Vision Laguna hits snag

Mary A. Castillo

At his final City Council meeting, Paul Freeman brought the vision

process back to the table with hopes of beginning the second phase of

implementation.

“This is an item intended to continue with some next steps of the

vision process,” he said. “There’s nothing particularly

earth-shattering or novel about these suggestions.”

The Vision process began in the Spring of 1999 when the City

Council wanted to explore the effects of regional development on the

quality of life. In December 2001 the Vision Steering Committee

generated the final report of Vision 2030.

The vision process made its last appearance before the council on

Aug. 13, when the steering committee presented an addendum to the

Vision Laguna 2030 Final Report and Strategic Plan. The addendum

contained a list of consolidated action items and a table of those

action items that identified their respective status of work.

No action was taken by the council at that meeting except for

Freeman’s offer to prepare an agenda bill in collaboration with the

steering committee.

The agenda bill considered at Tuesday’s meeting recommended that

the City Council officially accept the body of work provided by the

steering committee and allocate $27,500 for a consultant to conduct

opinion research and hold workshops. It recommended that staff

distribute summary vision reports to each household, place the

complete report on the city’s Web site and propose a format of how

vision goals and interim objectives would be reflected in the annual

budget.

The bill also proposed a resolution that the new council define

the roles of the city and private parties in sustaining the process,

developing a progress report by February 2004 and providing direction

to the Planning Commission by May 2003 about relevant municipal code

and general plan revisions.

“This report is an opportunity based on what the citizens have

suggested in the community,” Steering Committee Chair Fred Droz said

in support of the bill. “We can use it as a dialogue to what we want

to get accomplished in this town.”

Vision steering committee members took turns urging the

implementation process and even suggesting possible candidates for

the opinion survey consultant position. Councilwoman Toni Iseman said

that the opinion survey would give the community a chance to find out

where it really stood on the issues brought forth by the vision

process.

After public comment was closed, Steve Dicterow, Cheryl Kinsman

and Mayor Wayne Baglin revealed that they were not in support of the

bill.

“I think I might be the minority on this one,” Dicterow said. “I

very much support the spirit of this agenda bill, but I’m not going

to be able to support the recommended actions.”

He stated that he wanted to take the objectives, review them in a

public session and, from there, determine priorities. He also pointed

out that he felt uncomfortable having the current council make

decisions.

“I think we do run into a danger area here if we, tonight, at the

last meeting of this old council, make new resolutions for the new

council,” Councilwoman Cheryl Kinsman said in agreement.

Freeman tried to bargain.

“Can I just ask if you don’t like resolutions and specific dates

for the future, council, do you not support getting going with the

opinion survey either,” he said.

Kinsman and Dicterow shook their heads.

Dicterow plans to present a future agenda bill to propel the

vision process forward. He was not available for further comment on

the specifics of his plan at press time.

Although Baglin was happy with the inclusiveness of the vision

process, he pointed out that the objectives and priorities were

incomplete and, in some cases, redundant.

“I still find conflicts in them,” he said. “We haven’t completed

the process.”

He joined Kinsman and Dicterow in saying that the newly elected

council should resolve how it wanted to implement the process.

“Well, let me make it easy,” Freeman said. “I’ll withdraw the

agenda item.”

* MARY A. CASTILLO is a news assistant for the Coastline Pilot.

She covers education, public safety and City Hall. She can be reached

at mary.castillo@latimes.com.