Council Slate Full After Long Recess

A two-week holiday recess has created a long agenda for the City Council’s meeting today.

Council members face such chores as renaming a downtown street, approving a lease agreement for a community resource center and hearing an angry neighborhood’s appeal of a recent city decision.

At least a dozen Anaheim Hills residents are expected to ask the council to rescind its final approval of a shelter on Santa Ana Canyon Road for abused women and children.

The Eli Home project has become the focus of a bitter battle between shelter supporters and Canyon Crest Drive homeowners over the last three years. Saying the shelter has not lived up to its original operating agreements, neighbors now want city officials to revoke the project’s conditional-use permits.

In other action, the council probably will approve a recommendation to change the name of West Harbor Place to Center Street Promenade, which was the original name of the main street in Anaheim. Community development officials proposed the name change last fall, along with a second suggestion of Downtown Promenade.

West Harbor Place is the main downtown strip, lined with shops, a food court and businesses and ties in with Center Street on the east side of Lincoln Avenue.

“Together, they make up the central pedestrian spine of the area,” said Elisa Stipkovich, the department’s executive director.

Also in line for approval is the extension of a lease agreement for the Police Department’s West Anaheim Community Resource Center on Lincoln.

The center, which is staffed by volunteers, offers residents a meeting place, a rest stop for area officers and a neighborhood office for police assigned to the community.

Extending the lease for one year will cost $100 per month, and the following year would be free, Chief Randall Gaston said.

The Police Department will pay the operating expenses, which are less than $3,000 a year, Gaston said.

The meeting starts at 5 p.m. in council chambers at City Hall, 200 S. Anaheim Blvd. Information: (714) 254-5166.