Dreams Do Not a City Make

There are 26 cities in Orange County. By the end of this year there could be 27, or even 28 or more. Not since the booming growth period of the 1950s and early ‘60s has there been so much incorporation fever. And not since December, 1971, when residents voted to create Irvine, has a new city been carved out of the county’s unincorporated territory.

But now residents in five communities, Laguna Niguel, Mission Viejo, Dana Point, Capistrano Beach and North Tustin, are considering cutting their ties with the governing county Board of Supervisors and creating their own Camelots in Orange County. Two of them, Laguna Niguel and Dana Point, have already submitted formal applications for cityhood and are awaiting a hearing date.

The inclination is to support such efforts. Home rule and local control is a near-sacred concept. It makes sense to have land-use and other decisions made by a locally elected city council made up of residents instead of by others many miles away at the county seat in Santa Ana. That’s especially true when the county can no longer adequately provide the level of services that residents in rapidly urbanizing areas require.

Public officials who review incorporation applications will be concerned mainly with whether communities seeking cityhood have the population and tax base to be financially self-sufficient.

Judging from the rocky condition of some of the county’s existing cities, that financial determination should include a look as far into the future as possible.

History has shown that not all incorporations in Orange County were good ones. Some cities would have been better off being part of their more solvent neighbors. Care must be taken not to create new mistakes that crumble like King Arthur’s Camelot.