HB Neighbors (HBN) assembled information from different government sources to produce a Survey of Downtown Huntington Beach Bars and Restaurants. HBN, a Downtown neighborhood organization, produced this survey as a planning tool for government decision makers.

The survey lists 39 establishments that are licensed to serve alcohol of the 62 restaurants in the Downtown area. These 39 restaurants and bars have a capacity of 6355 occupants. Most of these establishments are within two city blocks of Main and Walnut Streets. This survey highlights that the Downtown area has the highest concentration of bars in Orange County, and one of the highest in California.  Twenty-three of the locations have an Entertainment Permit allowing live music, DJs, or dancing.  Eighteen of the bars close after midnight spilling up to 3200 young bar patrons onto Main Street in the early morning hours.  This creates policing issues, littering, parking and noise issues in the surrounding residential neighborhoods, loitering, and the highest concentration of crime within the city. The nearby Pacific City Development, now stalled in the construction stage, will bring at least eight new alcohol serving restaurants or nightclubs with an estimated additional capacity of 1800 patrons. This will create a total of over 8000 patrons being served alcohol within the small Downtown core area.

Huntington Beach has the highest number of DUI’s for midsized cities in California, and the HB Police Department reported the primary source was Downtown bars.

The city states it is promoting tourism while the HB Neighbors website www.hbneighbors.com  claims the city is instead promoting kids to party in the bars on weekend nights at the expense of a more balanced retail area. “The Downtown area has become one dimensional” states Angela Rainsberger a board member of HBN. “Most of the bars and restaurants now focus on the youth below 30 years old instead of a balance of restaurants catering to families and all age groups” Angela stated.

Other beach cities such as Santa Monica, Manhattan Beach, Hermosa Beach, Belmont Shores, Seal Beach, and Newport Beach discourage the expansion of bars and restaurants to allow retail stores to flourish.

HBN is requesting a partnership of the city planners, Downtown business owners, local residence, and the HB Police Department to create a Comprehensive Alcohol Plan with stated goals, strategies, and implementation plan. The city’s Economic Development Department should change their emphasis to promoting retail businesses catering to tourist and the local neighborhood, including non-peak time periods.

HBN acknowledges the Downtown area has a long history of bars and entertainment venues.  During the years of the Golden Bear, there was only seven places with alcohol licenses.  Today, there are 39 places and six of them are the approximate size of the former Golden Bear. Only in recent years has the Downtown area grown to the highest concentration of bars in Orange County.

HBN claims the city has missed the opportunity of creating a smaller version of Santa Monica’s Third Street Promenade (with a balance of retail stores) and instead created an unbalanced emphasis of youth bars. Angela concludes “most late night bar patrons are not tourist”.

 The LA Times has cover story

Bar scene gives Huntington Beach both headaches and a hearty revenue boost

 Welcome to Huntington Beach, the “Jersey Shore” of Orange County.

When the sun sets here, a three-block stretch of innocuous-looking stucco buildings morphs from a place where shopkeepers hawk beach towels and surfboards to one where bartenders sling bottles of vodka, illuminated by black light and neon.

But the debauchery comes with a price.

Huntington Beach is ranked No. 1 in victims killed and injured in alcohol-involved traffic accidents among cities its size in California. DUI arrests are more than twice the number in Irvine, a college town roughly the same size.

With 1,419 DUI arrests last year and a clear problem on their hands, city officials decided they needed to tackle the problem. The City Council placed restrictions on new bars — no beer pong or drink minimums, for example — and police began tracking where people had their last drink before their arrests.

Reed the full story at : http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-huntington-beach-alcohol-20110403,0,2795221,full.story

Please see the artical written by Mona Shadia in the HB Independant linked below.  Here is an excerpt…….

A hearing on whether Huntington Beach violated state environmental laws in how it put together its environmental impact report for its downtown specific plan is scheduled for Thursday.

Huntington Beach Neighbors filed a lawsuit against the Huntington Beach in November, claiming the city simplified the EIR to hide the effects the developments will have on the area.

http://www.hbindependent.com/news/tn-hbi-0317-neighbors-20110314,0,64326.story

The City asserts (page 32 of its opposition brief) that all additional Police personnel, needed to support development permitted by the New Downtown Plan, “‘can be absorbed within existing staffing levels.’”

Downtown’s current number of alcohol-serving establishments is approaching forty, an over-saturation of bars.  The Existing Downtown Plan allowed for these 140,000 square feet of restaurants and bars.  When combined with Pacific City, the New Downtown Plan will permit an additional 140,000+ square feet of new restaurants and bars, an absolute doubling of space for these potentially problematic uses.  Thus, we could see two times as many bars as we have today, a future number in the range of eighty total.

Will Police staffing remain adequate in our Downtown, with the plans for doubling the number of bars?  You be the Judge.

