The Pied Piper of Mission Viejo
Staff editorial

In “The Pied Piper of Hamelin” a piper contracts with Hamelin to rid the city of rats for a fee of 50,000 florins. The piper completes the job and asks for payment, but the mayor tells him the rats are gone, and the job wasn’t worth more than 50 florins. As a consequence, the piper rids the city of its children.

In his Mar. 24 letter to the editor, Bo Klein refers to Councilman Frank Ury as Mission Viejo’s Pied Piper. The reference has an ironic twist.

Mission Viejo’s “plague” was Southern California’s Edison’s decision to add new lines on the city’s north side. A few residents sounded the alarm, rallied their neighbors, formed No Overhead Powerlines by Edison and invoked homeowner associations and the city council to fight the overhead lines.

Jumping in front of the crowd, Ury promised to “force Edison to bury its lines.” Even after SCE began installing poles for overhead lines, Ury mailed campaign flyers promising to get the lines buried. The war was over, but Ury’s battle cry went on, right up to Election Day. The day after the election, the noise stopped. Dismayed residents who likely had his campaign signs in their yards called Ury. One of them received a chilly response, “How did you get my cell phone number?”

Ury first started running for city council in 2001, long before anyone knew about new power lines. His battle cry back then was “I don’t like bullies” – Sherri Butterfield and Susan Withrow. Ury gave numerous “I don’t like bullies” speeches and abruptly moved to Northern California in 2002. He returned to Mission Viejo in 2003 and won a council seat in 2004. To residents attending council meetings since his election and asking for much of anything, Ury has said, “What we’ve heard up here [from the dais] is a bunch of people complaining.”

When residents – lots of them – asked the council to protect commercial zones, Ury sarcastically said from the dais on Sept. 19, 2005, “We should put a Xerox machine out front.” Residents were all asking for the same thing, and Ury was apparently annoyed. When residents asked for the right to vote on zone changes, Ury said, “You elected us to make decisions for you.” Again, he doesn’t agree he’s supposed to listen to and represent the residents.

The Pied Piper of Hamelin did his job, and the rats were gone forever. All those who paid the Mission Viejo piper should remember the legend as they drive under the power lines. The Pied Piper of Mission Viejo doesn’t care about your zone issues, your traffic problems, your infrastructure or how an apartment complex might affect your life. The piper lives in a gated community, and he cares about developers, his political consultant and campaign donors.