ORANGE : Alvarez Taken Off City Planning Panel

The City Council has decided unanimously to remove Michael Alvarez from the Planning Commission a little more than six months after he was appointed to the post by Mayor Gene Beyer.

“I just lost confidence in him, and I didn’t feel we had the communication with him necessary,” Beyer said Wednesday of his decision to ask his council colleagues to remove Alvarez from the commission. “I don’t want to go much further into it.”

Alvarez said he believes the move was prompted by his refusal to support Beyer during November’s mayoral election. Alvarez publicly endorsed Beyer’s opponent, Councilwoman Joanne Coontz, in the bitterly contested race.

“(Beyer has) been mad at me ever since,” Alvarez said. “I now realize doing a good job on the Planning Commission isn’t enough. They wanted to play the political game. But I’m a businessman, not a politician.”

Moreover, Alvarez was not informed that there would be a vote on his removal from the Planning Commission until after the decision had been made Tuesday afternoon.

“I never missed any Planning Commission meetings. I was so conscientious that I even changed my vacation plans so I wouldn’t miss anything,” he said. “I wish I would have known so I could have shown up (for the council meeting).”

The vote on Alvarez’s removal was not listed on the council agenda, but rather occurred as one of several votes on assignments to city commissions.

Alvarez, a lifelong Orange resident, operates Alvarez Properties, a real estate group. He will continue to serve on the city’s Old Towne Steering Committee.