At the Corona del Mar Residents Association meeting held at OASIS Senior Center on Thursday, Aug. 21, Newport Beach Police Chief Dave Miner and Fire Battalion Chief Nick Stocks updated the community on fire and police activities in the city.
Chief Stocks addressed the two dozen meeting attendees and noted that it has been a busy summer in Newport Beach for the fire department due to multiple units being deployed to help fight fires in central and northern California.
“I responded to the Gifford fire,” said Chief Stocks, referring to a large fire that scorched more than 100,000 acres in San Luis Obispo county. “I was up there for two weeks. And our wildland fire engine just returned from the Gifford fire, they were up there for two and a half weeks actively engaging in fire suppression and helping the community in Santa Maria.”
Chief Stocks said that at the September 9 city council planning session, the fire department would make a presentation on fuel modeling.
According to Chief Stocks, fuel modeling is a computer-generated model that shows the pathways of historical wind and weather patterns in our area, and adds the vegetation, humidity, and other factors that can impact a fire. An AI program takes all those variables and then can predict fire behavior, such as what could occur if a fire comes from the Irvine area or if a fire comes from Laguna Beach, like it did in 1993.
After Chief Stocks concluded his presentation Police Chief Miner took the floor. Chief Miner has been in his position since February of this year but has been with the Newport Beach Police Department since 2002.
Chief Miner began his law enforcement career with the Newport Beach PD working on a variety of assignments, including patrol officer, Field Training Officer, SWAT Team member, Property Crimes detective, and Crimes Against Persons detective. In 2011, he was promoted to the rank of sergeant, and worked as a patrol sergeant, Field Training Program supervisor, SWAT Team supervisor, firearms instructor, Crime Suppression Unit sergeant, and Professional Standards Unit sergeant.
In 2018, he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant, and worked as a Patrol Watch Commander, Crisis Response Unit Commander, Support Services Division lieutenant, and Detective Division lieutenant. In 2023, he was promoted to the rank of deputy chief and worked as the division commander for both the Patrol/Traffic and Detective Divisions.
He began serving as the acting chief of police on December 14, 2024, and was officially promoted to rank of chief on February 22, 2025.
Chief Miner admitted he was still getting acclimated to the “pace and the demands of the job.”
“It’s been a very busy year, from spring break to the summer,” said Chief Miner. “It was a very, very busy Fourth of July week and weekend, and we’re anticipating a busy Labor Day weekend. My guess is not quite like we saw on Fourth of July, but we believe we have adequate staffing. We’ll have teams of officers throughout the city.”
Overall, Chief Miner said that crime in Newport Beach is looking good, although some visitors to Newport Beach don’t want to behave, and the NBPD is doing its best to address that.
Chief Miner talked about staffing and said that the City of Newport Beach offered the NBPD a generous compensation package, which according to Chief Miner helps with officer recruitment and retention.
“We’re seeing an influx of lateral officers. Those officers work at neighboring agencies, or somewhere up north or even out of state, so when they apply, they can get hired. They don’t have to go to the academy. They can go through a few months of training, and then they’re out in the street. The turnaround time is about half what a new hire would be,” explained Chief Miner.
The city’s mounted enforcement unit, or MEU, was another topic of interest at the meeting. Chief Miner said the unit has grown to four riders with four horses, but they’re working on expanding it.
“They were very helpful for crowd control on the beaches during the summer months, especially the Fourth of July,” said Chief Miner. “If you really want to see them, you can go out on Labor Day weekend down on the peninsula and see our mounted officers in the safety enhancing zone.”
Within the safety enhancement zone, said Chief Miner, fines are tripled over Labor Day Weekend for municipal code violations and other violations.
The NBPD has done a lot of burglary suppression in the Corona del Mar and Newport Coast areas, with patrol officers looking for specific trends and areas and patterns, which Chief Miner said has been effective.
Another topic covered by Chief Miner: the use of police drones in spotting fires, search and rescue, and for crimes.
“We’re weeks away from having what are called drones as first responders. These drones will be housed in what they call nests, in five different nests, strategically located throughout the city,” said Chief Miner. “With the AI and other technology, they can deploy at the push of a button and get on scene and provide us information, and they have forward looking infrared. I know we’ve been talking about it, it’s a multimillion-dollar project over the span of five years. We’re very excited about it.”
Chief Miner also talked about the success the NBPD has had with flock cameras in combatting crime.
“We have over 70 now throughout the city that are city owned, plus a lot of privately owned through the HOAs and business owners there,” said Chief Miner. “If you look, you can see them on some traffic signals or on some poles. You’ll see what kind of looks like a sheet of paper or a solar panel. Some can be hard wired. Some are solar powered, cellular based. They don’t sit and actively record everything. What they’re doing is capturing a vehicle description and license plate.”
If a vehicle’s license is in the NBPD’s system as suspected of being stolen or involved in a crime, officers can be alerted to look for that vehicle.
Another hot topic at the meeting was E-bikes.
“We love them, and we hate them, right?” said Chief Miner. “Kids ride them in high school. Like a lot of technology, they’re great, but then they’re terrible. The problem is, you’re giving juveniles motorcycles. That’s what they are. They’re electric motorcycles.”
Chief Miner said his motor officers do education programs during the first few weeks of school. The issue, he said, is that e-bikes are legal in most areas, including a lot of sidewalks, other than on the boardwalk near the beach. But the city is looking at potential ordinances to regulate the use of e-bikes.
Addressing the homeless population, Chief Miner said the city averages between 8 and 14 homeless individuals at any given time. The police force has four homeless liaison officers.
“We partner with Costa Mesa to have beds into the bridge shelter. We have very reasonable but firm ordinances about anti-camping and loitering. It’s going really well, and I expect it to continue to go well.”
Other topics briefly addressed by Chief Miner before the meeting ended included code enforcement and calls for service.