From the latest available CA statistics, for 2009, HB has the highest Per Capita rate among its 56 peer cities, for Alcohol Related traffic collisions causing death or physical injury.  HB had 195 such accidents.  HB IS THE WORST CITY IN THE WHOLE STATE FOR DUI WRECKS.

Again within this same CA peer group for 2009, HB was the fourth best in DUI enforcement, with 40% more DUI arrests than the state average.  These numbers and more are available at the California Office of Traffic Safety’s website:

http://www.ots.ca.gov/Media_and_Research/Rankings/default.asp

Comparing HB’s two rankings, you can see that our City’s record-setting epidemic in DUI collisions, deaths, and injuries is NOT the result of lax enforcement.  These accidents come from an over-saturation of bars, most importantly in our Downtown.  The many drunk drivers from our Downtown bars are totally overwhelming our City’s Police resources and their enforcement capabilities.

Is current Police staffing adequate in our Downtown, with all of our bars?  You be the Judge.

HB City’s opposition brief (at page 32) asserts that,  “‘The current authorized staffing level for the Police Department . . . is adequate.’”

Completely contradicting this statement, the HB Police are fully aware that Downtown’s bar patrons and drunk drivers are absolutely out of control.  Quoting a July 2010 HB Police Report to the City Council:

“In spite of having 12 officers standing by to stop suspected drunk drivers, once the [Downtown] bars began to close, there was such a rush of suspected drunk drivers that within 10 to 15 minutes all of the officers had detained suspected drunk drivers.  Those drivers were ultimately arrested while a large number of suspected drunk drivers continued to drive out of the parking structure with no one left to stop them.  Our resources were so quickly overwhelmed we believe on any given night a large number of drunk drivers likely leave our downtown area undetected.  This is but one example of an event that leads us to believe there are significant numbers of undetected DUI drivers each day in Huntington Beach.”

Is current Police staffing adequate in our Downtown, with all of our bars?  You be the Judge.

From the LA Times / HB Independent -

Huntington Beach ranked No. 1 among California cities of its size in per-capita alcohol-related traffic collisions in 2009, according to numbers recently released by the state Office of Traffic Safety.

The report, which came out in January, ranks Huntington above 55 other cities with a population between 100,000 and 250,000. A total of 195 people were killed or injured in alcohol-related collisions, according to the report.

Huntington has been in the top 10 for per-capita DUI accidents for the last half-decade, ranking sixth in 2005, eighth in 2006, seventh in 2007 and fourth in 2008.

Lt. Russell Reinhart of the Huntington Beach Police Department said the city was aware its DUI accident numbers were high in 2009, but the ranking came as a surprise.

“I don’t think we knew we were No. 1,” he said. “We knew our numbers were high.”

Read the entire article here.

My husband was awoken last night from the sounds a man crying for help from his injuries from yet another accident on Main Street. 

Last month a DUI took out the side of our friends’ car a block south of us on Main Street. Did you notice the damage the DUI damage in front of the Art Center last month.  Did our tax dollars go to repair the damage to our city? I hope not.   The DUI problem is not improving in our neighborhood.  Why isn’t the city council addressing the growing problem with a solution that actually decreases the DUIs?  Lip service is not getting the results we need to make our neighborhood safe.

Here is a cool site that one of our members forwarded to us. The site easily shows crime stats, simply enter your address and or zip code. You can see Downtown has been a hotbed of activity with many calls that included assaults with deadly weapons, thefts, breaking and entering, robbery, etc. http://www.crimereports.com

8 Myths about Downtown HB

MYTH 1)

Adding extra density will create a renaissance of retail stores and neighborhood services in DTHB. HB City Staff argues that Downtown needs future 4 to 5 story buildings and very high residential density (50 DU/Acre) to create enough demand to stimulate new retail stores. The city’s EIR estimates 648 new Dwelling Units (DU) will be developed in the Downtown core area. If the current 3-story height limit were to remain, about 448 DU would be developed. So does City Staff believes 200 more DU will cause a renaissance? There are currently over 7000 people who live within a 10 minute walk of Downtown, plus the 516 DU to be built two blocks away at Pacific City. The city has already failed at capturing the very high disposable income ($96,219) of these 7000 adjoining residents. Adding 200 more DU, and ruining the “Village Concept” with big boxy buildings will not stimulated retail development.

MYTH 2)

The existing buildings are blighted and not viable. HB City Staff believes that Main Street (north of Orange) and 5th Street (north of Walnut) is blighted and we must have new big boxy buildings with minimal parking, to create a viable neighborhood. Every retail space along Main Street north of Orange is occupied with viable tenants. Most of these businesses are neighborhood serving and bring HB locals to Downtown during non-peak times, creating a balanced Downtown. The City’s own Specific Plan (page 8-2) refers to these properties as “viable” but high density development is the only way to stimulate new development. The fact is these areas are not blighted. Let future development happen naturally, within the current scale of Downtown.

