Local News in Brief : Mission Viejo : Council Approves Plan for Psychiatric Hospital
The City Council, after a nearly eight-hour public hearing, early Tuesday gave permission to the Charter Medical Corp. to build an 80-bed psychiatric hospital at the intersection of Los Alisos Boulevard and Madero.
The decision capped a yearlong struggle by the company to convince critics in the local community that the three-story, $11-million facility would not create a safety hazard and would not lower property values of surrounding residential neighborhoods.
Charter last November had obtained approval for the project from the Orange County Planning Commission, but some Mission Viejo residents appealed to the county Board of Supervisors. The supervisors, deferring to Mission Viejo’s cityhood status effective March 31, passed the appeal on to the new City Council.
The council, made up of three members of the former Mission Viejo Municipal Advisory Council, which opposed the project last year, voted 3 to 2 on Tuesday to deny the appeal and allow construction to begin.
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