Best, not-so-best for Yorba Linda in 2010

Here’s my annual review of the best and not-so-best in local politics, for 2010:

Best decision by voters: Giving the Measure Y ethics ordinance the largest margin of victory--better than 85 percent “yes”--of any municipal ballot measure in city history.

Best decision by City Council: Putting the ethics ordinance on the ballot, allowing voters to “lock-in” much-needed reform so future councils can’t arbitrarily return to past habits, such as convening closed-door committee meetings with no published agenda or minutes.

Next challenge for the council: Expanding the ethics ordinance to include added reforms related to political action committees, whistle-blowers, council conduct and transparency.

Worst decision by the council: Increasing the “cafeteria plan” fringe benefit package of council members a whopping 13.4 percent, while pleading poverty on many other issues.

Least transparent council action: Placing the 13.4 percent increase on an August agenda for one vote in a 10-item “consent calendar,” and removing four of the items for separate discussion and votes, but leaving the benefit boost with the “routine” items not discussed.

Most inept council action: Squabbling so much over how much to cut council salaries at a June 30 budget session, members finally decide against any “share-the-pain” reduction.

Most ignored council campaign issue: None of the six contenders offered a plan to fix finances at the city-owned Black Gold Golf Club, recipient of $4,786,268 in city loans and $327,592 in waived interest payments through the 2009-10 fiscal year.

Best grass-roots campaign finance method: The Yorba Linda Residents for Responsible Representation political action committee raised $13,452.79 at 10 garage sales 2008-10, and Jan Horton raised $437.02 from one sale in August.

Biggest quagmire for council: Where to put state-mandated, low-cost housing units in light of loss of Measure Z that would have allowed some in a Savi Ranch business area.

Luckiest break for council: Longtime Parks and Recreation director Steve Rudometkin agreed to return as City Manager, when Dave Adams resigned after one year on the job.

Most tireless Old Town advocate: 41-year Main Street businessman Louie Scull devotes untold hours to promoting the special events that draw thousands of residents to the area.

Best attempt at redemption: Former mayor and one-and-a-half-term state Assemblyman Mike Duvall donated $34,100 in leftover campaign cash to non-profits, including $7,000 to the local Boys and Girls Club.

Most interesting challenge facing “fiscal conservative” council members who oppose pork barrel spending: Deciding whether or not to utilize a $3.1 million Congressional earmark to build a pedestrian bridge over Imperial Highway in the Old Town area.

Best and most-watched city event to squeak by on a 3-2 council vote: The July 4 fireworks show--the 21st in city history--cost less than the amount spent last year.

Most historic election outcome: Voters tendered pink slips to two incumbents at the Yorba Linda Water District, biggest turnover in the public agency’s 50-year history.

Most surprising election result: PYLUSD voters narrowly nixed an appointed incumbent and teacher union-endorsed candidate, while two other teacher-backed candidates won by wide margins.

Welcome tidings at Christmastime

Christmas, of course, is a traditional time for good news. Even the local civic scene offers a share of welcome tidings:

--The long vacant, sadly dilapidated historic Trueblood-Janeway home--visible from Imperial Highway at the Lemon Drive intersection, behind the deteriorating railroad caboose adjacent to Polly’s Restaurant--has drawn three proposals for rehabilitation.

The city’s Redevelopment Agency, which funds ventures from the increased property taxes collected due to building activity in the city’s Savi Ranch and Old Town project areas, bought the two-story house for $385,000 on a 5-0 City Council vote in January.

Six interested parties visited the home at Park Avenue and Lemon Drive in response to a city-sponsored marketing effort, and three development proposals were submitted Nov. 1. The council has scheduled presentations on the plans for a Jan. 4 meeting.

One plan from local activists in a recently formed Yorba Linda Preservation Foundation proposes a half-million dollar privately funded rehabilitation, with the city retaining title.

Another proposal from 25-year residents Pete and Jessie Sioson would buy the house for $50,000 and spend about $385,000 for renovation for their daughter’s use as a residence.

A third plan from Spectra Company of Pomona offers $10 for the house and requests a $250,000 city loan to help fund $545,000 rehab costs, for lease as a residence or office.

A final decision might be made by three council members, since John Anderson and Tom Lindsey have conflicts due to the campaign contribution provisions of the new ethics law.

--An Armed Forces Banner Program to honor active duty and fallen military personnel is under consideration by the council. The city already owns 22 decorative poles that could display banners, with 15 more Edison Company-owned poles possibly available for use.

Anaheim, Brea, Chino, Chino Hills, Diamond Bar, La Habra, Orange and Rancho Cucamonga already exhibit banners, from Brea’s 24 to Rancho Cucamonga’s 322.

