My umpteenth annual listing: the best and less-than-best for Yorba Linda community in 2015

Let's look at Yorba Linda's best and less-than-best for 2015:

Best City Council decision: Adopting fiscal year budgets with a projected $1.2 million surplus by June 30, 2016, and another $360,000 by June 30, 2017, even with transfer of $2.4 million each year to subsidize deficits in some landscape zones.

Next-best council decision: Moving ahead with property owner elections in some deficit landscape zones to raise fees to a level so the “special benefit” zones are self-sufficient.

Most severe payback: After last year vacating 26 commission and committee positions, the council this year reappointed some members, dumped opposition voices and fixed terms to expire after elections, setting precedent for future councils to also conduct critic-cleansings.

Best-organized grassroots citizens group: Protect Our Homes and Hills is training residents to gather petition signatures to overturn expected council approval of a pact with Esperanza Hills developer – wisely continuing resistance to a 340-home project largely without name-calling.

Best record-breaking trend: Another big increase in Advanced Placement exams given in Placentia-Yorba Linda high schools, with an 86 percent pass rate for 3,647 tests and a 97 percent pass rate for 348 International Baccalaureate exams at Valencia High School.

Most noteworthy break with history: Town Center developer seeks an upscale movie theater and outdoor dining area with alcoholic beverage service in a community where a lone liquor license was once held to prevent the sale of such spirits.

Least surprising occurrence: In a long city tradition for controversial issues, large doses of name-calling and demeaning opponents' motives have been spooned-out by both sides in Yorba Linda Water District's $25 monthly “basic service charge” increase for most users.

Saddest factors in name-calling campaigns: Voter turnout is low – 26 percent in June 2014, 49 percent in November 2014 – and fewer quality candidates seek elected positions, results favored by hardcore name-callers.

Most significant Grand Jury study: A report from the county panel focused attention on this city's unfunded retiree health care obligation, which ranks 12^th at $18.7 million and eighth in unfunded liability per resident at $292 in a county range of $1 to $694.

Longest wait for savings: $1,095 monthly deferred compensation for Gene Hernandez, Mark Schwing and Craig Young ends December 2016 under 2014's reform Measure JJ; PERS pension contributions for Tom Lindsey, Schwing and Young will run through their final terms.

Most delayed action: No decisions this year on how the city will use the Bastanchury Road property once leased for a Christian high school and the historic Trueblood/Janeway home.

Best economic news: The city's two main sources of revenue were projected to increase in two fiscal years, with a total 9.2 percent for property taxes and 10.4 percent for sales taxes.  

No holiday pause for Yorba Linda politics

Usually, in the holiday period between Thanksgiving and New Year's, political activity in Yorba Linda is barely perceptible, a refreshing breather from the contentious atmosphere that so often envelops the community after locally elected leaders make controversial decisions.

But there's no lull this month, as a couple of grass-roots citizen organizations battle changes they say will adversely impact the safety and pocketbooks of the city's 65,000-plus residents.

The well-established Protect Our Homes and Hills group is continuing efforts to stop two large residential developments just outside this city's northeast boundary, and the months-old Yorba Linda Taxpayers Association is proceeding with action to turn back a water charge increase.

Protect Our Homes and Hills leaders are training residents to collect signatures on petitions aimed at overturning the City Council's anticipated approval of a pre-annexation agreement with developers of the 340-home Esperanza Hills project, perhaps at a Jan. 5 meeting.

Expected council action to allow an entry road on city-owned “open space” as part of the pact concerns opponents, who also raise fire safety, traffic, water and other issues.

The group would need to collect 1,939 signatures from the city's 40,801 registered voters in 30 days to force council members to rescind the action or set a special election on the issue.

They plan to gather 5,000, since some might be ruled invalid. “There are various legal components and numerous tips and tricks of the trade that residents must learn prior to circulating the petition,” opponents noted.

The next training is scheduled Jan. 3. “A fantastic turnout” was reported for a Dec. 5 session: “There was a lot of enthusiasm and encouragement in the room” for the training, according to a group statement.

Meanwhile, the agenda for each council meeting this month listed a closed-door discussion of the lawsuit filed in Superior Court by the group contesting the adequacy of the project's state-mandated Environmental Impact Report.

The Yorba Linda Taxpayers Association is in full fundraising mode to pay for a lawsuit against the Yorba Linda Water District for disregarding petitions with a county Registrar of Voters estimate of 4,902 valid signatures seeking to overturn a $25 monthly increase in the district's “basic service charge.”

Cash raised also could be used to pay for a recall targeting some of the district's elected directors. A taxpayers group statement noted that if 10 percent of the district's customers contribute $50, “we will have amassed a formidable legal fund of $130,000.”

Also seeking funds to cover legal costs is Protect Our Hills and Homes, which accepts donations and earns a percentage of meal costs at local eateries, such as a recent six-day event at Wise Guys Pizzeria on Yorba Ranch Road.

