I’m the back alley neighbor of the Kirbys, and a co-founder of Laguna Neighbors (lagunaneighbors.org). Please check out our website and see for yourself what the Kirby family have been through to make a home in an historic property where they plan to be for the rest of their lives. Although Ms. Jurca and the Coalition’s lawyer are effective advocates for their point of view, that does not make them right. Ms Jurca states “Laguna’s historic preservation process can and must be repaired.” Laguna Neighbors wonder what exactly is broken? Any process can be improved, which is why the town spent five years revising our historic ordinance in a participatory, democratic fashion. (Only by Laguna standards is that a rush to judgment.) And if we still have a “broken historic process,” as Ms Jurca claims, where is the proof? Can any fair-minded person look around our town and tell me that we have been neglecting our historic heritage? Yet that’s what these lawsuits are attempting to prove, and if the Kirbys have to be collateral damage, it’s a price that Ms Jurca and the Coalition are willing to pay in the name of CEQA doctrinal purity. The lawsuit against the Kirbys may be legal. But Laguna Neighbors think it is immoral.
Chris Quilter, Laguna Beach
Editor’s Note: This letter appeared in the April 2 edition of the Independent.
