construction tonight, if the Newport Beach City Council agrees that the city should pay a $1.9-million budget shortfall.

The city and the Newport Coast Advisory Committee, which represents residents, signed a pact in 2001 that said the city would use $7 million of Newport Coast residents’ tax money to build the center at Newport Coast Drive and San Joaquin Hills Road.

Officials have haggled with residents over whether the center would include a library, how much parking should be provided and whether the city would take control of baseball fields next to the center’s site. Most of those issues have been resolved, and the city is ready to move forward.

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The big question that remains is funding. There is a little less than $6.7 million left of residents’ tax money, because some of it was spent on design and environmental studies. The city has agreed to pay about $800,000 for furniture for the center, reconfiguring a parking lot and other costs.

Bids for construction of the community center ? including a gym and community meeting rooms ? came in at $8.1 million. That leaves $1.9 million that is not funded.

City Councilman Keith Curry wants the city to pay that shortfall.

Some residents are still concerned the center will add traffic or block views from their homes, he said, and the council should to be sensitive to that.

The city always planned to take possession of the land where the center will sit, but the council must resolve who will own the baseball fields next to the center. Staff members suggest creating separate land parcels ? that way, the city could take the piece where the building will be and let the homeowners association that owns the property keep the ball fields, at least for now.

Dan Wampole, president of the Newport Ridge Community Assn. and a member of the Newport Coast Advisory Committee, thinks that’s a good approach. He said residents are adamantly against the city taking ownership of the baseball fields, as Councilman Tod Ridgeway has suggested.

“If the council will adopt it [the proposal] as to the staff’s recommendation, we’ve got a deal,” Wampole said. “If they don’t, no [deal].”

Ridgeway said he still wants the city to take over the ball fields, but he might support paying the community center shortfall even if the fields are not included.

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