Thanks to Yorba Linda's volunteer leaders

Thanksgiving is an appropriate time to appreciate Yorba Linda’s genuine civic leaders--the hundreds of residents who work tirelessly to provide programs for this community’s youth and who serve without salaries, stipends, fringe benefits or retirement packages.

Through the years, many of these dedicated individuals have volunteered their time and talents for Boy Scout Troop 99, which celebrates a 95th anniversary next year and holds the title as Orange County’s oldest, continuously chartered troop.

Recently, I spoke with 31-year resident Paul Weddell, who has devoted nearly 30 years of service to Troop 99. He’s currently the troop unit commissioner and is advancement chair for the Orange County Council, which oversees 28,056 scouts.

The local troop was chartered with 22 scouts in 1916 as Yorba Linda-Troop 1, a number that was switched to 99, according to Weddell, during a later countywide reorganization. The troop evolved from a First Baptist Church youth group formed in 1914.

It’s not known how many young men have participated in Troop 99 activities since 1916, but based on troop records, 93 achieved Eagle rank, with the latest, Ryan Marquiss, to be recognized at a Court of Honor 3 p.m. Saturday at the Community Center.

Among the 93 are 14 sets of brothers, including Weddell’s two sons, Steve and Dan in 1988. Other Eagle-earning brothers are four sons of Norm Carter, the troop’s longest-serving Scoutmaster, and three in both the Camp and Durfee families.

Ten-year Scoutmaster Ken Just is the troop’s 31st adult leader, as Sunrise Rotary followed the Masons, American Legion Post 675, the Women’s and Junior Women’s clubs, United Methodist Men, Kiwanis and, briefly, the Chamber of Commerce as troop sponsors.

One interesting story Weddell tells concerns the historic red Scout house at Hurless Barton Park, near the Community Center’s eastside entrance.

Weddell said the structure was first located near the old citrus packing house before moving across the street to a railroad-donated parcel now occupied by Mimi’s Café.

The park site was granted exclusively to Troop 99 in a 1981 City Council resolution, Weddell stated, carefully clarifying that the city’s action “was not a gift, but a trade.”

Weddell explained: “When the city was developing the [Station] shopping center, it came to their attention that they didn’t own the land where the Scout house was located,” so the city exchanged the park site for the Troop 99 land near the prime Town Center corner.

“But…termites had made moving the structure impossible,” so the center’s developer rebuilt the unit using some of the old materials, Weddell said.

Now, Troop 99 has 45 members and hundreds more are in the city’s 10 other troops, not counting The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints-sponsored units, which according to Weddell, “are not sorted by city.”

Thanks today and everyday to contributors to Yorba Linda Scout programs.

Increased City Council benefits: last of a two-year string of contentious 3 to 2 split votes?

A two-year string of 3-2 City Council votes on key issues might become political history on Dec. 7—which oldtimers remember as Pearl Harbor Day—when Tom Lindsey assumes a seat at the dais with four council members who endorsed his candidacy.

After the 2008 election, Nancy Rikel and Mark Schwing joined John Anderson to form a majority bloc, and a 3-2 pattern began when Jan Horton was denied the mayor’s chair by the now-familiar tally. She’s the only retiring member to never serve as mayor.

Lindsey is expected to add a fourth vote to the majority, since he campaigned with Anderson and was endorsed not only by Rikel and Schwing, as anticipated, but by Jim Winder, who also endorsed Horton and Brenda McCune for the two seats on the ballot.

One of the last of the contentious 3-2 votes came at the council’s election night meeting. Horton and Winder wanted to rescind a 13.4 per cent fringe benefit increase for council members that council quietly approved Aug. 17.

The 5-0 Aug. 17 vote boosted council’s “cafeteria” plan monthly benefit from $833 to $945, city-supplied cash that can be used for health and/or 401k-style retirement plans.

The resolution granting the increase for council members and management employees was one of 10 items placed on the agenda for a single, routine “consent calendar” vote.

Council members removed four items for separate discussion and votes, but the benefit enhancement was among the six items adopted without comment.

Two months later, Horton asked that staff prepare a report on segregating council’s benefits from other employees, a request approved 3-2, with Anderson, Horton and Schwing in favor and Rikel and Winder opposed.

On Nov. 2, a resolution splitting council’s benefits from other staffers gained a 5-0 vote, but Anderson, Rikel and Schwing opposed returning council’s benefits to $833 monthly.

(Council was added to the management resolution in 1995 on a 3-2 vote with Schwing, Barbara Kiley and Gene Wisner in favor, and John Gullixson and Dan Welch opposed.)

Although Anderson rejected returning benefits to the prior level, he said he wouldn’t take the $112 monthly increase that begins Jan. 1. In an e-mail reply to my questions, Finance Director David Christian explained council members could refuse the increase:

“If any council member requested a reduction in [the] benefits, we would certainly accommodate [the] request and treat it strictly as a voluntary reduction. The request would not automatically be tied to the start and end date of any particular enrollment period unless the requestor specifically stated such.”

Christian noted, “The council member would not be under any obligation to continue the reduction indefinitely, and upon rescinding the request, we would restore the benefits to the amount allowed under the resolution.”