Check the groups' Facebook pages for future fundraising and other information.

Consolidate water district with city government? Proposal has been aired many times in past years

Resurfacing in the current controversy surrounding the Yorba Linda Water District's recent pricing actions is an idea that's been occasionally aired in past years – consolidate the 56-year-old public agency with another governmental body.

In the past, a takeover by city government was proposed to save what advocates termed duplicate administrative costs, including salaries and benefits for management and five elected directors.

Now, a “dissolve the district” and “look to other agencies to deliver water service” option has been raised by the Yorba Linda Taxpayers Association, with more favored proffers, such as legal action and a recall of directors, as described in last week's column.

The 5-0 decision by water board directors to “receive and file” a referendum petition, which the taxpayers group claimed “ignored their legal obligation to rescind rates or place the question on the ballot,” led to the lawsuit, recall and dissolution discussions.

The group's online PowerPoint slides don't identify what other agency might assume water and sewer services, if voters dissolve the district, but a $25,000 estimate was given to write a “foolproof initiative” and fund a campaign.

The logical panel to take over such duties would be the City Council, in a consolidation that's been proposed several times in city history, most recently when the district was criticized after the 2008 Freeway Complex fire.

Although the deadline to seek a water board seat in 2008 came before the fire, two longtime directors were turned out in 2010. Only two other incumbents have lost in 28 election cycles.

A prominent consolidation supporter was 30-year council veteran Hank Wedaa, who pushed the issue during his tenure on the panel before losing a ninth-term bid in 2008. His 1996 motion for “a report describing the process and steps needed if the city was to initiate a consolidation procedure” lost on a 3-2 vote.

Seventeen of 34 county cities have water departments, with service supplied to the other 17 cities and some unincorporated territory by 12 local water districts and one private company.

Complicating a consolidation: The Yorba Linda district serves some 3,000 accounts in Placentia, Anaheim and Brea, while a private company supplies north Fairmont Boulevard-area customers.

Administrative savings are unclear, but ratepayers wouldn't be on the hook for directors' costs – $150 for each for up to 10 meetings per month – and nearly $50,000 in annual medical, dental and vision benefits.

Of course, water board directors – 22 have served in the five positions since 1959 – oppose consolidation, noting the benefits of an independent agency that's not involved in city politics.

The once-independent Yorba Linda Library District joined the city in 1985, but that merger was backed by the council and separately elected library trustees. The current council doesn't advocate taking on water district operations.  

Once again Yorba Linda hears serious talk of a recall, although no past efforts have succeeded

Serious talk of recalling locally elected officials often roils Yorba Linda's political landscape, but mounting a successful recall is difficult, partly due to challenges in precisely navigating the state's detailed rules to qualify a recall for the ballot and the costs involved.

In fact, no city council member, school trustee or water board director serving this community has ever been removed from office in a recall, and only one of multiple recall efforts has ever reached the ballot – the 2014 attempt to replace councilmen Tom Lindsey and Craig Young.

However, a recall targeting Yorba Linda Water District directors might be on the horizon, guided by Yorba Linda Taxpayers Association leaders, including some who were active in that first-ever recall election.

Before co-founding the taxpayers group, Jeff Decker ran to replace Lindsey in the recall attempt, but Lindsey retained his seat by a comfortable 18-point margin. Co-founder Jon Hansen had opposed the recall.

In a statement issued after a recent “town hall” meeting that drew some 170 residents, the taxpayers group said, “The audience support to proceed with both a writ of mandate and a recall of board members was overwhelming.”

A writ of mandate, the group noted, “is a court order to a government agency to follow the law” and “is necessary” because directors “refused to comply” with a statutory obligation to rescind a rate increase or place the issue on a ballot, upon receiving a referendum petition.

The petition contained 5,520 signatures. The county Registrar of Voters checked a sample of 500, found 444 to be valid and extrapolated 88.8 percent or 4,902 would be valid, surpassing the 2,157 needed.

But the petition was turned away by directors in a 5-0 vote after hearing a report from district General Manager Marc Marcantonio and longtime legal counsel Art Kidman.

They recommended rejection because “the referendum process isn't allowed by the laws applicable to the rate (increase) resolution,” and only an initiative petition – not a referendum process – would be lawful, a stance vigorously disputed by the taxpayers group.

With an expensive lawsuit and possible recall effort afoot, the taxpayers association is raising funds, asking donors to state if a contribution is a loan and promising to “pay you back in full,” should “the court order our legal fees be reimbursed by the water district.”

A key cost is printing petitions, which must follow strict state format requirements, including type size, margins, signature and address spacing and other details, with noncomplying forms rejected.

A recall effort would require separate petitions for each director targeted, signed by at least 20 percent of the district's nearly 48,000 registered voters in a 120-day period. Slated for the November 2016 ballot are seats held by Mike Beverage and Ric Collett. Terms for Phil Hawkins, Bob Kiley and Gary Melton run through 2018.