Town Hall meetings, Duvall and Gullixson
This week I’ll update topics from past columns and add a social note:
First, only one resident attended the most recent Town Hall meeting, an event initiated in January 2007 to provide an informal forum for citizens to comment on and ask questions about city actions and policies and generally held when a month has a fifth Tuesday.
Attendance crested at 82 at the July 2007 gathering but dwindled to the mid-40s in 2008 and the low-20s recently, not counting City Council members and top-level city staffers.
Nancy Rikel, a longtime council critic elected to the governing body on a reform slate in November 2008, commented that the low turnout could be interpreted as “a good thing.”
Rikel explained, “I think this actually says a lot about transparency, as I can remember the days when having a Town Hall meeting was not even a possibility. We have had so many meetings and made ourselves available on many levels.”
Second, my recent Mike Duvall column drew several e-mails and on-line comments, with some suggesting the 40-year resident owes answers to his Yorba Linda constituents. But the once-gregarious Duvall remains tight-lipped and still hasn’t answered media inquiries left at his Lemon Drive insurance office.
Yorba Lindans cast 51,441 ballots for Duvall during his 10-year political career. He won 8,614 in the 2000 council race and 16,400 for his 2004 re-election.
Yorba Linda Republicans gave him 3,138 votes in the 2006 primary for the city’s west-side Assembly seat nomination and 3,206 in an uncontested 2008 primary. He received 8,059 Yorba Linda votes to win the seat in 2006 and 12,024 for a second term in 2008.
One answer from the former two-time mayor and Chamber of Commerce president is due by Jan. 31, 2010. That’s when he’s required by law to account for the $66,732 he listed in his 2010 Assembly re-election treasury June 30.
Third, the social note: Rev. and former three-term Councilman John Gullixson officiated at the recent wedding of his son, John William Gullixson, to Christine Serventi.
The groom is an Esperanza High, UC San Diego and Seton Hall law school graduate now employed as a Toll Brothers project manager in New York. The bride is an Arizona State communications grad working for a Manhattan real estate firm.
Gullixson, a former Messiah Lutheran lay leader, said he was ordained by the Universal Life Church, “a libertarian organization” that doesn’t “subscribe to a particular religious philosophy but instead allows one to exercise his or her own spirituality and beliefs.”
The three-time mayor, now living in Portola, added he’s “in the final stages of retiring but will maintain a small law practice.” His wife, Kelly, continues as an “on-call” nurse at St. Joseph’s in Orange, and they’ve bought a Laguna Woods condo for winter use.
First, only one resident attended the most recent Town Hall meeting, an event initiated in January 2007 to provide an informal forum for citizens to comment on and ask questions about city actions and policies and generally held when a month has a fifth Tuesday.
Attendance crested at 82 at the July 2007 gathering but dwindled to the mid-40s in 2008 and the low-20s recently, not counting City Council members and top-level city staffers.
Nancy Rikel, a longtime council critic elected to the governing body on a reform slate in November 2008, commented that the low turnout could be interpreted as “a good thing.”
Rikel explained, “I think this actually says a lot about transparency, as I can remember the days when having a Town Hall meeting was not even a possibility. We have had so many meetings and made ourselves available on many levels.”
Second, my recent Mike Duvall column drew several e-mails and on-line comments, with some suggesting the 40-year resident owes answers to his Yorba Linda constituents. But the once-gregarious Duvall remains tight-lipped and still hasn’t answered media inquiries left at his Lemon Drive insurance office.
Yorba Lindans cast 51,441 ballots for Duvall during his 10-year political career. He won 8,614 in the 2000 council race and 16,400 for his 2004 re-election.
Yorba Linda Republicans gave him 3,138 votes in the 2006 primary for the city’s west-side Assembly seat nomination and 3,206 in an uncontested 2008 primary. He received 8,059 Yorba Linda votes to win the seat in 2006 and 12,024 for a second term in 2008.
One answer from the former two-time mayor and Chamber of Commerce president is due by Jan. 31, 2010. That’s when he’s required by law to account for the $66,732 he listed in his 2010 Assembly re-election treasury June 30.
Third, the social note: Rev. and former three-term Councilman John Gullixson officiated at the recent wedding of his son, John William Gullixson, to Christine Serventi.
The groom is an Esperanza High, UC San Diego and Seton Hall law school graduate now employed as a Toll Brothers project manager in New York. The bride is an Arizona State communications grad working for a Manhattan real estate firm.
Gullixson, a former Messiah Lutheran lay leader, said he was ordained by the Universal Life Church, “a libertarian organization” that doesn’t “subscribe to a particular religious philosophy but instead allows one to exercise his or her own spirituality and beliefs.”
The three-time mayor, now living in Portola, added he’s “in the final stages of retiring but will maintain a small law practice.” His wife, Kelly, continues as an “on-call” nurse at St. Joseph’s in Orange, and they’ve bought a Laguna Woods condo for winter use.
posted by Jim Drummond at 12:00 PM
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