Foothills Sentry - October 2022

NEWS INSIDE East Orange • Old Towne Orange • Orange Park Acres • Villa Park • Silverado/Modjeska Canyons • North Tustin A Monthly Community Newspaper October 2022 *********ECRWSSEDDM**** Residential Customer Letters To The Editor Page 6 Canyon Beat Page 15 Service Directory Pages 17-19 Prof. Directory Page 19 Classifieds Page 19 Real Estate Page 20 Community Sports Page 23 The Best News In Town Since 1969 FEW CURBS FOR CARS Orange lowers application fee for neighborhood permit parking. See Orange parking, page 5 FOLLOW US at Foothills Sentry VOTERS TAKE NOTE Candidates for local government introduce themselves. See Orange mayor, page 5; Villa Park council, page 8; Orange council, pages 10, 11, 13 NO DOUGH FOR NO SHOW School board member seeks meeting attendance stipend for meeting he didn’t attend. See OUSD, page 2 THICKER THAN WATER Inspired by a cousin’s bout with leukemia, high school senior coordinates a blood drive to help cancer patients. See Student, page 16 HEALTHY, WEALTHY AND PIES The Orange Farmer’s Market foundation assembled a cookbook rich with fresh food recipes and local flavor. See Home Grown, page 12 See "Grijalva" continued on page 4 The Orange International Street Fair, held over Labor Day weekend, was plagued by tem- peratures hovering around 105 degrees. Fairgoers sought relief however they could, center. At left, Ernie Blue donned booties to protect his feet from the hot asphalt. At right, Hudson and Parker Reyes kept cool with large slushees from a food booth. Orange to seek grants for Grijalva Park expansion projects Orange council recognizes potential of Sully-Miller site as recreation/open space By Tina Richards The Orange City Council spent the last segment of its Sept. 13 meeting backing away from any suggestion that a bond be floated in order to buy the landfill prop- erty in East Orange and preserve it as open space. The city has, until recently, ignored the acreage, allowing property owner Milan Capital to dump construction waste on the site and create 40-ft.-tall mounds of debris. No permits were issued for the activity, and no records kept to chronicle what was being stockpiled. Citizen complaints to the city went unheeded for years. A disgruntled resident finally got some traction when she reported the site to the Local Enforcement Agency, part of the Orange County Health Department and an arm of CalRecycle. The agency inspected the site, declared it an illegal landfill, and issued a cease and desist order. Months of legal wrangling between LEA and Milan en- sued while the city remained si- lent. Earlier this year, the parties reached an agreement wherein Milan would test portions of the site and, if contaminants were found, clean it up. That agree- ment was appealed by the site’s neighbors, who argued that the entire property should be tested, not just a portion of it. Hidden in plain sight The city acknowledged the East Orange eyesore in July when the council was given an update on what’s commonly known as the Sully-Miller property. It was then They’re back The Irvine Company (TIC) notified residents of Santiago Hills that it intends to build 1,180 houses on 396 acres at the intersection of Santiago Canyon Road and Jamboree. The project will cover the north side of Santiago Canyon Road to Irvine Regional Park and the 241. On the south, it will stretch from the Jamboree/Santiago Canyon intersection the length of Peters Canyon Regional Park to the 261. The development was approved by the City of Orange in 2016. The city had, in 2005, approved a 4,100-unit project that would have encompassed 1,400 acres stretching to Irvine Lake. The Irvine Company later reduced the scale of that development. TIC says it will provide public trails, bike lanes, landscaped medians, and an additional lane on both sides of Santiago Canyon Road. No start date was announced. Meanwhile, residents are asked to flex their power to avoid overtaxing the electric grid and reduce water usage to compensate for severe drought conditions. See "OC Council" continued on page 4 that the council realized the best use of the 70-plus acres of con- struction waste was open space. The idea that the city should buy it was introduced seemingly out of the blue, as was the possibility By Tina Richards The Orange City Council agreed to explore state, federal and other grant funding to aid the development of four new ven- ues proposed to expand Grijalva Park. The venues, including a senior center, library, community theater and skatepark, were approved in 2019 when the city offered the park land to community groups that agreed to raise funds for con- struction. An aquatics center was originally part of the mix, but that proposal has since been with- drawn. The council was given an update on the status of each proposed facility at its Sept. 13 meeting. It was clear that, despite the fundraising efforts of the venues’ boosters, more monetary help is needed. Far and away Mark Conner, owner of Con- tenders Sports Shop, took the lead on skatepark fundraising, setting aside a portion of his sales for the project. He has, he said, raised $28,000. “I did the math,” he told the council, “at this rate, we won’t have the needed funds for 56 years.” Mike Short, president of the Greater Orange Community Arts Theater Foundation (GOCAT), reported that his group has raised $900,000. They have a matching grant of $100,000 lined up for 2022, and have applied for a $3.5 million grant that could come in next year. GOCAT has completed architectural drawings and artist renderings of the facility. Richard Alacon of the Orange Senior Center and Steve Free- man of the Library Foundation noted that their projects had a lot of synergy. They are prepared to pool their resources to create a multi-generational facility that would provide experiential areas, outdoor facilities, multiple meet- ing rooms and hi-tech resources for all ages. Both organizations, Freeman said, are putting in $50,000 each to produce an archi- tectural schematic. Ride on Skatepark supporters have been attending city council meetings for months, extolling the benefits of such a facility and urging the city to build one. Citing the need for “a place where kids can go,” the popularity of the sport, the lack of similar public facilities nearby, and revenue brought into the city by out-of-town boarders coming to Orange, skating enthu- siasts got the council’s attention. Councilman Chip Monaco had declared his support for a skatepark at a previous council meeting and, following Conner’s presentation on the park’s fundraising status, suggested the city dive into it sooner rather than later. He recommended breaking the expansion projects into pieces in order to “get action on something.” The skatepark, he noted, costing $850,000 to $1 million, would likely be the least expensive project and might be “more ready” than the others. When inquiring about any en- vironmental studies that would be needed to get started on a project, he was told that much of the work had already been done, and that it might need only an ad- dendum. City Planner Chad Ort- lieb stressed, however, that until final plans are done, staff won’t know what, if anything, needs to be changed; and, federal grant money might require an environ- mental document. A starting point “Conceivably,” Monaco ad- vised, “maybe nothing needs to be done for the skatepark. Not that a skatepark is more impor- tant than the other projects,” he added, “but let’s look at what is most likely today. I want to do more than talk about it. We have Photos by Tony Richards