City to study gun range

Paul Clinton

The City Council revived a proposal to build a state-of-the-art

gun range in Surf City to offer pistol and rifle training for its

police department and, perhaps, generate revenue from an eager clique

of gun enthusiasts.

At its Monday meeting, the council agreed to study whether a new

gun range is feasible. The city has been without a firing range since

1997, when an open-air range in Central Park was closed after it was

deemed a hazard.

Councilman Gil Coerper, a retired city police officer, proposed

the idea. Coerper, at the Monday meeting, said a new range is needed

for officer training. It could also serve to bolster the city’s

coffers, he said.

“We should bring this money into Huntington Beach,” Coerper said.

“We shouldn’t pay to send our officers to another city.”

As it now stands, city police officers drive out to Norco and

other cities in the Inland Empire for rifle and pistol training,

Police Chief Kenneth Small said.

Coerper asked his colleagues to support forming a new committee to

study the gun range proposal again.

On a 6-1 vote Monday, the council decided to hold a study session,

expected to occur in early March, before deciding whether to

commission a new panel. Councilwoman Cathy Green voted in opposition.

After a three-year effort to study whether a gun range in Surf

City would be feasible, a council subcommittee, in 2000, concluded

that the city doesn’t offer an adequate location for the range.

Councilwoman Debbie Cook echoed that conclusion Monday.

“We don’t have any place to put it and we don’t have any money,”

Cook said. “I don’t see any point in starting a committee, unless

it’s a fund-raising committee.”

The city has also found itself in a budget crunch, caused, in

part, by a struggling economy and state budget crisis.

Latest estimates put an $8-million price tag on any indoor range,

said Ron Hagan, the city’s former community services director, who

studied the issue at the time.

“It is needed in the community,” Hagan said. “The police need a

place to train.”

What makes a new range such a costly proposition is the need for a

closed facility with automated targeting, a collection system to

prevent lead bullets from entering the soil, classroom space, an

armory and complex computer and video systems to run the

hit-and-don’t-hit practice drills.

The previous range closed because, as an open-air range, it was

susceptible to bullets flying out of the range, a phenomenon known as

a “blue sky escape.”

The most promising proposal for a new range has come out of Surf

City’s neighbor, Fountain Valley. That city has proposed building a

range in an industrial section of town that could be jointly used by

both departments.

Small said there could be federal funding to defray the high cost.

A task force of six federal agencies, including the Coast Guard, the

Drug Enforcement Administration and the CIA, has offered $2 million

in aid to help build the range.

But challenges remain for the project, Small said.

“It would be very difficult to have a gun range in the city,”

Small said. “It’s a very complicated project.”

Procession subdued, but meaningful, planners say

While it wasn’t infused with the raw emotion of the post-Sept. 11

event, this year’s Procession of Light still resonated with the

nearly 500 people who attended, organizers said.

“It had more of a reflective tone,” organizer Debi Wheeler Ure

said. “We’re all very pleased.”

For last year’s event, organizers invited members of the New York

Police Department, who joined hands with local officers and religious

leaders.

This year, Rep. Dana Rohrabacher, Police Chief Kenneth Small and

Mayor Connie Boardman ushered in the new year, with hopes for “peace

at every level of society,” event spokeswoman Lourdes Guttierrez

said.

The event began at 3 p.m. Sunday at the Huntington Beach Pier

Plaza and continued until nearly sundown.

The Greater Huntington Beach Interfaith Council has been

sponsoring and organizing the event since 2000.

This year, after a musical prelude, organizers and attendees

gathered at the pier to hear public remarks from community leaders

and then marched down to a beachfront fire pit to offer the “unity

prayer.” Those who chose to participate wrote down a prayer on slips

of paper, which were collected and burned together as a show of

communion.

“The wonderful thing was that people came and they stayed,”

Wheeler Ure said.

Rohrabacher’s speech at the event wasn’t a political one. Though

he has been one of the most hawkish advocates of military action in

Iraq, Huntington Beach’s congressman didn’t address the topic at the

event, Wheeler Ure said.

Sick sea lions wash up in Newport, Huntington

Two sick sea lions washed up on the beach Sunday morning, one at

the Newport Beach Pier the other at Huntington Beach Pier.

The sea lions, who both appeared to be highly dehydrated and

malnourished, were immediately transported to the Friends of the Sea

Lion Marine Mammal Center in Laguna Beach.

