Costa Mesa firm named best to...

Costa Mesa firm named best to work for in U.S.

Fortune Magazine named the Costa Mesa financial services firm,

Edward Jones, the best company to work for in America. Pete Peterson,

of the firm, announced earlier this month that the company, which has

made the list four times before, has received its first No. 1 ranking

as will be seen in the Feb. 4 issue of the magazine.

The magazine chose the firm because nearly 97% of employees rated

the management as honest, as well as the fact that the company had no

lay-offs despite having experienced financial hardships.

While part of the survey is based on an in-depth analysis of the

company’s culture and human resource practices, the majority of the

Fortune 100 Best ranking is based on an employee-driven survey from

randomly selected employees of companies nationwide.

The firm, which advises individual investors exclusively, serves

five million clients and offers a variety of investments such as

certificates of deposit, taxable and non-taxable bonds, stocks and

mutual funds. Edward Jones has more than 8,000 branch offices

throughout the United States with affiliates in Canada and the United

Kingdom and plans to expand to 10,000 offices by 2003.

Luxury division formed to build at Crystal Cove

John Laing Homes, a homebuilding company under WL Homes of Newport

Beach, launched a new division in May geared toward developing homes

and communities for the upper price segments of Southern California.

The new division, John Laing Homes Luxury Group, will acquire

land, design and build homes and eventually market its programs to

luxury-oriented home-buyers in an effort to expand the company’s

current operations throughout the market.

As its first project, the luxury group will be responsible for

building homes at Crystal Cove on the Irvine Ranch. The project,

which will consist of 40 ocean view homes, will be named Nautilus at

Crystal Cove.

Tom Redwitz, a 20-year veteran in real estate entitlements,

developments, architecture and construction, was selected to head up

the new division. Ginny Kerr, a 6-year employee with Taylor Woodrow,

will serve as project coordinator.

WL Homes plans to refocus its homebuilding efforts in its core

markets in both California and Colorado.

More people flying, fewer flights in the air

John Wayne Airport witnessed a 4.3% increase in airline passenger

traffic in June 2002 as compared to June 2001. While passenger

traffic has totaled 715,613 as compared to last year’s count of

685,949 passengers, the total number of aircraft operations during

the same months decreased.

In June 2002 the total number of aircraft operations, which

consists of both take-offs and landings, was 31,839, a 10.5% decrease

from the June 2001 when aircraft operations totaled 35,572.

Similarly, the June 2002 commercial carrier flight operations also

experienced a decrease of more than 2% while the commuter carrier

operations (air taxis) showed a significant decrease of 44.7% when

compared to June 2001.

Overall, the general aviation activity at the airport, which

accounted for 76% of the total aircraft operations during June 2002,

revealed an 11.6% decrease when compared to the same month last year.

The airport is a self-supporting enterprise, owned and operated by

the County of Orange.

Golf tournament aids Blind learning center

The Orange Coast Assn. of Realtors, based in Newport Beach,

generated more than $8,000 for the Blind Children’s Learning Center

in Tustin during its annual golf tournament.

The tournament, which was held at the Strawberry Farms Golf Course

in Irvine, recently attracted 130 players and produced a significant

donation for the center.

The nonprofit organization helps nearly 300 students integrate

into the mainstream through a curriculum of speech and language

classes, occupational therapy, orientation and mobility, Braille

instruction, specialized vision services, social opportunities and

adaptive technology.

The realtors association, which was established in 1929, is

composed of 1,500 real estate professionals, provides members with a

variety of support services such as industry communication,

legislative support, seminars, high tech support and access to

multiple listings and reference material.