This last week the vote to push forward on the Great Park was set to take place. I was not initially planning to cover it, but a large number of readers have asked me to weigh in on what took place and to give a brief analysis.

To give a bit of background on the situation, Councilmember Jeff Lalloway voted with Larry Agran and Beth Krom to delay the vote on the Great Park which came as quite a surprise to me and based on the e-mails that I received a large number of readers.

Here is my overall analysis on what this means and what hopefully will happen.

In a year of historic GOP losses, 2012 had a glimmer of hope when Republicans regained majority control of the Irvine City Council. Wresting control from Larry Agran’s majority was the first step in getting the Orange County Great Park on the right track.

After months of negotiation with a development partner, the Irvine City Council had the opportunity last Tuesday to move the Park forward. But, to 688 acres of sports facilities, gardens and wildlife corridor, Republican Councilmember Jeff Lalloway and Democrats Beth Krom and Larry Agran said, “no, not just yet.”

In addition to getting the Orange County Great Park built, the development partner announced that Broadcom was in discussions to move their corporate headquarters to the Great Park, instead of a speculated move to the District in the City of Tustin.

Getting infrastructure at the Great Park, keeping thousands of high-paying, high-tech jobs in Irvine, fulfilling promises to build a world-class destination for Orange County’s enjoyment. Why is Jeff Lalloway stalling? The development deal will expire at the November 26th City Council meeting. With virtually no development fees left to build the Park, this is the last, best and only hope to fulfill the promise of the Orange County Great Park.

Councilmember Lalloway needs to help protect the Republican majority of the Irvine City Council by doing what’s right and advancing development proposals at the Great Park. If he truly wants to protect Irvine’s interests, he will support Mayor Steven Choi and Councilmember Christina Shea in finally moving the Park forward.

In what was a rather interesting meeting yesterday at Irvine City Hall the new Irvine majority City Council continues to make some changes on the administrative side of things. I am quite pleased with the direction that Irvine is heading and am impressed with the fact that the current Irvine City Council majority is trying to cut costs wherever possible. 

Mayor Steven Choi, Mayor Pro-Tem Jeff Lalloway, and Councilwoman Christina Shea have already  (as the OC Great Park Board) decided to eliminate a contract that was in place with Newport-based Forde & Mollrich. According to an article published in the Orange County Register:

Forde & Mollrich had been paid $100,000 a month until it was reduced to half that, or up to $600,000 a year. In the contract, the firm also was allowed to be called on for up to $300,000 worth of miscellaneous services a year, according to Lalloway’s memo.

At the recent March 21st City Council meeting the decision was made on a 3-2 vote to terminate the contract with City Attorney Rutan & Tucker. This would obviously create a vacancy that needs to be filled. This brings me to the meeting last night and at the meeting last night Irvine had a couple of interesting items on the agenda including item 2.1 which was in the agenda as follows:

2.1 APPOINTMENT  OF INTERIM CITY ATTORNEY

ACTION

1) Authorize the Mayor to execute the agreement attached to  the staff report with the law firm, Jones & Mayer, LLP to serve as  Interim City Attorney.

2) Direct the City Manager to prepare and distribute a  request for proposals for city attorney services so that the Mayor and City  Council may subsequently consider the resulting proposals when selecting a  law firm to provide permanent city attorney services.

3) Authorize the City Manager or his designee to compensate  Rutan & Tucker for work performed by the firm to complete existing work  assignments and enable the transition of assignments to be performed by the  successor attorney(s).

If for whatever reason you are a glutton for punishment and want to read the entire report on this item you can click here. The report is in all honesty pretty important to understand if you want to follow the issue closely.

The other item that I found interesting was expansion of the infamous iShuttle that travels throughout Irvine. This was item 5.1 on the agenda and read as follows:

5.1RECONSIDERATION  OF EXPANDED iSHUTTLE SERVICES

ACTION:
City Council discussion and direction.

I recognize that this description is useless so I have also included the staff report on that item here as well.

The meeting was not on my radar to begin with until I read about it taking place on Facebook. After watching some highlights of the Council meeting on video this morning I was able to get to some of the highlights in order to give brief and somewhat incomplete synopsis of the actions taken last night and a couple of other observations. At the beginning of the meeting it was discussed that the interim law firm in place will be charging fees at a rate that matches that of the previous law firm with the exception of paralegal fees which will be decreased.

