Village entrance still point of contention

Mike Swanson

One of the city’s most divisive issues will be in the Orange County

Board of Supervisors’ hands on Dec. 16, a date two of the five

council members believe discourages public debate.

An appeal by the Laguna Canyon Conservancy against moving the

city’s corporate yard to the ACT V parking lot will move the matter

to Santa Ana, at a site and time Mayor Toni Iseman said doesn’t suit

Lagunans’ best interests.

“It’s in the morning on a Tuesday, so if someone wants to go, and

they happen to be employed, then they’re out of luck,” Iseman said.

“This is a Laguna issue that should be heard in Laguna. It’s an

attempt to keep locals from being a part of the democratic process.”

Iseman tried at the Nov. 18 City Council meeting to have the date

of the hearing moved from Dec. 16 to one of two dates in January

offered by the board of supervisors. She said the Laguna Canyon

Conservancy preferred a January date and that more people would

likely show up after Christmas.

Iseman and Councilman Wayne Baglin voted to change the date to

January, but council members Cheryl Kinsman and Steve Dicterow said

they wanted the hearing on the earliest date possible, so the date

remained Dec. 16. Councilwoman Elizabeth Pearson, who with Kinsman

and Dicterow has supported moving the corporate yard to ACT V, was

absent.

“Dec. 16 isn’t close enough to Christmas to be that big of an

issue,” Dicterow said. “I’d like to get this done.”

Carolyn Wood, president of the Laguna Canyon Conservancy, said she

wanted to withhold the organization’s reasons for the appeal until a

6 p.m. Monday meeting at Tivoli Terrace on the Festival grounds. The

conservancy will answer questions, present facts and give attendees a

better understanding of how moving the corporate yard to ACT V

affects current and future parking and the development of the Village

Entrance project.

The matter could be handled in Laguna if the ACT V property were

annexed by the city, which Iseman said the county wants the city to

do. ACT V is owned by Laguna Beach, but it’s overseen by the county

because it’s on unincorporated property, Baglin said.

“The city has procrastinated in annexing it because they find it

easier to approve the project through the county than through the

city,” Baglin said. “We’ve had the opportunity to annex the property

several times over the past several years. It should have been done a

long time ago.”

The agenda moves faster in the county and the board is less

stringent than Laguna’s Planning Commission, Iseman said. She added

that the Planning Commission is more in tune with Laguna-specific

issues.

The board of supervisors’ meeting begins at 9:30 a.m. Dec. 16.

“We won’t know where it is on the agenda until a few days before

the meeting,” City Manager Ken Frank said.

Iseman, a teacher and counselor at Orange Coast College, said she

missed a class for the last meeting in the county and plans to change

her vacation plans to catch this one.

“I’m going to San Francisco on the 12th, and I would have liked to

stay for a while and catch up with some friends, but I’ll be back for

the hearing,” Iseman said. “This issue is extremely important to the

future of the city.”

Moving the corporate yard to ACT V would cost the city $3.5

million to $4 million. Dicterow has called the yard an eyesore to the

Downtown area at past council meetings and has said it needed to be

moved to accommodate a decorative village entrance to the city.

Iseman has repeatedly said that ACT V is not the answer.

“If we lose the critical mass of parking at ACT V, the shuttles

lose their effectiveness and congestion and parking will only get

worse Downtown,” Iseman. “Congestion and parking are two of

residents’ most common complaints. It doesn’t make sense to worsen an

existing problem, and with money the city doesn’t have.”