Part-time Newport Beach resident Jeff Moorad’s deal to buy the San Diego Padres means there again will be a baseball owner with a home in OC. The Angels’ owners always have been out-of-towners,Gene Autry, Jackie Autry and Disney, all based in L.A., and Arte Moreno, who has homes in La Jolla and Phoenix. In the 1980s Newport Beach resident George Argyros owned the Seattle Mariners and Emerald Bay’s Peter Ueberroth was baseball commissioner. Moorad was a sports agent with Leigh Steinberg in Newport Beach before becoming CEO of the Arizona Diamondbacks in 2004. He has relinquished that job to head an investment group buying the Padres from John Moores on an installment plan …
Eleven House Democrats voted against the economic stimulus bill. It would have been 12, but OC Rep. Loretta Sanchez changed her vote at the last moment. Sanchez said she’s concerned that too much of the $800 billion-plus won’t find its way down to the community level where it should go. But after initially voting “no,” she said she picked up a newspaper and read about another wave of layoffs, and decided a flawed bill was better than none. Sanchez said nobody pressured her: “They know better than that.” Besides, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi “knew she had the votes” for passage …
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And what do you get for saying nice things about President Obama but then voting against his stimulus package in the House? Rep. John Campbell, R-Irvine, got lampooned on “The Colbert Report” show (which also misidentified him as “Jim” Campbell) …
UCI Merage School Dean Andy Policano’s tip for getting through the recession: “Turn off your TV.” Policano told the Irvine Chamber there are six months of bad economic news ahead, with some improvement after that. Lennar’s Emile Had-dad made the building industry’s pitch for federal help to stop the “erosion” in the housing market. But he said the long-term outlook for OC home-price appreciation remained strong, in large part because land is scarce and in relatively few hands: “Irvine Company is not going to dump land. We are not going to dump land” …
Speaking of which, we know it’s tough out there and we’ll keep reporting it. But behind the gloomy recession news, many businesspeople continue to get credit, expand, turn profits and add jobs. We’ve heard from some of them in recent days, complaining that there’s too much negativity in the media coverage. In this issue and subsequent ones, you’ll read about success stories during these challenging times, starting on today’s front page. If you have an example, let us know …
California Lt. Gov. John Garamendi made the local rounds Jan. 30, attending the ribbon-cutting for the New University Hospital at UCI Medical Center in Orange and taking a swig of purified wastewater at the OC Sanitation District’s reclamation plant in Fountain Valley; Assemblyman Mike Duvall tagged (and drank) along …
Four world mountain summits down, three to go: High-achieving showoff Jim Doti is back from subzero Antarctica, where he planted Chapman U’s banner atop 16,000-foot Mount Vinson.