While both sea lions are undergoing similar treatment at the

center, their precise recovery will be unknown for the next 48 hours,

said Michelle Hunter, director of operations at the center.

The sea lion found in Newport Beach, the older and heavier of the

two -- about 1 year old and 58 pounds -- should be released back into

the wild in about a month, Hunter said.

The other sea lion, whose recovery will be much longer, was only

6-months-old and 38 pounds. It will require re-nourishment through a

feeding tube after rehydration.

Neither sea lion has shown signs of sickness due to disease or

infection, and the exact cause of their dehydration is unknown,

Hunter said.

Harbour View tennis court restoration done

A group of Huntington Harbour neighbors cut the ribbon on a pair

of tennis courts at Harbour View Elementary School, which they have

been restoring over the past two years.

The Friends of Huntington Harbour spearheaded the project, which

cost about $40,000.

“It’s a reason for the children to exercise,” said 36-year-old

Jeannine Studer, who oversaw the project. “It makes the community

tighter.”

The courts are at the intersection of Saybrook Lane and Heil

Avenue, north of the 4343 Pickwick Circle school.

Studer and a group of dedicated neighbors banded together two

years ago to begin raising funds to pay for the restoration of the

courts, which were then infested with weeds.

The City Council handed the group $12,000; local realtor Sean

Stanfield donated another $12,000; and Pacific Polymers International

Inc., based in Garden Grove, donated $12,000 worth of paint. In all,

130 neighbors made donations.

Neighbors repaved, repainted and re-asphalted the courts. A

chain-link fence and new nets were also added.

The group held a ribbon-cutting on Sunday.

The public courts will now be open from 7 a.m. to 8 p.m. seven

days a week.

Job fair for Kohl’s store set for Friday

Kohl’s Department Stores has scheduled a job fair for Friday to

recruit employees for its new Surf City branch, which is scheduled to

open in the spring.

Surf City’s Kohl’s will occupy the long-vacant Broadway building

in the former Huntington Center Mall, which is set to reopen in March

as Bella Terra.

On Friday, job-seekers will vie for about 150 openings at the

store. The A-to-Z jobs range from department supervisors, sales

associates, customer service associates, register operators,

housekeeping personnel, overnight stockers and receiving personnel.

“It’s like applying for a job in person,” said Tawn Earnest, a

Kohl’s spokeswoman. “We are going to interview candidates on a

first-come first-served basis.”

Kohl’s, a public company based in Menomonee Falls, Wis., is

holding eight such job fairs in Southern California to hire employees

for 28 stores.

Friends de-weed Shipley center

Members of the Friends of the Shipley Nature Center spent their

Saturday removing invasive plants from the now-closed Shipley Nature

Center in Central Park.

Volunteers worked from 9 a.m. to noon to remove weeds from the

center, which is on Goldenwest Street, near Talbert Avenue.

City officials began removing tamarisk, myoporum, passion vine,

pampas grass, Brazilian pepper trees, giant reed and other nonnatives

in 1999. However, in September, the City Council voted to close the

center, citing an increasing budget crunch. The center’s gates were

locked Oct. 1.

The volunteer group took over these efforts in November. It plans

to open the center once a month to the public during the ongoing

effort.

Envoys for sister city program wanted

The Sister City Assn. of Huntington Beach is looking for eight

students to travel to Japan and New Zealand in early August.

The organization is sponsoring an exchange program with Anjo,

Japan and Waitakere, New Zealand. Applicants for the positions need

to submit paperwork by Jan. 17.

The association would accept high school freshman, sophomores and

juniors for the program. Applicants must live or go to school in

Huntington Beach.

“We’re looking for applicants who are self-assured, mature,

interested in learning about a foreign country and its people and

eager to host students in their homes,” association President Carmen

Erber said. “Opportunities for acceptance are good.”

The association will pay for a portion of the students’ expenses

during their two-week stay in each city. Applications are available

at the Huntington Beach Central Library, at 7111 Talbert Ave., or

City Hall, at 2000 Main St.

For more information: (714) 846-7685.

Verizon gives $5,000 to Oak View school

The Verizon Foundation handed $5,000 to the Children’s Bureau to

fund a handful of programs at the Oak View Elementary School. The

nonprofit group runs a family-resource center for the school.

Children’s Bureau members said they will use the money to put on

several programs, including a homework club, parenting classes and a

summer camp.

The phone giant awarded the grant in September.