Sunrise Backs Off Housing Plan
Staff editorial

Has Sunrise Senior Living thrown in the towel? On Fri., Aug. 15, the city received word from Sunrise spokesman Wayne Sant announcing the withdrawal of plans to build an assisted-living facility on the Casta del Sol Golf Course. The question remains if Sunrise is giving up entirely or waiting for a more opportune time to try again.

Two councilmen, Frank Ury and Lance MacLean, have indicated during council meetings that they favor the developer’s plan to build. With Ury up for reelection, Sunrise might lose one of its key supporters if voters remove him from office in November. Councilwoman Trish Kelley publicly claims she likes the golf course, but she has sided with developers 100 percent of the time on rezoning issues. Sunrise needs three council votes to get the property rezoned to high-density residential in order to build its assisted-living project. Activists say the developer wouldn’t have hung in there for the past year without the support of three council members.

The Sunrise spokesman cited slow growth in housing as one reason to scrap plans. As another issue, the OC Register on Aug. 21 broke the story of a new lawsuit alleging inadequate care in a Sunrise facility, Villa Valencia in Laguna Hills. In May 2008, Sunrise was ordered to pay $2 million following the 2007 death of a patient in Villa Valencia. The new lawsuit alleges inadequate care of another patient who died.

In its decision not to pursue housing on the golf course, Sunrise also mentioned community activist Dale Tyler’s Aug. 8 launch of the Mission Viejo Right-To-Vote Initiative. If passed by voters, the initiative would require a popular vote on any major zone change. While Sunrise might be able to persuade three council members to rezone the golf course to high-density housing, persuading a majority of Mission Viejo’s registered voters would be more difficult and costly. Those gathering signatures to put the initiative on the ballot are finding strong opposition throughout the community to housing on the golf course.

Proponents of the initiative say the departure of Sunrise hasn’t changed anything because the golf course is still for sale. As one resident posted on another city blog, there will be another Sunrise. Additionally, numerous other parcels around town are targets for high-density housing. As residents have signed the petition, they say they’re supporting the initiative because the city is built out and getting overcrowded.

Easelgate Update
Editorial staff

Community activist Lisa De Paul-Snyder received notice the city will need more time to provide the public records she requested on Aug. 8. No surprise there, as the city took nearly six weeks to find 59 pages in response to her first request for information about easels trashed on a hillside in April.

While interested parties are waiting for city hall to find its own records, other city activities have come under scrutiny. A resident on July 27 reported to blog staffers that truckloads of dirt, asphalt, sand and debris were being dumped in Lower Curtis Park. Because the city staff engaged in a stealth grading project in 2003 and spent $200,000 without the council’s approval, activists and those who live near the park have been watching Lower Curtis for several weeks.

On Aug. 22, a resident prepared two complaints, and an activist sent a copy to this blog. One complaint was filed with U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, and the other went to the California Dept. of Fish and Game. Following are specifics of the complaints.

“From July 27 to Aug. 15, the city of Mission Viejo (Mission Viejo city employees and city contractors) dumped tons of broken concrete, asphalt, sand, dirt and debris in Lower Curtis Park near the Arroyo Trabuco at the eastern edge of Mission Viejo, CA. The site is in Lower Curtis Park, near the intersection of Olympiad Road and La Paz Road. I am among residents who saw hundreds of truckloads of material, and I photographed the area to document what took place. Saddleback Valley News ran an interview with City Projects Manager, Mark Chagnon on Aug. 15. Chagnon acknowledged the city had directed contractors to haul material to the site to dump it. According to Chagnon, the dumping will continue for at least four more months. He went on to state that the materials dumped could be picked up and removed by contractors needing fill dirt or at some point in the future, the area would be graded, if the city opted to develop the site. After the story, with a photo, came out in the Saddleback Valley News, the area was immediately graded. Lower Curtis Park is zoned as recreation/open space, and it is an environmentally sensitive area. It has been designated as California Gnatcatcher Habitat and a Wildlife Corridor and Breeding Habitat with Coastal Sage Scrub. Vehicle access is limited to the city and city contractors, and a locked gate is the only point of entry for vehicles.

“It is doubtful the city has communicated with any of the appropriate agencies, contributed to any funds or requested permits to grade or otherwise disturb and destroy protected habitats (Coastal Sage Scrub and riparian). Please see photographs enclosed showing the mounds of materials hauled in as of August 6, 2008, and the area on August 17, 2008, after it was graded. This is the second time that materials have been surreptitiously hauled into this site and subsequently graded, after discovery by residents.

