Filling the Vacancy; Yes or No?

The recent passing of Dr. Peter Gardiner has left a seat unfilled with the Rancho Palos Verdes City Council.

Dr. Gardiner had been ill for some time and was forced to be away from the Council all this year and at some meetings last year.

Dr. Gardiner's seat and the seat now held by Mayor Larry Clark are the subject of a regular election to fill those two seats for a four-year term.

Currently there are six gentlemen who have taken out nominating papers and are expected to become qualified candidates for the two seats.

The clock has started on the options the current City Council members may wish to utilize to temporarily fill the seat or leave it unfilled until one of the two highest vote-getter's sits in his new seat at the first City Council meeting in December.

The City Council must either appoint someone to temporarily take the vacant seat until early December, or it can decide, using current laws, that the seat can remain vacant until early December.

What allows those options is the fact that even though a special election would normally be required to fill the seat, if no one was appointed to it, there is a section of the law that states if a regular election falls within 114 days between the time the clock starts and the end of that time, no special election would be necessary and a winner from the November 3 election will take the seat in December.

Even though I am not happy at all with the TOT Rebate and I feel strongly that it is going to bite our city, I accept the concept that the three C.C. members who worked on it and voted for it, did their best.

I also believe that during Dr. Gardiner's extended absence before he passed, the four sitting Council members did more than an adequate job governing our city during some very hard times.

I do not feel they need to appoint anyone to temporarily fill the seat.

But they do have the option of appointing someone to fill the seat for just a few months.

If the members like that option, I would need to strongly urge them not to appoint any one of the six gentlemen who have taken out nominating papers and would become qualified to be candidates for the two seats at the election.

If one of those six remained a candidate for a seat and the majority of voting Council members appointed that person, it would clearly demonstrate a bias towards that person and against the other candidates. It could also mean that if one of the candidates were appointed to fill the seat temporarily, that person would have an unfair advantage over the others because of the implied support by current City Council members.

I'm still not ready to endorse any of the six candidates, but I would hope that if the City Council decides to appoint someone, none of the six would apply for possible appointment.

If any of them did, that should trigger in others a clear sign that they should not be supported for regular election to either of the two seats in this November's election.

The City Council members do have a unique opportunity should they choose to utilize it, to honor a citizen of Rancho Palos Verdes by appointing him or her to temporarily sit in the seat left vacant with the passing of Dr. Gardiner.

There are former Mayors, City Council members, former Committee and Commission leaders, and others that could do a fine job, even though it would be for a short period of time.

I hope the current candidates standing up for possible election to the two seats available, will offer their opinions on this matter.

This is one way we can all learn their positions on matters that are unique like this and how they might deal with issues like these if they were sitting on the Council.

I don't feel there is a need to fill the vacancy and it would be legal not to.

But if the C.C. members wish to appoint someone, it should be as an honor and sign of gratitude to the appointee for the services they provided to our city in the past and continue to be willing to provide, today.

And NO! I wouldn't consider myself having anywhere near the minimum it takes to be a Councilperson. But I sure know some great members of our city that would serve all of us quite well.

City Council Election Cycle is Rolling Along

On November 3, 2009, eligible voters living in the city of Rancho Palos Verdes will vote to elect two new members to our city's Council.

Current Mayor Larry Clark and Councilman Dr. Peter Gardiner will leave the seats they have honored and two new behinds will occupy them.

Here is the current list of probable candidates, in the order listed on the city's Web site, with their Email address under their names.

(The period for filing for the election will end on August 7 and more candidates may be added. I will post their names and Email addresses as they are added)

Jim Knight

JimKnight@palosverdes.com

Anthony Misetich

mizie@cox.net

John C. McTaggart

mrrpv@palosverdes.com

Jeff Lewis

JeffLewis@palosverdes.com

Paul Tetreault

paul.rpv@gmail.com

Brian Campbell

brian@CampbellForRPV.com

Nomination papers for the 6 have been issued but none of them have been deemed "Qualified Candidate" at this point in time.

Here is a list of words I feel the candidates should offer their opinions about before the election is held:

Ponte Vista

Traffic Signal at Miraleste and P.V.D.E.

Traffic Signal at Forrestal and P.V.D.S.

Voter apathy in Eastview

Terranea

Trump National

Storm Drain Levy

Full Eastview inclusion into P.V.P.U.S.D.

Marymount College Facilities Redevelopment

Restoring the shared Deputy position.

Securing more funding for the constant repair of P.V.D.S. in the slide area

Remaining Storm Drains under Western that haven't failed.....yet

Traffic in the Eastview area

Added traffic in the East Rancho Palos Verdes area

R.P.V.'s business concentration along Western Avenue

Restoring lost seats on Commissions and Committees

Finding ways to have more residents of the Eastview area care about and work with the city of R.P.V.

Our dismal turnout at for City Council elections

There are a small number of unique cities in Southern California and Rancho Palos Verdes is the most unique among those cities.

I will offer more on a future post dealing with how we are so very different and the challenges put upon us and our environment because of who we are and where we live.

It is almost certain that two of the names appearing on this post will appear as Council Members soon after November 3.

It is certain that the next City Council Election, just two years from now, will have three available seats to fill and we may seem names typed above, as names of candidates for those seats.

We may see more candidates for this election cycle. It is probably that not all of the six named above will appear on the November 3 ballot.

Mr. Campbell followed Mr. Lewis in creating a Web site. The sites I know about at this time should be viewable on the links icons

I will post links to other candidates' Web sites if and when they are published.