Banners are estimated to cost $354 each, including design, printing, hardware and installation expenses, or a total $15,576 for 44 banners on the 22 city-owned poles.

According to a 5-0 council vote, the city would “encourage participants to sponsor” design and printing, with the city paying for hardware and installation. “Additional sponsorships could be sought to offset costs,” noted a city staff report.

--Police officers designated as School Resource Officers are in place at all high schools in the Placentia-Yorba Linda school district again this year, despite budgetary difficulties shared by the three sponsoring agencies, the school district and the cities of Yorba Linda and Placentia.

Yorba Linda and the district are splitting the cost of one officer to serve both the Yorba Linda and Esperanza campuses, while Placentia and the district are sharing costs to put one officer at each of three campuses, El Camino Real, El Dorado and Valencia.

SROs are trained for three roles--law enforcement, law-related counselor and law-related education teacher--and act as comprehensive resources to the assigned campuses, stated a report to the school district’s trustees by Assistant Superintendent Candy Plahy.

“We expect the SRO to positively impact student, staff and parental perceptions of school safety,” Plahy’s report noted.

Council reorganization sends signals

The City Council’s reorganization meeting last week sent strong signals the governing body will prevent one veteran member from serving as mayor again and might dismiss a three-year planning commissioner before his current term expires in 2013.

As expected, Nancy Rikel was unanimously named mayor, but Mark Schwing’s election as mayor pro tem drew an opposing vote from Jim Winder, who would have been in line for the position if council adhered to a policy of rotating the two offices among members.

The mayor pro tem has moved into the mayor’s chair 36 of the 47 times the council has selected one member to be mayor. Although Schwing was mayor in 2009, the 4-1 vote put him ahead of Winder for a fourth one-year stint in the position in 2012.

Based on 2008 and 2010 election results, ballot identification as mayor gives candidates an edge in the final vote tally. Winder won by one vote in 2008, the last of two times he served as mayor. Since he’s termed out in 2012, he’s not likely to be named mayor again.

Should Schwing succeed Rikel in 2012, he’ll be mayor during an expected run for a fifth term. He won his first three terms before the three-term limit law became effective, so he could serve through 2020 and possibly top Hank Wedaa’s record of five mayoral terms.

Council also will consider removing Mark Abramowitz from the council-appointed, five-member Planning Commission, the city’s “decision-making authority on applications for various types of land use and zoning matters,” at an upcoming meeting.

Abramowitz was appointed to the commission in 2007 and re-appointed to a four-year term in 2009. If dismissed, he’ll be the only commissioner to be let go mid-term since council members dropped four Parks and Recreation commissioners in 1993.

Abramowitz was elected to the Yorba Linda Water District board in 1998, but he lost that seat in 2002. He placed seventh out of nine candidates for three council positions in 2008.

Statements from newly elected Tom Lindsey and re-elected John Anderson were routine promises to live up to the responsibilities of the office, although Anderson outlined some of the challenges facing council members in the coming years.

One of the matters mentioned by Anderson was the Measure Z defeat by 197 votes in the November election. A favorable Z vote would have allowed council to rezone a 3.2-acre Savi Ranch land parcel for up to 30 units per acre for affordable housing.

How the council will attempt to meet state-mandated low-cost housing requirements and whether state officials and/or court decisions will trump council actions or public votes in zoning issues will be a major concern during the next few years.

Interestingly, 12,707 eastside voters in the 60th Assembly District opposed Z, 54.5 to 45.5 percent (6,931 to 5,776), and 13,784 westside voters in the 72nd Assembly District backed Z, 53.5 to 46.5 percent (7,371 to 6,413), indicating voters might decide density issues based on how close they reside to a proposed affordable housing project.

Also worthy of note: for the first time in a regularly scheduled election, mail-in ballots topped precinct-cast ballots, 14,713 to 13,809. And while 28,522 of 43,681 registered residents cast ballots, fewer voted on Measure Z (26,491) and on the Measure Y ethics ordinance (26,352).

2010 election makes Yorba Linda history

The last of the Orange County ballots from the Nov. 2 election were counted on Nov.19, and the tallies show a couple of history-making results that affect Yorba Lindans. Here’s a look at historic factors in the voting:

--Jan Horton, the fourth woman elected to the City Council in city history, is one of three to serve only one term. Carolyn Ewing, elected in 1972, didn’t seek another term in 1976, and Keri Wilson, elected in 2002, lost in 2006 and in a 2007 special election.

Only Barbara Kiley, wife of newly elected Yorba Linda Water District director Bob Kiley, won two terms, placing third for three seats in 1992 and 1996. But Horton is the only individual, male or female, to leave the council without serving as mayor.

All 24 men and three women who’ve completed one or more council terms have served as mayor. Horton was mayor pro tem, the usual precursor to the mayor’s chair, in 2008, but lost the mayor ballot on a 3-2 vote. Ewing was mayor twice, Kiley and Wilson once each.

