The Buzz

The city staff’s budget for bringing a farmers market to Mission Viejo was supposed to be no more than $500 TOTAL. City Hall has either set a record for stretching dollars or it exceeded the limit long ago. Ongoing expenditures include full-page newspaper ads, live music, taxpayer-funded giveaways (e.g., reusable shopping bags), staff time to coordinate, promote, oversee, etc. An unknown factor is whether or not the city gets paid for use of the parking lot by a commercial enterprise. Instead of gradually withdrawing taxpayer support, City Hall has increased subsidies, particularly for promotion.

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City Hall proves with each endeavor that it cannot accurately predict costs, describe the scope of work, keep a project within budget or complete it on schedule. The latest large-scale fiasco is the tennis resort remodel at Marguerite Parkway and Casta Drive. Issues have been reported on the Mission Viejo Dispatch, including the latest setback – the budget as presented to the public didn’t include major landscaping costs: http://missionviejodispatch.com/budget/letter-omitted-landscape-shocks-tennis-budget/ From the beginning, concerned citizens questioned the need for such extensive and costly work. Tennis players asked only for one additional court, and the project mushroomed over the “need” for more parking. It is true the outcome will eliminate parking spaces instead of adding them?

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Look at the desperate effort of council majority members to transfer $5 million from the redevelopment account into a new agency, the Mission Viejo Housing Authority. When the state demanded that cities hand over their redevelopment funds, it didn’t mean transfer the money into another account. If the council majority was attempting to hide money from the state, it didn’t do a very good job. The state is broke, and it is not going to overlook $5 million the city confiscated.

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When the council majority approved Watermarke’s high-density apartment project on Oso, it involved deal-making whereby Watermarke received $5 million in city redevelopment dollars. Given the impact of the project – increased traffic and overcrowding, plus city services for new residents – the developer should have received no taxpayer incentive. Then, Watermarke is to pay City Hall $5 million in developer fees. If the $5 million the city is giving to Watermarke is the $5 million that belongs to the state, how long can the shell game continue?

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The city is not awash in cash nor does it have millions to spend on discretionary projects. Nearly all of the $20 million reported as “reserves” is already obligated for such things as payroll, police and other services. This sheds light on why such costs as the tennis resort landscaping are not accurately presented and why the city hasn’t paid the state its redevelopment money.

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Is the party over for the Tea Party? The OC Register sent a photographer to cover Mission Viejo’s April 16 event, and the article referred to the crowd as “small but enthusiastic.” The dramatic decrease in turnout actually occurred the year before, and that’s the way it is nationwide. The primary reason is the current lack of a national figure or conservative talk-show host driving the public to attend Tea Party rallies. The measure of importance will be turnout in the November election. In the most recent election in Mission Viejo, November 2010, the voter turnout was 61.44 percent. As an appropriate measure of comparison – the last non-presidential General Election of 2006 – Mission Viejo’s turnout was 54.6 percent. The improvement is stunning.