Welcome back, rapacious readers. Before getting to this week’s installment of “As the Council Turns,” I wanted to present a small example of the power of the press.  
   
As loyal members of Fans O’ CityBeat will recall, several weeks ago your intrepid columnist mentioned the Universal Studios tour ride that is the Long Beach Courthouse. 
  
Brave souls clearing their ticket books of those worthless “A” tickets to take this ride experience a multitude of thrills and chills: The Comode Waterfalls, the Elevators to Nowhere, and the earthquake-induced Chasm of Doom between the two buildings.
  
Another popular feature of the ride was the Dripping Walls of Ooze. Frequent riders were known to shout out in terror, “It bleeds. The building. It bleeds.” Well, in reality that is what some of the lawyers who use the building have said.
  
Now, you writer only refers to the Dripping Walls in the past tense because shortly after this fascinating spectacle appeared in CityBeat, some joykill removed the ooze. Your humble writer would never want to take full credit for this, but it is interesting to note the timing of the column and the disappearance of the Dripping Walls. Interestingly, and in the sake of rider enjoyment, the Dripping Walls have now been replaced by the Wall of Graffiti, replete with the tribalistic Sharpee markings of some of the areas’ most notable gangs. Apparently, no clean surface goes unpunished in the Halls of Justice.
  
You, know if they would throw in an animatronic Yeti at the metal detectors, this ride will certainly have to be upgraded to a “B” ticket.
  
So, fearless reader, onto the Council proper.
  
Tuesday was do-or-die day at the City Council for the Port of Long Beach’s newest project—the $750 million Middle Harbor Development. Essentially the port wants to take three old contiguous terminals and turn them into one massive super terminal.
  
The Council was being asked to approve the environmental impact document for the project—a precursory but go-no-go vote that had to happen before actual development of the ten-year project can begin.
  
Your writer is not going to take this meager space to debate the merits of the project, other than to say there are two sides to the argument.
  
The simple business reality is that the port needs to increase its ability to handle cargo more efficiently or a lot of cargo is going to simply go somewhere else.
  
On the other side, critics have assailed these port projects for creating pollution. While the port has taken steps to assure that the pollution from the project is minimized, one thing that is often overlooked–even by critics–is that the whole goal of the project is to allow more cargo to flow through Long Beach. Even if you don’t consider the pollution argument, more cargo means more trains and trucks moving in and out of the port. Maybe City Hall’s plan for the 710 Freeway will address that.
  
One of the points your writer does take issue with is that nearly every major project at the port lacks any kind of serious input from the citizens—you know, those people like you and me that just love getting stuck next to the perpetual 18-wheel Wall of Death that makes up all but the fast lane on the 710 Freeway during sunlight hours.
  
Certainly, you say, it can’t be that bad. According to the more than 1,000-page EIR, when the project is completed it will add another 3,584 daily truck trips to the local highways, mainly the 710 Freeway. That is nearly 150 truck trips per hour, or enough trucks lined up end-to-end to stretch over 1.5 miles.
  
Surely, with all of the input the port received from the public, someone would have raised an eyebrow at having to deal with nearly 3,600 more trucks on the freeways every day.
  
In the agenda item accompanying the EIR, the port took great pains and hundreds of pages to detail all of the public outreach that it has done regarding the project: the draft of the EIR was circulated for 80 days (though only mandated to be for 45), two public meetings were held after notices placed in local papers, and according to the port, 584 individual comments and 66 written comments were received.
  
However, it appears the port is being purposefully obtuse with the numbers.
  
Of the 62 comments received (these are from the public documents submitted along with the EIR) a total of 34 came from government entities and 18 came from individuals. (These broke out as five from the feds, five from state entities, two from regional entities, five from local governments, one from a national organization, seven from community groups, 19 from industry and business groups, and the remaining 18 from individuals.)
  
As for the hundreds of individual comments received, it appears to have worked like this: If you showed up at one of the public meetings or wrote a letter and asked two separate questions, these were counted as two comments. Needless to say, many of those appearing or writing in asked numerous questions.
  
In addition, at two public meetings held by the port on the draft EIR, 31 individuals spoke at the June 11, 2008 meeting and 52 speakers spoke at the June 18, 2008 meeting. By your writer’s rough count of the transcripts, more than half were members of the industry speaking in favor of the project—keep in mind, a project that will benefit them financially in a very direct way.
  
So, again by a rough count, a total of about 40 were actually members of the general public. Add these to the 20 written comments from individuals and another 21 speakers (out of 51 that spoke) at an April 13, 2009 Board of Harbor Commission meeting and you have a total of about 60 community members who offered any questions or critiques about the project.
  
You might ask why your writer is overlooking those that spoke in favor of the project. Well, simply put, it is not input when you offer support for something. The idea of seeking public input is to increase discourse on a topic. Going along with the proposal, whatever it may be, does not advance this goal.
  
Here is what the port said regarding the public input process: “There were ample opportunities over a four-year period for affected communities, individuals, organizations, and groups to participate in the EIR/EIS process.”
  
So, if “ample” is defined as 80 days and two public meetings that elicited questions from .00012 of the Long Beach population (yes, that’s 12 hundredths of 1 percent), then pick up the shovels and let’s start digging cause hallelujah the people have been heard.
  
Even if you assume one commenter to each of the port’s number of 584 comments, this would still only represent just under 12 tenths of 1 percent of the citizens that had any say in the process.
  
This is a lower percentage than it actually takes to get elected to City Council.
  
That irony was evidently lost on the Council, which approved the project by a vote of 9-0. Your writer is still waiting to hear from the other 99.99988 percent of the city’s population that has not yet come to the podium on this topic.
  
Smaller cities than Long Beach hold public referendums on smaller things than the Middle Harbor Project. While the Mayor seemed fine going to the public last summer to bail the city out of its financial mess with Prop. I, why is no one asking the public if it wants 3,600 more trucks on the freeways? Certainly, the port, in the spirit of truly ascertaining the public support of this project, could afford to pop for the $1 million or so cost of a referendum.
  
After all, doing the will of the people is somewhat dependent on knowing the will of more than 12 tenths of 1 percent of the people.