The actual vote on approving the new interim law firm was 4-1 which surprised since Agran voted with the majority to go this way, and as you may have guessed Krom was the lone dissenting vote on this. Jeff Lalloway made it very clear that this contract would be put out to bid, which is always good to hear in the name of transparency and open government.

For some reason which I did not catch Beth Krom left the meeting early and was not around for the end of the meeting discussion on the iShuttle expansion. After reading the staff report it was obvious that Agran was the one pushing this item. Agran initially made the motion to move the item and ironically without Krom he had nobody to second his motion. After watching this meeting it is clear that Councilman Larry Agran & Councilwoman Beth Krom do not like being in the minority, Agran did come around on item 2.1 though to appoint the interim city attorney.

Kudos to Allan Bartlett and Anthony Kuo for live tweeting the Irvine City Council meeting last night and allowing me to follow the juicy details.

In news that should come as no surprise to anyone the Irvine City Council passed 3 reform items at their meeting last night:

Item 3.2 was an amendment to the “Orange County Great Park Corporation Articles of Incorporation” which was detailed in the following way

1) Adopt the Certificate of Amendment of Articles of Incorporation attached to the memorandum dated December 31, 2012 establishing the composition of the Orange County Great Park Board of Directors to be five directors, who shall be the persons serving as the duly elected or appointed members of the Irvine City Council.

2) Reiterate that the personnel of the Orange County Great Park Corporation are employees of the City and, consistent with previously adopted City Council resolutions and a voter-approved initiative (“Measure R,” effective 2008-2012), shall operate under the general supervision of the City Manager.

3) Direct the City Manager and City Attorney to prepare documents effectuating a change of meeting times and days of regularly scheduled meetings of the Orange County Great Park Board of Directors, as recommended in the memorandum dated December 31, 2012, for the Board of Directors’ approval at the earliest possible date.

4) Direct the City Manager to direct Orange County Great Park Corporation President/CEO Ellzey to immediately schedule a special meeting of the Orange County Great Park Board of Directors at 10:00 a.m. on January 10, 2013 in the City Council Chambers for the purposes of 1) removing the Chair and Vice Chair of the Board and electing a new Chair and Vice Chair; and 2) adjusting meeting times and days for all future regular meetings of the Orange County Great Park Board of Directors.

In simplified terms this agenda item would remove the members of the Orange County Great Park Board of Directors that are not on the Irvine City Council.

Item 3.3 was agendized to immediately terminate the consulting contract with Forde & Mollrich as well as Townsend Public Affairs. This item was fairly straight forward in the way it was worded.

Immediately terminate all existing contracts with Forde & Mollrich and with Townsend Public Affairs, Inc. in accordance with the termination clauses included in the respective agreements.

Item 3.4 was the item meant to conduct an audit of all Orange County Great Park contracts in excess of $50,000. The item was laid out very clearly and is meant to uncover at least a little bit of waste I would assume.

1) Direct staff to solicit proposals for the performance of a comprehensive contract compliance/forensic audit of Orange County Great Park contracts in excess of $50,000, including any and all work efforts associated with the Orange County Great Park.

2) Appropriate $250,000 from the Orange County Great Park reserves (Fund 180 fund balance).

3) Appoint a two-member City Council subcommittee (and City staff) to work with the auditor to receive periodic updates of findings, and bring information to the full City Council.

In a meeting that was very contentious and dragged out into the early hours of the morning it became apparent that the new Republican majority is on the same page about reform. All 3 agenda items passed with Larry Agran & Beth Krom being the lone dissenting voted on items 3.2/3.3. Item 3.4 passed on a 5-0 vote which doesn’t surprise me based on the political ramifications that a no vote would mean.

One comment that struck me was when Agran pointed to the City of Tustin and the Tustin Marine Corps Air Station as an example of a development that has not moved. I often find myself traveling down to The District for a shopping trip to Whole Foods or to eat at Ra Sushi. Unless I am mistaken The District is part of the Tustin Marine Corps Air Station site.