Ceremony For New Fire Chief Tomorrow Morning

DAN STEFANO TAKES OVER TODAY
Overlooked by me as I pounded my head on the wall about the whole "Public Comments" fiasco is the fact that our new Fire Chief, Dan Stefano, starts to work today.

CEREMONY AND RECEPTION TOMORROW
Tomorrow, Tuesday, December 3rd, there will be an official badge pinning ceremony at City Hall in City Council Chambers beginning at 10:00 a.m., followed by a reception for the new Fire Chief.

LONG SERVICE IN LAGUNA BEACH
According to the City press release, Stefano comes to us after long service in Laguna Beach.  Read that press release HERE.

INTERIM STEPS
Costa Mesa has been without a permanent Fire Chief for several years.  Several men have stepped up to perform as Interim Chief during that time.  Kirk Dominic filled that role, then retired.  Retired Deputy Fire Chief from Newport Beach, Tom Arnold, stepped up to provide some stable, mature leadership to the organization on a part-time basis and created a new deployment model that, once fully implemented early next year, will provide superior service and save a ton of money.  Recently Fred Seguin has acted as Interim Chief and has done a fine job of juggling many balls while the search for a permanent chief was conducted.

WELCOME, CHIEF STEFANO!
We welcome Chief Stefano to head the Costa Mesa Fire Department and hope he will provide the stable leadership needed as the department converts it's deployment model.

Tom Arnold Named Costa Mesa Interim Fire Chief

HATCH APPOINTS ARNOLD AS INTERIM FIRE CHIEF
Today Costa Mesa CEO Tom Hatch announced that long time resident Tom Arnold has been appointed Costa Mesa Interim Fire Chief pending the completion of physical examination and background check.

EXCELLENT EXPERIENCE
Arnold, who has been a Costa Mesa resident for more than three decades, is a retired Deputy Fire Chief in the City of Newport Beach. According to the Daily Pilot article on his appointment, he worked as a firefighter, paramedic, fire captain and battalion chief before his final 15 years as Deputy Fire Chief.

GREAT NEWS!
This is great news for the City of Costa Mesa and for the Costa Mesa Fire Department specifically. The department has been in a state of unrest, without a Fire Chief, Deputy Fire Chief and with other senior Fire management positions vacant for a year. Interim Fire Chief Kirk Dominic, who has tried to hold it all together during this troubled time, will return to field operations once Arnold takes charge.

LEADERSHIP NEEDED MORE THAN EVER
There remains much turmoil swirling around the Fire Department, including the potential of the takeover of the department by the Orange County Fire Authority and the conflict with the City Council over pensions. Arnold's experience and leadership will be especially welcome at this time.

KUDOS TO BOTH TOMS
Kudos to Tom Hatch for making this move, and to Tom Arnold for accepting this challenge.

Quiet 4th And More Fireworks Tonight (Amended)*

FIRE CHIEF REPORTS A QUIET 4TH
Well, how was your weekend? Safe and sane, I hope. According to Costa Mesa Interim Fire Chief Kirk Dominic this morning, it was a quiet weekend. Except for some trash fires caused by folks discarding hot fireworks in their trash cans, things were quiet from a fire response standpoint. That's wonderful news. There were no structure fires reported.

EASTSIDE WAR ZONE
On the Eastside of Costa Mesa there were lots of illegal fireworks fired-off throughout the evening of the 4th, beginning before dark and continuing until just before midnight.

MORE MONEY FOR YOUTH SPORTS?
No word yet from our friends who were selling the safe and sane fireworks around town. Logic would tell you that they'd have more sales than in years past because folks could shoot the fireworks off for three evenings instead of just one.

KUDOS TO ALL
Kudos to all who used the fireworks for doing so safely.






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CITY COUNCIL MEETING TONIGHT
Tonight the Costa Mesa City Council meets in its first meeting of the new fiscal year. It looks like it may be a short meeting - a nice change.

REDUCING INCOME?
The first Public Hearing - scheduled to commence at 7:00 (the meeting itself begins at 6:00), we will hear a proposal to REDUCE income to the city by establishing a new schedule of rates, fees and charges for police department coverage of special/community events. You can read the staff report HERE. The theory is apparently to reduce costs charged by the city for police presence at special events and thereby entice more such events to our city. Seems like a curious tactic at a time when we're struggling to balance our budgets and potentially laying off half the city staff to do so. This is just another affirmation that the current city council's actions are not about finances, they are about politics.

"MASSAGING" THE MASSAGE PARLOR ORDINANCE
The third Public Hearing (there's another one, but it's being recommended for continuance to the next meeting) deals with a revision of the ordinance governing Massage Establishments and Practitioners. You can read the staff report HERE and the actual ordinance HERE. Certainly, this is a necessary modification to our ordinances since we're told that many such establishments in our city are actually fronts for illicit activities. As I scrolled down through the ordinance I came to the definitions on page 4. Some of the terms used therein snapped these old eyeballs open, for sure. I'll let you visit the ordinance to read them for yourselves.

*OCEA AUDIT TO BE EXPLAINED - AGAIN
I forgot to mention that Steve Foti, the man who actually performed the audit recently for the OCEA, will appear before the City Council tonight to explain his numbers. I have no idea how it will play out, but at least this time around we will hear from the horse's mouth, not a Union surrogate who was clearly unprepared for the hand-to-hand combat she was subjected to by Jim Righeimer at the last council meeting.

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OCEA/CITY IN COURT TODAY
Over at the LiberalOC blog, writer Chris Prevatt reports that the Orange County Employee's Association (OCEA) will be in court today requesting a Preliminary Injunction to stop the layoffs of more than 100 Costa Mesa city employees. HERE. We've seen this issue on closed session agendas in recent weeks, but were not aware that the court date was today. In fact, it's on the closed session agenda again this evening. We hope that some member of the staff will report the results of the court date in open session tonight.