MYTH 3)

New 4 and 5 story buildings will blend into the Downtown Neighborhood. The 1983 Downtown Specific Plan established the concept that the tallest buildings would be situated at Main Street and PCH, and building heights would be reduced on city blocks moving north. Currently, three buildings along PCH are 4 storys. All buildings north of Walnut are 3 storys or less. The remaining sites for future development are skinny lots with alleys behind them. New 4 and 5 story buildings developed on these lots will seem out of scale and they will dwarf over the adjoining one and two story houses. It is not possible to build a 5 story on a small lot and have it blend into a “Village Concept” neighborhood.

MYTH 4)

Tourist will patronize shops 4 and 5 blocks from the beach. The city’s original plan was to have a large tourist destination on Triangle Park luring tourist to shops along north Main Street. The City has wisely abandoned this plan, yet they still plan on replacing the viable businesses along north Main Street without an anchor to draw shoppers. No new large garages are planned in north Main Street. So what will draw tourist to an area so far from parking and the beach? Sounds like a recipe for a ghost town during non-peak periods and many vacant retail shops.

MYTH 5)

The Updated Specific Plan will solve the current parking problems. The HB City staff assures us that new high-density development will provide adequate parking and help solve the shortage of parking during peak periods. In reality, for the past 12 years the city allows up to 50% of the required parking for new development to be excused by the city through a in-lieu parking fee. The city collects a low fee from the developer to build the parking in a future city garage. The city currently has a requirement to build 263 in-lieu parking spaces. According to the DTSP the city is planning on relying on the in-lieu parking program to subsidize the development costs for the new high-density buildings. The DTSP is eliminating the 2000 Parking Master Plan and has no plan to build a new city parking garage. As new development occurs along north Main Street, the convenient surface parking lots will be eliminated and replaced with under-parked high-density development. Neighborhood services will be substantially reduced because locals will not want to patronize shops with inconvenient paid parking. The best example of this is the new CVS Drug Store in The Strand. The Updated DTSP should have a plan to build a new city garage and provide convenient free short-term parking for neighborhood services.

MYTH 6)

Adding new Downtown restaurants and bars will increase city income. Restaurants and bars generate substantial sales tax and the HB Downtown District (with 55 of these establishments) generates some of the highest taxes in HB. The Updated Specific Plan continues this plan with over a 50% increase in the number of new restaurant and bars. The problem with this plan is restaurant/bars require expensive city services such as police, fire/paramedics, cleaning and maintenance. The HB City staff is only looking at the revenue projections and not the added costs to the city. Downtown restaurant/bars are also closing because of over-saturation, and increase security issues are scarring away many HB residents. The city needs to develop a new Downtown business plan that creates a balance between residents and tourist, and promotes new office and retail uses that creates a balance during peak and non-peak periods. If the city allows bars to continue to increase without limitation this ghost town will eventually be filled with the only thing that can make money in an area so saturated by bars that the local population avoids it, more bars. The atmosphere of the bars will drive out other business and the local population and the associated crime will creep into the neighborhood. Police services are being cut back and the DTSP states that almost no new police resources will be needed.

MYTH 7)

The City knows and understands the impact Pacific City will have on the Downtown neighborhood. Pacific City was planned and entitled during 2002 to 2005. The developer started construction on this very large 31 acre, 1,000,000 square foot development with a major hotel, restaurants and 516 DU. In 2007, the financing fell apart. Similar large developments are now selling for less than 50%, and it does not appear Pacific City will be completed for at least five years. When it is completed, who knows how it will be developed. Traffic studies, security issues, demands for city services, estimated retail sales, and parking studies, are educated estimates by experts, but until a massive project like this is developed and seasoned, know one really knows the impact it will have on the Downtown neighborhood. HB Neighbors is in favor of the development of Pacific City, but the city should delay planning high-density development along north Main Street until the impacts of Pacific City are understood.

MYTH 8 )

Downtown HB needs to turn into a destination center that is pedestrian friendly. The Updated DTSP wants to turn Downtown into a walkable tourist destination center. Downtown is already a successful pedestrian friendly commercial center with large parking facilities. Our beaches and pier are major destinations for tourist, and the adjoining commercial area services these tourist during peak periods. During non-peak periods the commercial district is empty. The Downtown neighborhood is the densest neighborhood in HB with high household incomes. Over 22,000 residence live within one mile of Downtown and many of these neighbors already walk or bicycle to the main Street area. If the city would focus on higher quality shops, family oriented entertainment, and a variety of neighborhood services, the residents would shop more Downtown while leaving their cars at home.

Richard Plummer

Director of HB Neighbors