3 Suitors Vie for the Affection of Upscale North Tustin

As land grabs go, it may not rank with the Louisiana Purchase or the partition of Poland.

But the prospect of Santa Ana annexing the wealthy, unincorporated bedroom communities in North Tustin has outraged officials in the City of Tustin--which already is annexing parts of the area--and sparked nasty political skirmishes. Charges of backroom wheeling and dealing, bullying and subterfuge have been raised, both within and across city boundaries.

At stake, at the very least, are the mailing addresses of about 30,000 people who have the good fortune to live in some of Orange County’s most desirable neighborhoods: Lemon Heights, Cowan Heights and Red Hill, among others in the North Tustin area.

Several Options

Like other unincorporated communities, North Tustin has had to take a hard look at its local government options the last two years, as county funds for basic services have tightened.

Some residents want to annex to Tustin or the City of Orange, while others would just as soon remain with the county. Another group thinks North Tustin ought to become a city unto itself, while still others think annexation to Santa Ana is the answer.

The last option--and Tustin officials’ belief that Santa Ana is actively fomenting support for it and opposition to their own annexation plans--is what is causing most of the rancor.

Santa Ana officials maintain that they are doing nothing improper.

But Tustin City Manager William Huston said: “We’re not real appreciative of another city stirring up the mud. . . . We told them that is not your sphere and you’re not welcome to go in there.”

Unincorporated territory is often placed in a neighboring city’s “sphere of influence,” which state law defines as a city’s “probable ultimate physical boundaries”--in other words, likely areas of annexation.

North Tustin is split into two cities’ spheres of influence, with the northern third contained within Orange’s sphere and the southern two-thirds in Tustin’s. No part of North Tustin is designated within Santa Ana’s sphere.

State law also requires that a city must have a contiguous boundary with territory it wants to annex. Santa Ana, however, has no boundary with North Tustin, blocked off by a finger of land along the Costa Mesa Freeway that was annexed by Tustin 25 years ago, precisely to stave off the advances of its expansion-minded neighbor.

For Santa Ana to annex any part of North Tustin, it would have to try to annex part of Tustin or Orange as well. At this point, neither of those cities is willing to cede any territory.

The issue is coming to a head now because Tustin is preparing to annex a neighborhood south of Fairhaven Avenue, a move that would widen its buffer zone and most likely extinguish any smoldering possibility of Santa Ana reaching into North Tustin.

The Tustin City Council will hold a public hearing on its proposed annexation plan later this month. Residents who oppose it began circulating petitions last week to stop the annexation. While those homeowners say they do not want any part of Santa Ana either, Tustin city officials are casting a wary eye westward for anything resembling assistance or encouragement to the anti-annexation forces.

And statements by Santa Ana council members that they would love to have North Tustin in their city are enough to send their Tustin counterparts into a tizzy. They are incensed that Santa Ana officials would maintain an interest in the area, given the legal obstacles to annexation.

“I am deeply disturbed by the fact the City of Santa Ana would inject itself into a matter where it has absolutely no legitimate reason for involvement,” Tustin Councilman Richard B. Edgar wrote in a letter to the mayor of Santa Ana last month.

“Santa Ana is attempting to create an expectation that it can annex North Tustin, whereas, in fact, such an act is not physically or legally possible,” he wrote.

Santa Ana Mayor Dan Young, however, says that if the residents of North Tustin decided they wanted to join Santa Ana, it would be up to them to find a way to overcome the boundary problem, which he called a “technical issue.”

Bill Moses, a North Tustin resident and publisher and owner of the local weekly newspaper, The Tustin News, said his community would have “nothing to gain” by joining Santa Ana.

“They’ve over-industrialized their city,” said Moses, whose paper has taken a decidedly anti-Santa Ana tack on the issue. Twenty-five years ago, Moses and his newspaper played a key role in expanding the Tustin city limits northward to keep Santa Ana out of the foothills.

“We worked for five years on the West Wall,” he said. “We did not want to be part of them. We wanted to retain our rural aspect . . . and they were laying big annex plots over us all the time.”

Santa Ana officials, for the most part, are trying to maintain a low profile on the issue and say they have done nothing more than respond to questions by North Tustin residents who are interested in joining their city.

“If the people of North Tustin choose to go to Santa Ana, we would be delighted,” Santa Ana Mayor Young said. “It’s a beautiful place, and a lot of people who work in Santa Ana live in that area. . . . But I would never be supportive of any effort to apply to LAFCO (the Local Agency Formation Commission) to annex that area all on our own.”

Says He Gets Calls

Young said he began receiving telephone calls early last year from North Tustin residents interested in annexing to Santa Ana. Last May, he arranged a meeting with officials from Tustin and Orange to discuss their annexation plans and tell them of his own communications with North Tustin residents.

“I made it very clear that we would not get in the way of either of those cities,” Young said.

Edgar, who was mayor of Tustin at the time, said he told Young at the meeting “in no uncertain terms” that he would fight any efforts by Santa Ana to annex any part of North Tustin.

Since that meeting, Santa Ana officials have met with North Tustin residents--at their request, says Young--monitored community meetings and public hearings on the issue, and drafted a “sample” agreement outlining possible terms of annexation, Santa Ana City Manager David N. Ream said.

The 19-page document, titled “Preannexation and Development Agreement Between the City of Santa Ana and Santa Ana Hills Property Owners,” was given last October to representatives of North Tustin Tomorrow, a residents’ group studying incorporation and annexation options.

Ream said the document was prepared by the city staff, but was not reviewed by the city attorney’s office or the City Council.

