Mind the dang store. Huntington Beach voters didn’t elect a City Council to audition for flashy cable news. We want them to run a stuffy service business: streets, safety, facilities, finances, and risk mitigation. Our current council keeps running up public relations bills before paying for the daily wheat bread. And we taxpayers fund their fun.
Start with basics: our own city documents acknowledge deferred maintenance and infrastructure needs—this isn’t rumor, it’s published in city materials. Potholes linger and facilities age out. “Deferred maintenance is just debt with potholes.” Huntington Beach residents can feel it: aging facilities, stressed infrastructure, and a city budget that always seems one surprise away from panic.
The city has started to acknowledge this openly. Huntington Beach’s 2024 Infrastructure Report Card describes major components of backbone infrastructure dating back decades and being extended beyond intended useful life—an explicit warning about deferred maintenance and underinvestment over time. That’s not political commentary; it’s the city’s own documentation. Even without mentioning disasters, homeowners know: pay me now or pay me more later.
The budget. Reports on Huntington Beach’s FY 2025–26 budget described balancing partly by drawing down reserves and using one-time sleights-of-hand. That’s not evil. But it is a big warning light colored red. By covering recurring costs with one-time patches, the present council is abdicating its grown-up responsibilities. And the next council will inherit a budget pothole that we, the taxpayers, will have to backfill.
Then there are long-term commitments. Voice of OC reported on the city’s generous 25-year Pacific Airshow deal and the city’s financial obligations on behalf of the vendor around public safety and parking. Questions quickly arose about how the benefits were justified. In our modern, fluid socio-economic time, long term contracts aren’t automatically bad, but this one is curiously lopsided and naive. The taxpayers need transparent assumptions, measurable performance, and credible exit ramps. And less buddy buddy relations with the vendor.
Now add risk. Huntington Beach’s Emergency Operations Plan materials note that low-lying coastal areas are exposed to sea level rise and increasing vulnerability to hazards. The city’s hazards element also notes elevated liquefaction risk, particularly near the coast and Huntington Harbour. These are not abstract academic scenarios—they’re the kinds of events that turn “routine maintenance” into “emergency spending.”
In this context, priorities matter. Residents are right to ask why city attention and dollars go to discretionary controversies instead of measurable readiness and infrastructure repair. Even public-safety technology spending needs clear goals and trust. For example, LAist reported that the city installed 10 security cameras and three license plate readers in Oak View and quietly signed contracts, creating a citywide debate about process and targeting. Even policing tools—like surveillance cameras focused on particular neighborhoods—require trust, clear rules, and public process, or they create division while consuming money and staff attention.
This November 2026 election is where Council competence gets rewarded or punished. If you want streets fixed, disasters averted, reserves protected, and big contracts scrutinized, vote like your household budget depends on it—because it does.
Less drama. More potholes filled.
Buzz McCord, biomedical physicist, entrepreneur, educator, traveler and author. McCord is a long time resident of Huntington Beach, active in local schools and civic affairs such as the 19th Street Bridge and Poseidon Desalination Plant.
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