Harriett M. Wieder dies

Friends, family and former colleagues paid tribute on Tuesday to Harriett M. Wieder, the first woman in Orange County to hold the office of County Supervisor and a founder of the Bolsa Chica Conservancy, who has died at age 89.

Wieder, a Newport Beach resident and former mayor of Huntington Beach, died Monday night of heart failure at Hoag Memorial Hospital Presbyterian, according to Ed Laird, her longtime friend and Conservancy colleague.

“Many of you knew Harriett was a woman who would easily share her convictions in the most demonstrative ways,” her daughter, Gayle Tauber, and son, Leland Wieder, said in a statement. “She was a woman who made things happen. ‘You don’t just talk about things, you do them.’ And our mother did make things happen. She was a vital, passionate force of nature.”

Wieder was a devoted environmentalist both on and off the Board of Supervisors, Laird said.

“She had a great mission in life to leave the world a better place than she found it, and the Bolsa Chica Conservancy was one of her passions,” he said. “She enjoyed it a great deal, and she worked very hard on it to make it what it is today.”

He added that Wieder, who served on national political boards in addition to local ones, always seemed busy with one project or another.

“She could have a simple conversation with a very ordinary person, and the next minute, she could be in a very sophisticated and complicated issue regarding the environment or governing,” Laird said. “She fit in almost everywhere.”

Wieder was first elected to the Huntington Beach City Council in 1974, and chosen by her peers for a one-year term as mayor in 1976. She served one term on the council before moving on to the Board of Supervisors, where she served from 1978 to 1995.

State Assemblyman Jim Silva, who was mayor of Huntington Beach when Wieder was on the Board of Supervisors, said she always believed there should be a safety net for social programs. Wieder was a leader for many young women, Silva said.

“She was a woman that was ahead of her time,” he said.

Wieder stayed in politics after her years as a supervisor. President Clinton appointed her in 1995 to the governing body of the Council of the Administrative Conference of the United States and in 1996 to the Commission on U.S.-Pacific Trade & Investment Policy, which advised the president on how to increase U.S. trade opportunities in Asian countries. In 1999, she was appointed to the National Advisory Environmental Health and Sciences Council, which advised the federal government on matters related to environmental health.

She is also the namesake of Harriett M. Wieder Regional Park, which opened in 1992 near the Bolsa Chica wetlands and is still under construction. Bill Reiter, a supervising ranger for OC Parks, said just 4.1 of the total 106 acres had been developed, and those areas consisted largely of recycled playground materials, reflecting Wieder’s ecological concerns.

“Harriett was always very dedicated to the community,” said Grace Adams, the executive director of the Bolsa Chica Conservancy. “She liked to mentor. It was a privilege to work with her.”

Wieder grew up in Detroit, Mich., where she met her husband, Irving Wieder, and married him in 1941. Wieder called her husband her “secret weapon,” said Lucy Dunn, the president of the Orange County Business Council and a longtime friend. His quieter ways complemented Wieder’s extroverted personality, Dunn said.

“Harriett always, always took center stage,” Dunn said.

Wieder is preceded in death by her husband Irving; and survived by her son, daughter, daughter-in-law, Diane Wieder; son-in-law, Philip Tauber; seven grandchildren and five great-grandchildren.

A celebration of her life will be held at 3 p.m. Jan. 31 at University Synagogue in Irvine.

More to come.