By Grace Leung, Newport Beach City Manager
The next Newport Beach City Council meeting is Tuesday, May 14. Items of interest are highlighted below. The entire agenda and reports can be viewed here: https://newportbeachca.gov/Home/Components/Calendar/Event/73673/72.
The regular meeting will begin at 6 p.m. Agenda items include:
- A license agreement with Aqua Superpower (USA), Inc. to install, maintain and operate electric watercraft charging equipment at the Marina Park docks. The charging equipment would be open to the public. Under the proposal, Aqua would pay the City $3,000 a year and a percentage of the profits for an initial term of 8 years.
- Review and approval of a floor plan and architectural design for the replacement of the Balboa Branch Library and Fire Station No. 1 at 110 E. Balboa Blvd. The Council review follows previous public meetings with the Board of Library Trustees and Parks, Beaches, and Recreation Commission. Based on input from the meetings, three floor plans and two architectural styles were refined. The Council will review the plans and provide direction to staff. The branch library building (originally built in 1929) and fire station (added in 1962) are aging, outdated and no longer meet current needs. The replacement cost for the new facility is estimated at about $16 million.
City Council Meeting Information
The Newport Beach City Council meets on the second and fourth Tuesdays of most months (the exceptions are August and December). Typically, there is a Study Session that starts at 4 p.m. Study sessions are times for the Council to take a deeper look at a specific issue, or hear a presentation, that might eventually lead to a specific and more formal action. A closed session often follows the Study Session. Closed sessions are typically to address legal, personnel, and other matters where additional confidentiality is important.
The Regular (evening) Session typically starts at 6 p.m., and often has a specific listing of different items ready for formal votes. Items on the “Consent Calendar” are heard all at once, unless a Council member has removed (aka “pulled”) an item from the Consent Calendar for specific discussion and separate vote. If an item on the agenda is recommended to be “continued,” it means that the item won’t be heard nor voted on that evening, but will be pushed forward to another noticed meeting.
Public Comment is welcomed at both the Study Session and the Regular Session. The public can comment on any item on the agenda. If you want to comment on a Consent Calendar item that was not pulled from the Consent Calendar by a Council Member, you will want to do so at the time listed on the agenda – right before the Council votes on the entire Consent Calendar (it’s Roman Numeral XIII on the posted agenda). If an item is pulled, the Mayor will offer that members of the public can comment as that specific item is heard separately.
Additionally, there is a specific section of Public Comment for items not on the agenda, but on a subject of some relationship to the city government. If you cannot attend a meeting and/or want to communicate with the City Council directly, this e-mail gets to all of them: citycouncil@newportbeachca.gov. The City Manager also gets a copy of the email, because in almost all cases it’s something that the City Manager follows-up on.
The Council meets in the Council Chambers at 100 Civic Center Drive, off of Avocado between San Miguel and East Coast Highway. There is plenty of parking in the parking structure. You are always welcome to attend in person, but you can also watch on TV, Spectrum channel 30 and Cox channel 852 or stream it on your computer.
