Page 5 Foothills Sentry SEPTEMBER 2025 Registration OpensMay2 New Students: Apply Online sccollege.edu/apply Returning Students: Register Online sccollege.edu/register ATSCC FALL ENROLLMENT FALL 2025 FLAG FOOT SEASON STARTS SEPTE R! For ages 7–14 | Hosted at SCC REGISTER TODAY: www.ferragamoffl.com or call 714-628-4960 Give your child more than just game time Player Sponsorships Available Late-Start Classes Still Available! TBALL EMBER ve y h ICE cold comfort Dear Editor: These comments were made at the Aug. 12 Orange City Council meeting: I am here tonight as a proud product of immigrants, a lifelong resident of Orange and an American citizen. Your silence in the face of the recent ICE raids is not neutrality, it is complicity. You use the excuse of “that’s a federal issue,” but this isn’t about your jurisdiction. This is about your humanity. This is about your refusal to condemn the acts of racial profiling and masked kidnappings that are taking place in our neighborhoods. You can comply with federal law while still saying out loud that racism, racial profiling and fear-based targeting have absolutely no place in the City of Orange. These raids aren’t just “targeting criminals,” they are tearing apart families. They are leaving children without parents, workplaces without employees and communities in fear. Whether you like it or not, the products of immigrants, people like me, are your constituents. We are voters. We are taxpayers. And you work for us. Protect us. Speak up for us. Condemn what is wrong. That’s not politics, that’s leadership. Keep dodging the uncomfortable conversations, but deep down, you know you’ve been comfortable while others have been living in fear. Go ahead, hide behind your talking points, but the people you’re too afraid to defend will remember that you stood by and watched. The question is: will you keep choosing your own comfort, or will you finally choose courage? To every family and individual who’s been told they don’t belong, yet refuses to disappear, refuses to be erased, you are the inspiration. Every ounce of courage it takes to stand here, to face this council, comes from you. From growing up surrounded by hard-working immigrants who taught us what resilience, sacrifice and dignity look like. Cynthia Gonzalez Orange Blame game Dear Editor: At the Aug. 12 meeting, the Orange City Council laid the blame for the city’s financial predicament at the feet of the Design Review Committee (DRC) and used falsehoods and misinformation to justify it. Three projects were cited as examples of the DRC “taking too long to process applications,” and the reason to “rein in the scope of the DRC.” An industrial truck terminal on Struck Avenue, a dental office on W. Chapman, and a fast food restaurant on S. Main. All three projects had significant unresolved design issues before being seen by the DRC. Reaching back nearly 10 years to cherry-pick these three complicated projects as evidence of “handcuffing businesses” while ignoring literally hundreds of projects that were efficiently approved by the DRC, is both disingenuous and a misrepresentation of the record. Regarding the truck transfer terminal: “there is absolutely no reason the DRC should hang up a project in the industrial zone for years … for one tree.” Stop repeating this fiction and get the facts straight; the DRC did not spend “years” on “one tree!” That project had more than eight months of staff reviews before coming to the DRC with woefully inadequate landscaping. The Orange Municipal Code required 125 trees for the project, but the applicant proposed only 30. That’s not “one tree,” it’s a deficiency of 95 trees. Ninetyf ive! A fatally flawed dental office, designed by an electrical engineer with no architectural training, submitted an inaccurate and incomplete proposal with so many defects the committee doubted it could actually be built. A fast food restaurant was stuck in the planning department for years because the site was on a corner designated as a gateway to the medical corridor on S. Main. The General Plan called for an architecturally significant project, not a drive- thru. The problem these examples illustrate isn’t of the DRC “taking too long.” The problem is that projects struggling to meet city requirements are not ready for DRC review. Solving difficult design problems is not “handcuffing” businesses, but rather working to bring quality projects that meet the city’s development standards into Orange. The DRC's purview is design: the quality and integrity of the architecture, the landscaping, the consistency and compatibility with the neighborhood. Developers and businesses hire their own teams of professionals to promote their projects. The citizens of Orange depend on the DRC. Anne McDermott, DRC member Orange Hold on Dear Editor: As a member of Orange Unified’s 7-11 Land Surplus Committee, I am pleased the committee has paused in its deliberation about surplusing land at La Veta Elementary School until the Consolidation Committee submits revised recommendations. I also want to thank new OUSD Superintendent Dr. Rachel Monárrez for attending our recent meeting and listening to community concerns. Declaring this property surplus now would be premature and potentially harmful. The initial consolidation proposals would increase enrollment at La Veta, so reducing the campus footprint could limit opportunities for students. The touted $30 million sale price is far from guaranteed, especially given rezoning hurdles, and selling would permanently eliminate valuable open space. Instead of selling, I recommend OUSD explore partnerships to lease the land for youth sports, working with AYSO/OJSC, or even the CIF-Southern Section to host championship events. Partnering with the City of Orange to create a public park could also bring in grant funding while enhancing recreational opportunities. These options would benefit students, the district, and the surrounding neighborhood, while preserving long-term flexibility for future educational needs. The right move is to pause, explore these partnerships, and keep this irreplaceable asset working for our community— not give it away for a short-term windfall. Eugene Fields Orange Smoke signals Dear Editor: It is about time cities start standing up to all types of smoke/ vape shops, and I give continuous applause to Orange! We all know the harm smoking/vaping does to our health: body organs become toxic, stop functioning properly, then cause other body parts to fail. Health insurance rises due to poor health, and people die. Making money cannot be the prime objective of the USA’s foundation anymore. We must look out for our citizens and protect them from harmful substances. So, I applaud Orange for starting a process, which, I hope, will continue, until all cities in Orange County no longer have any type of smoke/vape shops, stores or markets where these perilous substances are available. Go Orange! Carolyn Brothers Tustin Medicaid Turns 60! By Supervisor Vicente Sarmiento, 2nd District This July, Medicaid reached its 60-year milestone. Created in 1965 as part of President Lyndon Johnson’s “Great Society” reforms, Medicaid serves over 85 million Americans – including more than 15 million Californians, or one in three residents. On July 30, I joined with local healthcare leaders, including Isabel Becerra, CEO of the Coalition of Orange County Community Health Centers, at a press conference where we celebrated this important milestone, but also sought to shed light on the threats that this critical safety net is facing from legislation that provided tax cuts to the wealthy at the expense of healthcare coverage. Medicaid has transformed lives and strengthened the health and dignity of our most vulnerable communities. It impacts more than just insurance for individuals, but also impacts our ability to have our hospitals and clinics operate properly to protect access to care and safeguard public health. Protecting Medicaid funding is essential. Any cuts to the system will directly harm millions of families and individuals who rely on it, as early intervention, preventive services, and managed care reduce costly ER visits and hospitalizations down the line. Undermining Medicaid doesn't just risk individual health; it threatens the economic and public health infrastructure of entire communities, especially during times of crisis or recovery. Access to healthcare is a fundamental human right, not something that should be determined by income, immigration status, ZIP code, or employment. Denying people access only worsens public health outcomes. In the United States, the richest nation in the world, no one should be forced to choose between going to the doctor and paying for rent, food, or other essentials. We have the resources; what we need is the will. Supervisor Vicente Sarmiento, second from right, joined OC Health professionals to celebrate Medicaid's 60th anniversary.
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