“A second site where the city is dumping in an environmentally sensitive area alongside Oso Creek (within two miles of Lower Curtis Park) has recently been discovered. The area is city property designated as open space adjacent to the water treatment facility off La Paz Road (one block east of Marguerite Parkway), which can be viewed from the road behind the Michaels store in the retail center on the southeast corner of La Paz and Marguerite. The area immediately east of Oso Creek is used as a secured city yard, and only city, city contractor and water department vehicles have access to the yard. The open space where the dumping is taking place abuts Oso Creek. The site is occupied Gnatcatcher Habitat, and the hillside is covered with Coastal Sage Scrub. Photography is included.

“If any other information is needed to investigate this complaint, please advise me. Additional photographs are available.”

Change the Council, Not the City
by Lisa De Paul-Snyder

While gathering signatures on the Mission Viejo Right-To-Vote Initiative, I’m getting an earful from residents. They say the current council is untrustworthy and incompetent. It’s not just about their harmful rezoning decisions, it’s cell towers near homes, increasing traffic congestion, road-widening that takes years, lawsuits and threats of putting apartments on top of stores.

In direct contradiction to the fiscal conservative assertions of their campaign days, these council members refuse to rein in wasteful spending by the city. Despite conducting an expensive PR charade of Character Words, the council tolerates and even promotes out-and-out lies, such as the “vandalism” of 93 easels and reason for the dumping at Lower Curtis Park on top of what was a $200,000.00 grading project by Granich Construction back in 2002. Instead of “Make living your mission” their slogan has become “Make spinning your mission.”

City hall has decided to “re-brand” the city with multistory housing development in open spaces and omnipresent depictions of the “mark of the iron tree” instead of real trees. By the time they’re done, Beautiful Mission Viejo will no longer exist.

Like many residents, I want city hall to gather up their re-branding slogans, non-recyclable banners, overbearing tree stamp and miscellaneous community engagement fiascos and take a hike. Sure, a few areas could benefit from a little facade updating, but the original land-use plan remains family-friendly and sound.

We don’t need to change the city, but changing the city council is long overdue.

CUSD Update, Aug. 22
Editorial staff

Last week’s update included a report from the Aug. 11 board meeting on the “Pipeline Risk Analysis” at San Juan Hills High School. This week’s update was written by a CUSD parent who is closely following this issue. Another parent, Jim Reardon, who discovered the location of a high-pressure jet-fuel pipeline near the campus, questions the school’s safety.

Carter is behaving as though he is actually following the Board's instruction in waiting for the Board to review and vote to approve sending the Pipeline Risk Analysis to the California Dept. of Education (CDE) for approval. However, as the post from Jim Reardon's blog indicates (included below), Carter's own email confirms that he has already submitted it to the CDE for approval - in direct insubordination of the Board's instruction to him.

In the meantime, if you visit the blog, Jim has posted input from a petroleum pipeline expert who found several serious flaws in the Pipeline Risk Analysis that Carter commissioned. The input and questions Jim has received from several different experts about the accuracy of the Pipeline Risk Analysis are, by the way, the reason the Trustees wanted more time to review it.

In true educrat form, however, Carter went behind the backs of the trustees in an effort to ram this flawed "risk analysis" through the CDE without serious and thoughtful discussion or consideration of the safety issues. It seems he is continuing to do exactly what got CUSD into such trouble with the SJHHS school site to begin with – trying to rubberstamp questionable and downright unsafe conditions at that $155M site. It begs the question, why is he even placing it on the agenda for discussion and/or approval, when he's already gone around the trustees to submit it to the CDE? 

Carter's actions come as no surprise to me. In my opinion, Carter has already shown his true colors by trying to grab an extra $410,000 for himself by illegally inserting a severance clause into his contract without the Board's knowledge or approval while laying off hundreds of teachers and employees. To add insult to injury, he then publicly lied about his contract - repeatedly, as demonstrated in his own memos in which he contradicts himself. Meanwhile, CUSD continues to hover on the brink of bankruptcy.

Then there's the issue of the SJHHS site being in violation of the law in several areas, issues of which Carter is aware but on which he has taken no action. You can expect to see these issues surfacing, now that we have the documentation (which we have spent the past three to four months collecting through Open Public Records Act requests).

