April 17 council meeting summary
Editorial staff

The most significant council business on April 17 may have been conducted behind closed doors. Closed-session topics included the YMCA’s lease with the city and re-tenanting major spaces at The Shops after Saks leaves and Macy’s replaces Robinsons-May.

Members of the public pulled the only consent calendar item, $99,500 for cat isolation and rabbit hut buildings at the animal shelter. The council unanimously approved all other consent calendar items and likely would have unanimously approved the animal buildings as well, had the item not been pulled by the public. All public comments supported the item. Councilman Frank Ury questioned the cost and dissented when the council voted 4-1 to approve. Ury isn’t up for reelection this fall, and he apparently isn’t courting the cat and rabbit vote.

The council agreed to combine an item regarding franchise audits with three audits proposed by Ury. By consensus the council requested information from Southern California Edison regarding its franchise terms, number of customers, amount of power consumed and payment information during the past five years. Ury also proposed a franchise audit of Cox Communications. MacLean commented about Cox’s recent internal audit, after which the company paid approximately $157,000 to the city for miscalculation of advertising revenue. MacLean suggested another audit wouldn’t be fruitful or worth the cost.

Ury countered MacLean’s comments by claiming the audit of Cox would be at no cost to the city because of Cox’s payment following its internal audit. City CFO Irwin Bornstein said, no, the money from Cox had been owed and it went into the general fund. Even with fuzzy math, a cost of $24,000 still costs $24,000. Ury then asked why the council was objecting to the “$10,000 cost,” which moments ago had been stated and restated as $24,000. That’s salesmanship. The motion failed on a 3-2 vote (Reavis, Kelley and MacLean against, Ury and Ledesma for).

The council next voted 5-0 to spend $13,500 for an audit of the franchise fees from Waste Management, going back three years.

A schedule of franchise audits should have been implemented years ago, and residents should ask why the city has been operating on blind faith instead of monitoring companies that pay the city $2.5 million annually in franchise fees for rendering services to the residents. Ury, whose political contributors include an independent power provider, has a long history waging an anti-Edison campaign. He may have hit on the benefits of auditing all city franchises for the wrong reason, but the city should have implemented an audit schedule years ago. Despite the lengthy and somewhat contentious discussion, a comprehensive plan didn’t result regarding which companies would be audited in which years.

The council next unanimously approved posting a speed limit on Trabuco Circle, following staff and Planning Commission recommendations.

Councilman John Paul Ledesma proposed the support for Orange County 2006 Measure A. The ballot measure prohibits the exercise of eminent domain for private purpose when the intent of the acquisition is to convey the property so acquired to any private party. MacLean commented, saying the council’s support wasn’t necessary. He said, “This is an exercise in political grandstanding, which is distasteful for me personally.” Others were perhaps ignoring the irony of his remark about grandstanding when they voted unanimously to support the county’s ballot measure.