TODD NICHOLSON : Facing Growth’s Drawbacks : Transit Problem Is Major Challenge for Industrial League

The county was a lot smaller and the troubles confronting the business community were a lot simpler when the Industrial League of Orange County was formed 19 years ago.

Back then the league--which today counts more than 900 members who collectively employ more than 150,000 workers, or about 11% of the county’s work force--dealt with such matters as establishing a priority for installing traffic signals in the Orange County Airport industrial complex.

Today, the group wrestles with such issues as soaring health insurance costs, industry’s role in providing child care and how to recruit blue-collar workers in one of the nation’s priciest housing markets.

An avowed special-interest group whose bylaws call for it to initiate, sponsor and influence public policy on issues of common interest to its members, the association is also pushing for passage of Measure A, the proposed countywide half-cent sales tax hike to raise funds for transportation programs.

For Todd Nicholson, league president for the past 17 years, the changes have been exciting--if sometimes frustrating. “When we were new,” he said, “we did projects with 90- and 120-day completion dates. Now we’re looking at things that might take 20 years or more before we even begin to see improvements. It is a drawback of growth.”

Nicholson, 42, has seen the league and the county grow tremendously since 1972. Originally founded as the Greater Irvine Industrial League, the association changed its name in 1982 to reflect its new, countywide scope.

A self-described “near native” of Southern California who grew up in Whittier after early childhood stays in Texas and his native Louisiana, Nicholson managed chambers of commerce in Tacoma, Wash., and Palo Alto before signing on as executive director of the league in 1972. He is a 1969 graduate of Fresno State College with a degree in journalism.

In a recent interview with Times staff writer John O’Dell, Nicholson discussed some of the major issues facing the Orange County business community as it prepares to enter the 1990s.

Q.What are the biggest concerns of business in Orange County today? And have they changed much in recent years?

A. At the top of the heap is transportation, and that hasn’t changed, or so the polls tell us. It has been a problem for more than a decade. Improving the surface transportation system is the No. 1 issue facing business today. Then, in a broad sense, the work force in the county is an issue of concern. Work force issues include housing, transportation and other cost-of-living issues, plus the education system and all the things that play into a company’s ability to identify, attract and maintain employees. And air transportation is a significant issue as we look down the road. Those are probably the key things.

Q. It is clear to anyone who drives a car that the surface transportation system in the county is overworked. What are the specific problems that this causes business?

A. The problems are in the economic ramifications of a freeway and surface street system that no longer moves people efficiently. The commute that workers face affects their attitudes once they arrive at work, so the frustrations they go through on the freeways here in Orange County as they try to get to work end up costing businesses money.

Q. Has anyone ever figured out how much time a one-hour commute takes away from work? Does it take the employee 20 minutes to calm down once he arrives at the job?

A. I’m not aware of one, but it would be an interesting study. One element that many people don’t recognize is that the traffic crunch wastes an awful lot of time for people whose livelihood is on the road--people who make sales calls or who deliver things. All of that time on the road comes together to have a severe economic and social impact.

Q. So it boils down to the fact that the surface transportation system is all jammed up around here. What do your employer members tell you about commuting? Do they say they can’t get or keep people because workers won’t put up with the long driving times?

A. We hear of some companies that are reaching out to the Inland Empire for workers, especially blue-collar and entry-level people, and finding that a lot of people who have moved out there from Orange County are saying ‘No!’ to their job offers. They say they are not going to make the commute.

Q. Is that why the league is supporting Measure A on the November ballot?

A. In part. We are concerned with the all the costs of an inadequate transportation system. And it is clear that in recent years, even as the county has been growing substantially, we have not been spending what we used to spend on our transportation infrastructure. The fuel economy of automobiles has cut the gasoline tax revenues that support a lot of transportation programs and at the same time, the cost of building the infrastructure has risen dramatically. It doesn’t take a brain surgeon to figure out that we are not plowing the dollars into the infrastructure that we need to.

Q. What other potential improvements to the transportation system do your members talk about and tend to favor?

A. The focus of talks mainly has been on transportation management rather than physical improvements like double-decking the freeways. And the transportation management issue is being accelerated by the new air-quality plan for the South Coast basin. But even before that plan came out, a number of companies in the county have attempted things like van pools and other ride-sharing programs. At the Industrial League, we hope to put together a demonstration van-pool program yet this year. We will share a van with different companies to let people have the experience of van-pooling to see how it works. If it works in a particular situation, great. That company can then go out and do it on their own. That’s one thing we’re doing, but not the only one.

Q. The head of a major job training program recently complained that while that program is turning out a lot of entry-level workers and while those jobs in South Orange County are going unfilled, she can’t get the workers to the jobs because of the county bus schedules. Why can’t companies shift their hours to accommodate public transportation, or the bus line shift its schedules to accommodate businesses’ hours?

A. I’m involved with the Private Industry Council in Orange County, a program that deals with job training. And I know there is a problem. Public transportation invariable jumps up as one of the issues you have to contend with. But I think the Orange County Transportation District is taking a better look these days at how to develop systems to accommodate transportation needs within employment centers like the South Coast Metro region around South Coast Plaza, or the Anaheim Stadium area or Irvine Business Center.

Q. But do planners realize that a lot of the people who might take entry-level jobs in the Irvine Business Center live in places like Anaheim and Fullerton? The problem seems to be that if you don’t have a car, you can’t get from one end of Orange County to another in any reasonable time, or at all in the early-morning hours because the buses don’t run as early as many manufacturing companies begin their work day.