Here's the post about the risk analysis. The report from the pipeline expert(s) that reveals flaws in the pipeline risk analysis is also posted on Jim's blog.

Follow the link, Wednesday, August 13, 2008: Orchestrated Chaos and Broken Commitment

There is considerable speculation that CUSD staff may have submitted the new pipeline safety analysis to the California Department of Education (CDE) before it was approved by the CUSD Board. A document has come my way that appears to confirm this.

This e-mail thread  also provides insight into thinking of CUSD staff regarding safety. In fact, I see no mention of it.

http://cusd.googlegroups.com/web/20080814+Email+Thread.pdf

The document further supports that fact that Dr. Fitzgerald's appearance at the Aug. 11 Board meeting was unexpected. "She will be out of town tomorrow through the weekend to attend [redacted] services and wasn't planning on returning Monday unless we specifically need her to attend the meeting. While she has graciously offered to attend, I think it would be unreasonable to ask her to cut short a family trip of this nature. We would have to let her know today if we need her there."

How easily something so innocent becomes so political in the absence of an explanation from those involved!

Notice, if you will, that Dr. Fitzgerald's response to Trustees, dated July 31, was not actually sent to Trustees until Aug. 6. Why would staff delay delivering this information to Trustees?

Lastly, a critical piece of information has not surfaced:

"Also, Greg is preparing a memo for you regarding liability questions which were raised previously."

Where is this memo?

If it was provided to trustees in closed session, it may be a Brown Act violation. If not, I would call on CUSD to publish this memo on their Website alongside the analysis.

I recall that Mr. Carter and Mr. Bergman promised that this entire subject would be handled "transparently," and in "public session." What happened to this commitment?

The Buzz

Reader reaction upon seeing truckloads of material dumped in Lower Curtis Park: “What are they building? This is not any ordinary storage project for fill dirt. After the city tried (unsuccessfully) to flatten the mounds by grading, I noticed bike riders discovered Mission Viejo’s newest BMX obstacle course. The city should just tell everyone what they’re doing instead of trying to keep something that big a secret.”

***

Residents who read the city manager’s explanation of activity in Lower Curtis Park said it was nonsense. He claimed the mounds of dirt were coming from the Crown Valley Parkway widening project. Residents continue to report that no excavation is taking place on the project. Drivers on Crown Valley have said they see little progress, and they rarely see anyone working on the road. After three years to widen a road and no end in sight, it’s not a project, it’s a career for those involved in it.

***

With the city paying a contractor, Jamey Clark, $9,800.49 a month to inspect its parks and other public property, is he not obligated to report vandalism to the police? As a curious practice, Clark gets paid to remove graffiti and make repairs, but the addresses of alleged crime scenes don’t show up on the OC Sheriff Dept.’s blotter. As two possibilities, he could either be aiding city hall in underreporting crime in “The Safest City in the Universe” or padding his invoices by billing for nonexistent problems. For $9,800.49 a month, he should also notice if truckloads of material have been illegally dumped in Lower Curtis Park by unknown culprits, as a city employee claimed in the Aug. 15 Saddleback Valley News.

***

A hot topic of conversation this week in Casta del Sol was Sunrise dropping plans to build housing on the golf course. Residents were asking if Sunrise’s PR guy, Roger Faubel, conducted a poll and found overwhelming opposition to the project. As another polling question, Faubel should have asked if anyone who opposes housing on the golf course is voting for Councilman Frank Ury in his bid for reelection. When Casta del Sol, Finisterra on the Green and Cypress Point residents vote on Nov. 4, they should remember that Ury chose to support Sunrise instead of representing the residents.

***

What was the rush among some council members to discuss selling off the city’s cell-tower leases at a loss? A resident who made public comments at the Aug. 19 council meeting said the city was contemplating a “fire sale” of contracts that bring in approximately half a million dollars a year in revenue to the city. The only person clearly benefiting from the sale, Tony Ingegneri of ATS, would get a commission for selling the leases. He was proposing that he and city staffers should make the decision about which leases should be sold. If this doesn’t make sense so far, consider that Ingegneri and Councilman Frank Ury appear to be working together, and Ury could use a boost to his campaign treasury. If the underlying purpose of the proposed sale was not to enrich Ingegneri at the city’s expense, it defies explanation.