Council members also qualify for a city-paid PERS retirement benefit.

Whew! the election is finally over; now, will the council govern according to tea party's tenets?

That huge sigh of relief you heard last week was thousands of harried residents thankful that this year’s version of the biennial battle for seats on the City Council is finally over.

Gone for two years are the hundreds of roadway signs—including dozens illegally placed within 15 feet of intersections and driveways and on public poles and fences—automated phone calls, repetitive mailers and flyers, phony voter guides and incessant name-calling.

Some say this 24th ballot to select members for the city’s governing body was the worst ever in terms of negative campaigning, with candidates accusing their opponents of lies, distortions, deliberate misrepresentations, unethical behavior and even dirty tricks.

But a “worst ever” tag would ignore donnybrooks in the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s, where contenders threatened to sue opponents and actually filed a few election-related lawsuits.

Sadly, attack ads and negative mailers have become staples of local campaigns, recently augmented by anonymous websites that belittle candidates. A shadowy “truth” site was this year’s addition to the fast-growing “We lack the courage to give our names” roster.

One significant aspect of the contentious contest: four council members will hold endorsements from the local “tea party” movement when Tom Lindsey replaces Jan Horton at the dais Dec. 7, and Nancy Rikel is expected to be named mayor for 2011.

North Orange County Conservative Coalition, sponsors of two well-attended “tea party” rallies on the Community Center lawn, endorsed Lindsey and John Anderson and promoted Rikel and Mark Schwing as “good, principled members” on its website.

Interestingly, rally organizers allowed Horton to speak on April 15, as Anderson was denied a spot in the program. On Oct. 14, Anderson spoke, and Horton was rebuffed.

And tea partiers criticized Jim Winder when he left the council dais rather than vote on a resolution supporting Arizona’s controversial illegal immigration enforcement procedure.

If Anderson, Lindsey, Rikel and Schwing stick to the “tea party” philosophy of limited government and primacy of private enterprise, changes in Redevelopment Agency operations and the financially challenged Black Gold Golf Course can be expected.

Will the Redevelopment Agency continue to purchase individual Old Town parcels to assemble into larger lots for sale to developers who will re-build a Town Center based on council decisions? Or will private enterprise and market forces play a larger role?

Will the city accept a $3 million Congressional earmark to build a bridge over Imperial Highway in the Old Town area? Or will the money be rejected as an example of pork?

Will the city continue to loan money to Black Gold ($4,786,268 since 2000) and continue to waive interest on the loans ($327,592 since 2007)? Should the city own a golf course?

We’ll see soon if council governs according to “true conservative” and “tea party” tenets.

Town Center redevelopment at top of city's Redevelopment Agency 'to-do' list for 2011

Foremost among many items on the City Council “to-do” list in the coming year are actions council members will take as directors of the city’s Redevelopment Agency, with the emphasis on various projects designed to revitalize the Old Town area.

This week, I’ll present some background on the agency, based partly on a talk I gave to Dave Tennant’s government classes at Esperanza High School last week. Tennant was on the Blue Ribbon Committee that set guiding principles for remaking Town Center.

The agency begins its 28th year of operation later this month, with an expected income of $21 million for the current fiscal year from “tax increment” revenue, the increase in property taxes from the amount collected when the agency’s project area was created.

A project area was formed in 1983 that included 2,640 acres of residential, commercial and industrial parcels, generally east of Hidden Hills Road and Yorba Linda Boulevard, including Savi Ranch, the La Palma Industrial Corridor and about 2,100 homes.

The area was amended in 1990 to include 344 acres along northern Imperial Highway, including Town Center and parcels abutting Valley View Avenue, Richfield Road and Yorba Linda Boulevard. Tax increment income ends in 2033 and 2038 for the two zones.

Work next year in the Savi Ranch area could include improved signage, negotiations with owners of 400 Archstone apartments on River Bend Drive for affordable covenants on 80 or more units and rezoning on some Savi Ranch commercial acreage for affordable units.

However, next year’s focus will be on specific plans for the 31-acre Old Town area. But don’t expect to see one developer remaking the entire area, as was proposed in 2004 and discarded in 2006. The council aims to select different developers for individual projects.

Among projects council will consider in coming months: an expanded and relocated library, performing arts center, passive park with outdoor amphitheater, a multi-level parking structure, Lakeview Avenue widening, new streets and pedestrian walkways.

Even though the agency already has more than $60 million in bond debt, secured by the tax increment revenue, maximum debt is $675 million, according to figures listed in the agency’s latest, council-adopted five-year implementation plan.

Not all of the agency’s $21 million annual income can be used for new projects. About 24 percent pays bond debt and 20 percent is set aside in an affordable housing fund; the largest amount, 43 percent, goes to 19 taxing agencies that would’ve normally collected the increased property taxes resulting from project area development.

Of these “pass-through payments,” Placentia-Yorba Linda school district received the most ($5.2 million in 2009-10) and Orange County Cemetery District the least ($113).

Future columns will explore other facets of redevelopment, including the agency’s affordable housing compliance plan and eminent domain authority that’s still legal.