--The Yorba Linda Water District traces its history to 1909, when a mutual company supplied water to the area, but the government agency, with five directors elected by voters, not just stockholders, goes back 50 years.

During that time 22 men have been elected to the board, most for several four-year terms, including longest-serving director Paul Armstrong, 1982-2010. Only two lost seats: Carl Scanlon to Mark Abramowitz in 1998 and Abramowitz to Bill Mills in 2002.

Now, two incumbent directors, Mills (1985-87 and since 2002) and John Summerfield (since 2002), have lost to two members of the district’s Citizens Advisory Committee, Gary Melton and Bob Kiley. Appointed director Phil Hawkins placed first in the vote.

Hawkins, who replaced Armstrong after his death, also was an advisory group member. The three winners were supported by Mike Beverage, a one-term councilman 1982-86, director since 1992 and veteran consultant, who told me the board needed “new blood.”

--Incumbents, either appointed or elected, rarely have lost elections in the Placentia-Yorba Linda school district, since initial unification in 1933. This year, Kim Palmer, who replaced Judy Miner in March, lost to Carrie Buck by 218 votes.

Buck, a Rose Drive School parent, also upset another trend: winners who were often endorsed by the Association of Placentia-Linda Educators, the union representing the district’s teachers. But she was supported by the non-teaching, classified employees.

Karin Freeman, selected trustee in 1989 from the old Yorba Linda Elementary School District board in a second merger, was the top vote-getter. The 21-year trustee usually earns APLE support, as did special education teacher Judi Carmona, who won the two-year term.

--History wasn’t made in the North Orange County Community College District, where Yorba Linda resident Jeff Brown beat a spirited challenge, as did two other incumbents.

No incumbent has lost a district race since 1990. Brown and Mike Matsua, also from Yorba Linda, are two of seven college trustees, with five initially appointed to office.

The Yorba Linda pair represent the college district’s Area III, which includes the Brea-Olinda and Placentia-Yorba Linda unified school districts as well as the La Habra City and Lowell Joint elementary school districts.

Measure Z defeat presents housing challenge

The Measure Z defeat in the November election presents this city’s elected leaders with quite a challenge: where to locate hundreds of state-mandated affordable housing units?

In a rare instance of harmony, the five feuding City Council members supported Z, with the non-profit group seeking the measure’s approval raising the only money spent in the campaign, for mailers, street signs and paid voter guide endorsements.

But voters, by a slim 197-vote margin, defeated Z, 13,344 to 13,147. The tally was the closest vote on any of the 14 measures submitted to voters in the city’s 43-year history.

A favorable Z vote, as explained in my Sept. 23 column, would have allowed council to rezone a 3.2-acre Savi Ranch parcel, once home to a Mitsubishi dealership, for up to 30 units per acre of affordably priced apartments with heights up to 45 feet.

Z was the city’s first-ever Measure B vote. B requires a public vote on certain density-level changes above 10 units per acre and heights above 35 feet and was approved by a 299-vote margin in June 2006 in the city’s single costliest campaign ($174,150) to date.

National Community Renaissance, which rebuilt143 affordable units at Arbor Villas and Villa Plumosa, both on Plumosa Drive, paid about $8,500 for election costs and, through Oct.16, spent $22,738 promoting a “yes” vote. The next expense report is due Jan. 31.

A new apartment community would have involved from 20-27 units per acre or 64-86 units, according to John Seymour, the developer’s acquisitions vice president. Priority would have been given to low- to moderate-income Yorba Linda families and seniors.

The Savi parcel was one of 13 the council identified for potential rezoning to 10, 20 and 30 units per acre on a 5-0 vote last year. Two are in Savi Ranch and 11 on the west-side.

One argument council members cited for a “yes” vote at Savi was “to keep work-force, affordable housing away from our low-density residential areas,” so favorable votes on increasing density in other areas in the city are even less likely to be achieved.

Certainly, council will have to make some affordable housing decisions before the 2012 election, when seats held by Nancy Rikel, Mark Schwing and Jim Winder will be on the ballot. Rikel and Schwing can run for re-election, but Winder is termed-out.

Affordable housing advocates, known to be keeping an eye on Yorba Linda, could seek court intervention on density issues, and they also could challenge Measure B’s legality.

While the Measure Z tally was the closest of any ballot measure since city incorporation in 1967, the Measure Y ethics ordinance won by the largest margin ever attained, 85.1 to 14.9 percent (22,415 to 3,937).

The next-highest “yes” margin was for Measure BB, which outlawed the use of eminent domain for economic development throughout the city, in November 2008. “Yes” votes won 79 to 21 percent (24,665 to 6,572).