Newport council to discuss plans for park

Newport Beach City Council members tonight will again discuss plans for Newport Center Park, the oft-debated 12-acre site next to the city’s central library on Avocado Avenue. It’s been slated for a park since 1992 but has recently, and persistently, been brought up as a place for a new city hall.

The council is only scheduled to decide whether the park should be passive and what amenities it should have, but the city hall issue is bound to come up again — particularly since proponents of a city hall there have filed papers to get the issue on the February ballot.

In a post on the OC Blog, a political website, former Newport Beach resident Jeff Solsby wrote his cell phone received a call Monday about the park. The message urged people to attend tonight’s meeting and to tell their council members to fund active parks before passive ones.

Mayor Steve Rosansky, who has backed a city hall/park combo, agrees that the council should spend money on active parks first.

The council meets at 7 p.m. at 3300 Newport Blvd.

— Alicia Robinson