ACLU Office to Open in a ‘Changing’ O.C.

When Hector Villagra told friends he was going to open the ACLU’s first Orange County office, they told him he’d have more luck setting up shop in, well, Death Valley.

But after only two days in his barren office, the lawyer has already drafted one lawsuit and has plans for several others. Change, he said, is coming.

“Orange County has a lot of issues,” Villagra said. “People have really been hungry for a legal organization with our expertise and prestige to lend them a hand.”

The office, which will officially open today in Orange, seems to be yet another sign that Orange County isn’t the conservative place it once was.

The American Civil Liberties Union, a defender of civil rights and liberties that is seen by conservatives as a champion of liberal causes, has roughly 100,000 members statewide, according to an organization spokeswoman.

More than 5,000 live in Orange County.

Villagra said Orange County’s libertarian background makes it a good fit with the ACLU.

“We’re both believers in privacy and the right to be left alone by the government,” he said. “Our rationales may be different, but our conclusions are often the same.”

In addition to litigating cases such as an education suit the attorneys intend to file Thursday, the office will involve itself in local policy issues.

Villagra has already sent a letter to the Santa Ana Unified School District protesting a proposed high school health textbook that he says focuses too much on abstinence and won’t sufficiently inform students about birth control.

The office will also study special education and gifted programs in county schools, Villagra said, and an office lawyer on a fellowship will examine the care that local hospitals provide to non-English-speaking patients.

One of the office’s three attorneys, Belinda Escobosa Helzer, brings a homegrown sense of militancy to the job. She says she saw injustices firsthand while growing up in La Habra, such as police harassment and illegal evictions.

At her previous job as the immigrant rights attorney at the Mexican American Legal and Defense Educational Fund in Los Angeles, she worked extensively on a day-laborer project challenging anti-solicitation laws and plans to continue that work in Orange County.

“Los Angeles is so big and has so many issues that Orange County often became secondary,” she said. “With this new office, our problems won’t be overshadowed.”

The office will accept walk-in clients and will be involved in community events and work with local leaders to uncover more cases, Villagra said.

At an event Saturday protesting Proposition 73, a ballot initiative that would require parental notification for minors seeking abortions, he was told about an education issue that he said required “immediate attention.”

“Being in the community with your ear to the ground is really important,” Villagra said. “You just can’t create that rapport when your office is an hour away.”

Not everyone is rolling out the welcome mat for the organization.

Former Newport Beach Assemblyman Gil Ferguson, a Republican who 21 years ago founded a conservative breakfast club called Principles Over Politics, doesn’t think the ACLU can garner enough support in Orange County.

“It takes a lot of chutzpah for that communist-inspired organization to come to the heart of conservatism in America,” Ferguson said.

“We don’t have the large groups of liberals who would support them. They’re not going to get any traction here.”

Nonsense, says Zeke Hernandez, president of the Santa Ana chapter of the League of United Latin American Citizens. An ACLU office has long been needed in Orange County, where school boundaries, immigration and day laborers are pressing issues, he said.

“They’ll be busy,” he said, adding that perhaps now more national organizations such as MALDEF and the Sierra Club will increase their presence in Orange County.

“This is no longer the Orange County of years past,” Hernandez said. “We’ve long been going down this transition road from conservative to moderate, and now we’re on the verge of a strong, progressive activism.”

Birdie Reed, president of the ACLU’s Orange County chapter for three years, is looking forward to the group having a permanent home in the new office after years of holding meetings at different locations.

“This is beyond my wildest dreams,” said Reed.

“I think it’s a sign that Orange County is a very diverse and changing county. It’s always been that way, but perhaps now people will better recognize it.”