A. We have got to do a lot better job in the county with mass transit programs. I recently was in Washington, D.C., and got to ride the Metro system there. I came back home and looked around and am just not convinced that sort of system won’t work here. It is a huge huge capital expenditure, but. . . .

Q. Perhaps instead of a countywide subway or rail system, we need a few smaller ones that serve the employment centers and are connected by bus lines. Then people could go from Point A to Point B and get around once they got there.

A. That’s the key. In Orange County now, you generally can get from A to B, but it is hard to get around in B once you are there. I was on the Citizens’ Advisory Committee on the 20-year Master Plan of Transportation for the county, and I know that issue was addressed. The plan says that we have to have regional feeder and distribution systems as well as primary connectors.

Q. Housing is another major issue facing business in Orange County. With the median price of a resale single-family home hovering around $255,000, I think it is pretty obvious what the problem is. But what is industry in the county looking at to help resolve the problem? Any talk of company-sponsored housing to relieve soaring costs?

A. It may be that individual companies are looking at specific programs like that, but in a general sense I don’t think we are ever going to see company towns in Orange County. One exciting thing that is happening is in the South County with Rancho Santa Margarita and the housing/business mix they have there. Trying to keep the job center and the residential community in the same development is an interesting concept, although it doesn’t solve the housing problems in a Fullerton or an Anaheim. A committee that the Industrial League formed to tackle this issue came out of its sessions with more questions than solutions. But we do recognize that housing is a problem in terms of recruiting employees.

Q. It must be. This is one of the highest-priced housing markets in the United States, and it seems to me that it would be difficult anymore for a family or individual making much less than $40,000 a year to find much in the way of decent housing.

A. That is a major concern to business. Housing costs do impact companies’ ability to attract the work force they need, in all pay ranges. And it makes it really difficult to recruit from other parts of the country.

Q. The county’s housing prices also are forcing a lot of younger people to leave the county. Won’t that have a tremendous negative impacts on business down the road?

A. It is a real frustration. But I think some movement out of the county is a life style decision rather than an economic necessity. Some people leave because they want a single-family home rather than a townhouse or condominium. We have to recognize that our ability to produce a three- or four-bedroom home with a yard for the dog to run around in is disappearing and that we may not be able to have that kind of home in Orange County much longer at a price most people can afford.

Q. If, as you say, a major concern of business in Orange County is finding workers, getting them here and keeping them, does that mean we are in any type of employee shortage crisis? We have a low jobless rate and keep hearing that many blue-collar workers can’t afford to live here.

A. I wouldn’t put it in the crisis category. But there are shortages, certainly in many entry-level and some skilled professional areas and especially in clerical. A lot of companies in the county go a long time to find data processors and straight clerical types.

Q. Workers are especially hard to find in the basic low-level jobs, such as those in fast-food restaurants and retailing. Why is that?

A. My guess would be that there has been such a dramatic increase in service-oriented positions in the county that the demand has far outstripped our ability to produce people to fill them. This summer, with my own daughter, I saw how bad things are. She was being sought by several stores at same time. Once a big sale was over at one place, another place was offering her work. It was a real seller’s market.

But in terms of overall recruitment, however, Orange County still is a very, very attractive place to people. The message I hear from those in the recruiting business is that they are focusing their efforts into areas that have costs of living similar to Orange County’s. That way, they culture shock isn’t as great as if you are trying to recruit someone from Ohio or Alabama.

Q. What other things are businesses in the county doing to try to improve the job climate?

A. Well, one growing area of employee recruiting--which really began as a social issue but is fast evolving into an economic issue--is child care. There are some innovative programs under way, and there is going to be a lot more attention focused in that arena. Child care programs are important not only from the social aspects but because of their ability to open up a whole new work force area if we can satisfy the child care needs of parents who have job skills but stay home because they can’t find good care.

Q. Still, there has not been much overt movement by business in the county into providing child care for workers. What is the holdup?

A. A lot is just plain reluctance. Child care is not the kind of thing business is comfortable getting involved in. But businesses are getting involved in less direct ways. In Irvine, as one example, the Irvine Child Care Project has received a lot of financial support from business. The land for the centers is donated by the school district, the city makes sure the zoning goes through and the private sector supports the leasing of modular facilities to house the centers. So the cost to parents is substantially reduced because they are paying only the direct operating costs.

Q. Speaking of Irvine . . . it is a city in which a number of progressive programs have been pioneered. Does the Industrial League, which started and still is headquartered there and draws a lot of its members from the business community there, work most closely with issues and causes in Irvine? Or do your members go out and evangelize in the rest of the county, to try to get businesses elsewhere to press for adoption of programs like the Irvine Child Care Project?

A. I think our role is one of communication, and we do it. We try to share the success stories and failures that we come across.

Q. Along those lines, do you find any regional differences in the county as to the role of business and its interaction with society?

A. Not anything that is regional. Individual companies have their own corporate philosophies, and some believe in being active socially, while some don’t. I guess it is true that in communities in the development phase, such as Irvine and much of the rest of South Orange County, we are likely to see more calls by government and the citizenry on the business community than we will in established communities.

Q. You’ve been doing this for 17 years. What is the major, positive change you’ve seen in the county over that period?

A. The urbanization of the county. I know that’s sometimes not a real popular phrase, but I mean it in the positive sense of the maturing of the economy and the cultural and social structures. As a resident and as someone involved in a lot of the issues in the county, to me that is the exciting part of being here.