Dec 15 Council Meeting - The Good News

Yesterday we discussed the bad news coming out of the Dec 15 City Council meeting so today I wanted to focus on the good news –

SENIOR/CIVIC CENTER MOVES FORWARD

One of my priorities has been to get the Senior/Civic Center project off the ground where it has been stuck for years. We are the only City in Orange County without our own Civic Center much less our own Senior Center. Last night the Council approved a design/construction company and a construction management company so we can move forward with an expected completion date 3 years in the future. Finally!

In the coming months we will share with the people the plans for both centers. Stay tuned. Meanwhile I asked the Director of Community Services to begin studying the characteristics of good senior centers for a City of our size and demographics. We want to have a knowledge base when we get to the point of offering suggestions as to the design elements.

PS - I was pleased with the quality of the staff report. It had lots of detail and demonstrated a lot of work. Kudos to Hannah Shin-Heydorn and Debra Rose. Since I’ve been on the Council this year I’ve noticed a measurable increase in the quality of our reports, although there are still the occasional clinkers thrown in. But it’s certainly very good news that staff’s ability to communicate is improving, at least from my perspective.

PUT LAKE FOREST FIRST

Given all the money we will be spending on the Senior/Civic Center, I asked the Council to adopt language that asked the builders to use Lake Forest people and businesses whenever possible. In the past when I (and Councilman Nick) have asked for this type of preference, we’ve been struck down by our colleagues. Andy Hamilton is so against this that he even wrote an article for the OC Register where he opposed any kind of system that offered preferences for our own people and businesses. Lo and behold my colleagues found religion, and I got the language put into the future agreements. No one can say at this point how much money will stay in the City, but we must do what we can to keep Lake Forest money in the hands of Lake Forest people and businesses.

COUNCIL CONDUCT

Mayor Voigts was up to his old tricks at the last Council meeting, interrupting speakers and demanding that the audience refrain from laughing or applauding. I finally got sick and tired of hearing him harass our citizens and interrupted him, called on the City Attorney, and asked for the basis of Voigts’ capricious rules. The Attorney said that since we appointed Voigts as Mayor, we had to live with his peccadilloes, but if enough Council members were upset with the way he was behaving, we had the right to over-rule him. I motioned to allow people to talk, laugh and applaud and Councilman Nick seconded my motion. Mayor Voigts objected strenuously, saying he didn’t want people booing, catcalling and disturbing the meeting. I said that my motion was restricted to “talking, laughing, and applauding”, but he didn’t seem to get it, so I wrote it out for him and then we voted. Voigts and Hamilton voted against the motion, but it passed 3 to 2. For the rest of the meeting, people were allowed to laugh and applaud. Next month I will bring this up as a standard procedure.

I find it offensive that Voigts and Hamilton want to run the City Council like it was a storm trooper meeting and everyone must sit in silence and listen to their instructions. I understand their concern. Almost all of the applauds happen when people are opposing their votes, or objecting to their behavior, so if I was one of them I would be upset too. Instead of demanding that people be quiet, they might think, instead, that if so many people are opposed to what they are doing or saying, perhaps they need to re-consider what they are doing or saying.

25th ANNIVERSAY YEAR STARTS

We started our year-long celebration of 25 years of incorporation. The Committee helping organize the events includes -

· Victor Sheer (Parks Commission)

· Robert Dealmeida (Planning Commission)

· Jim Rosenberg (Parks Commission)

· Heiko Peschel

· Margie Matsil (Kiwanis and Chamber of Commerce)

· Mary Visconte (Chamber of Commerce)

In the near future I’ll lay out the special events.

The picture accompanying this article is me with Director Scott Wasserman at the beginning of the 25th anniversary celebration. I am wearing one of the celebratory hats.

ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Dr. Jim Gardner is on the City Council for Lake Forest. You can check him out on LinkedIn and/or Facebook and you can share your thoughts about the City at Lake Forest Town Square on Facebook. His comments are not meant to reflect official City Policy.

Dr. Gardner has office hours every Tuesday from 4 pm to 6 pm at the City Hall. In addition, he holds a Town Hall meeting every quarter. The next meeting will be on Jan 30 at 2 pm at the Foothill Ranch Public Library.

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