Look folks, there are over 2,000 residential units in the Eastview area of Rancho Palos Verdes. We have the greatest concentration of our city's businesses located in the Eastview area.

During the last two City Council election cycles, we had about 11% of our eligible voters willing to vote for candidates at each election.

We provide so much into our city, yet too many of us are apathetic to our own government and issues.

Shame on us in Eastview.

I am not going to even consider that we not keep our hearts towards San Pedro. We are an old "San Pedro" area and have not been legally part of Rancho Palos Verdes for as long as that city has been incorporated.

But when we and our wonderful San Pedro neighbors spend money along Western at The Terraces, Think Prime, Smart and Final, Marie Calender's, Western Plaza, Green Hills Memorial Park, and other businesses in Rancho Palos Verdes, we provide much more income to the city than any other business area within the city. 

We have a very dense concentration of residential units in Eastview including condominiums and single-family houses.

Along with Miraleste, we have the vast majority of the oldest homes in the city.

If we want more influence in matters that are important to us, we must get more involved with our own city's government, processes, and issues.

One way to do this is to welcome discussion, debate, and the opinions from the candidates who wish to govern us.

Two of the candidates listed above should offer the residents of the east side of Rancho Palos Verdes enough so that our votes help them get elected.

We have not done that yet, since we were annexed. Nobody really needs to care unless we show up in numbers and let them know we want them to govern us.

If we can just vote in numbers to make a real difference, then we can move to the next step.

Perhaps by 2011 we will have shown by are participation in this November's election that we need to be listened to and governed properly, according to the issues WE find important.

And then, dreamingly as early as 2013, we may offer up a candidate for a City Council seat who lives in the Eastview area, who actually wins a seat.

The block of votes that has a possibility of being obtained strictly from Eastview residents could be enough to secure a seat someday.

Adding Miraleste to become the full voting block that would be East R.P.V. surely would create the ultimate goal of running the city we are so much a large group of.

Not to worry, I will NEVER run for a City Council seat in R.P.V. I don't have the educational background to be considered. Our city's history is so full of incredibly gifted and well-educated folks.

There are plenty of Miraleste residents and Eastview residents who are so much more qualified than I am.

After attending or watching as many C.C. meetings as I have, I would not enjoy enough the time serving in that volunteer position.

So please learn about the candidates for this coming election and vote for your two choices for seats.

Get involved in your city. Sure there are more than enough problems with San Pedro/Los Angeles to keep us occupied, but we don't live there and our city government is not there.

There are still four storm drains under Western that haven't failed. Wouldn't you like to see the same type of response we saw for two of the three one that failed and watch as our city's government dealt with any situation like they did with the McCarrol Canyon issues?

An Historically Significant Tract in East R.P.V.

No, it's not the original 'Eastview' tract of homes. It is the first tract of houses built west of Western Avenue in an area that eventually became part of the city of Rancho Palos Verdes.

These houses marked the beginning of a building boom along the eastern side of The Hill that seems to continue today.

Pictured below the new tract is the Channel Heights Apartments area. The store in the lower left of the photo was just about where In and Out Burger now stands.

The yard I grew up in and try to tend today is outlined in yellow. My dad bought the house and lot in 1950 and paid $7,500.00 for what was the largest yard and house on the south side of the first block on Trudie.

At the top of the photo are individual houses in the Miraleste area.

An Article from The News Pilot dated May 4, 1950:

Harbor Area Project Includes 215 Houses
Two Hundred and fifteen new homes are being erected in county territory above Peck Park as the harbor area continues its residential building boom.
The dwellings, known as Western View Homes, are being constructed by Shinn-Worzburger Building Corp. of Los Angeles.
Two Hundred of the structures are two-bedroom homes with attached garages, while the other 15 are three-bedroom houses with detached two-car garages.
The Price range of the smaller structures is $7200 to $7650. The three-bedroom houses are being offered for $8950.
Forty of the dwellings have been completed and several families already have moved into the project. Pioneer families in the area include those of M.O. O'Brion, James J. Prendergast, R. A. Marcoux and F.T. Veazey.
Three new streets have been created by the project-Highmore Ave., Jaybrook Dr. and Homeworth Dr.
The Shinn-Wurzburger firm built 55 new houses in Walteria in 1948 and has also done large-scale housing construction at Hawthorne, Monrovia, Arcadia and Fontana and in the San Fernando Valley.
The Western View project was started last December. One hundred homes are expected to be completed before the end of this month.

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The streets that comprise Western View Homes are Trudie, Highmore, Homeworth, Jaybrook, and the cul-de-sac of Bayend that is barely visible on the right side of the tract.

If you are old enough to remember the area, on the corner of Trudie and Western stood a Signal service station followed by an Enco, Exxon, and then Marie Calendar's, which remains today.

The southwest corner of Trudie and Western would eventually become the Western Plaza shopping center.

The first business nearest Trudie was actually a pharmacy. When I was about 2 year's old, Hillside Liquors opened on that spot and is one of the oldest businesses still there.

The other two businesses that seem to have remained over the many decades are 31 Flavors and the Barber Shop.

In the photo you should be able to detect that MacArthur, Caddington, Enrose, and other streets were just dreams that became true by 1955-57.

I doubt there are any tracts of houses in the city of Rancho Palos Verdes that were built when Western View Homes were completed.

Sure there were lots of individual and historic houses in what would become Rancho Palos Verdes, but this first tract in what is now Eastern Rancho Palos Verdes signaled the beginnings of growth that the city hopes will continue.