“We put together a sample format for them so they could see how one functions,” Ream said. “It’s nothing that is in any way an official document or representing the position of the city. . . . They are pretty logical conclusions that we’re willing to recommend to the City Council. But we’re so far away from any direct action, all we’re doing now is providing requested information.”

More Than Format

Members of North Tustin Tomorrow, however, view the draft agreement as more than just a “sample format.”

Dessa Schroeder, a member of the group, said the city drafted the document in response to a questionnaire that the group is sending to all three cities on possible terms of annexation. Santa Ana, she said, “is the only one willing to put it on paper.”

The draft agreement says that the existing transportation system shall not be expanded or modified without the written consent of two-thirds of the area property owners. Some North Tustin residents have expressed concerns that Tustin would widen roads and permit commercial development along Newport Avenue, although Tustin city officials say that is not true.

The Santa Ana agreement also says that the annexed area would gain two new seats on the City Council. “That is not something we asked for,” Schroeder said. “We’re not seeking political control.”

But the addition of affluent North Tustin, where voter participation is likely to be high, could significantly alter the balance of power in Santa Ana, City Councilman John Acosta said.

“This is just another method of controlling city government,” said Acosta, who sees the hand of his frequent foes on the council--Dan Griset, Wilson Hart and Young--behind the annexation idea. “This is a last gasp for the liberal Democrats, who see their power eroding away.”

Not Viewed as Liberal

Griset and Young are, in fact, Democrats. Hart, however, is a Republican. And political consultants do not consider North Tustin to be a bedrock of liberalism. But the three council members--Griset is an insurance underwriter, Hart a lawyer and Young a developer--are more closely linked with a new, upscale image that the City of Santa Ana is trying to project than is Acosta, who owns a masonry-contracting business and counts on the Latino community for much of his political and financial support.

Nothing in Santa Ana politics is simple, though. While he cultivates his image as a friend of the small business owners and blue collar workers, Acosta, a Republican, represents Ward 3, most of which is located north of 17th Street--Santa Ana’s silk-stocking neighborhood.

Acosta says he is furious because he and other council members have been kept in the dark for months.

“This whole thing is underhanded,” complained Acosta, who is running against Young in the city’s first mayoral election in November. “There have been secret meetings going on, and somebody on the council is telling staff what to do. . . . If I was the city manager and taking on something as serious as an annexation, I wouldn’t exercise any authority without asking my bosses first. He has seven bosses (council members), not one or two.”

But Young claims that Acosta was briefed on at least two occasions by City Manager Ream. “It’s just a lie that he wasn’t briefed,” Young said.

When informed of Young’s remarks, Acosta retorted: “I want to know what bathroom we were in, what hallway we were walking down or what elevator we were on when we were supposedly briefed.”

Ream would not say whether he had or had not briefed Acosta on the matter. “I don’t want to dispute Councilman Acosta,” he said.

Fueling the suspicions of Acosta and Tustin council members that Santa Ana is doing more than just providing information to interested residents is the involvement of Jerry Wolf and Robert Miranda, two board members of the Greater Santa Ana Chamber of Commerce.

Young, Hart and Griset support the chamber’s programs and close ties to the city, while Acosta thinks the city should sever its economic ties with the chamber.

Wolf also is president of the board of the Santa Ana Economic Development Corp., a quasi-city agency that administers a loan program for small businesses in town.

Both men are North Tustin residents who work in Santa Ana and have urged North Tustin Tomorrow to consider the Santa Ana option.

Wolf, however, insists that he and Miranda are acting on their own as North Tustin residents. “The chamber has not adopted any position on this, although my speculation is they would support the idea,” Wolf said. “It’s one of the missing links that Santa Ana needs. What’s Anaheim without Anaheim Hills? Santa Ana has a lot of things, but one of the things Anaheim has over Santa Ana is that they have upscale homes.”

Wolf and other North Tustin residents said they object to Tustin’s attitude that their neighborhoods are rightfully Tustin territory.

“Tustin wants to run a steamroller over us,” Wolf said. “I just think we should look at all options. . . . If the will of the people is to do this (annex to Santa Ana), then there is a way to accomplish that. Tustin just says, ‘You can’t do it, you have to do it my way.’ ”

Another source of rumors and suspicion is the finances of the groups opposed to annexation to Tustin.

A group that successfully fought off Tustin’s attempts to annex two North Tustin neighborhoods last year has been supported almost entirely by loans from a 24-year-old UC Irvine engineering student, according to campaign statements. The student, Joseph Herzig, treasurer of the North Tustin Homeowners Corp., had loaned the group $9,522 as of Dec. 31, records show.

Much of the group’s money has gone to pay for legal fees incurred in lawsuits that stopped the annexation moves last year. Some also has gone for forms and flyers used in the anti-annexation petition drives, including the current one, Herzig pointed out.

He said the campaign statements are accurate and the group, which he said does not favor annexing to any city, is not getting secret financing from pro-Santa Ana forces, as some of his opponents have speculated. “If I were to do that, there would be serious penalties,” he said.

Herzig said the group tried to raise money, but that “we’re not expert fund-raisers.” He said he owns half the house he lives in with his parents, which he estimated to be worth about $150,000, and has savings from previous jobs.

“I was disgusted by the situation,” Herzig said, referring to Tustin’s attempt to annex parts of North Tustin. “Something had to be done, so I put up what is needed to get the job done.”

North Tustin Tomorrow’s financial statement for the last half of 1987 has not yet been filed. Treasurer Schroeder said group members had been extremely busy and one woman working on the document has had to care for a daughter with pneumonia, thus delaying the report. But she maintains that everything the group is doing is above board.

“It’s just a silly bunch of paper,” Schroeder said. “People are looking for a Tustingate, and there just isn’t anything there.”

Times staff writer Kirk Jackson contributed to this story.