Even the Old-Timers Are New to 'Mo Val' : Fast-growing city adds about 1,000 new residents a month, even though nearby jobs are scarce.

By JEAN BOYER

April 9, 1989 12 AM PT

<i> Boyer is a free-lance writer who lives in Riverside</i>

In 1979, Edith Long gave her husband an ultimatum: Either leave Los Angeles--where their home had been burglarized four times in six months--or she was leaving without him.

Richard Long said OK, you find the place and we’ll move. Edith Long got in her car and drove until she reached Moreno Valley.

“It wasn’t the hustle and bustle of L.A.,” she said, and it looked like a good place for a family, so the Longs bought a home.

A lot of people had the same idea. Moreno Valley, which had about 20,000 residents when the Longs arrived, had 105,000 at last count, and gets about 1,000 new residents a month, according to city estimates.

Affordable housing has made “Mo Val,” as its residents call it, the fastest-growing city in Riverside County, second in size only to the city of Riverside, and one of the fastest-growing in the state.

Quick ‘Old-Timers’

In a town where five-year residency now qualifies you for old-timer status, “I’m about as stereotypical as you can get,” Steve Liljedahl said.

Indeed. He’s young, married with children, moved to Moreno Valley so he could afford a home, but continues to work elsewhere.

Liljedahl, 38, used to live in Manhattan Beach. In Moreno Valley, his 1,400-square-foot house on a half-acre lot zoned for horses cost $112,000. Anything comparable in Los Angeles County would have been close to $500,000, he figures.

Liljedahl likes the feeling of being a pioneer in a new community that still has some open space. “It’s a great place to raise kids,” he said. The only drawback is the commute. Liljedahl, a plumbing contractor, works mostly in Los Angeles and Orange counties.

“You really have to be on the road by 4:30 or 5 a.m.,” he said. When he moved to Moreno Valley 18 months ago, he could leave at 6 a.m. and make it to Los Angeles by 7:30 a.m., but increased traffic has forced him to depart earlier.

More Work Near Home

Liljedahl hopes to find more business near home so he can spend more time with his two daughters.

While new residents are enthusiastic about finding a pleasant place where they can buy a home, many who have lived in the area longer find the population spurt hard to take.

“Don’t make it sound too nice out here,” waitress Penny Pichette said dryly as she refilled coffee cups at Venus Burgers restaurant. “We don’t want any more people.”

Pichette, 44, recalls driving into town 15 years ago and seeing a tumbleweed roll down the street. The tumbleweeds haven’t disappeared, but they have a lot more to bump into with construction on every corner. The city expects to have 214,000 residents by 2010.

“I don’t mind progress, but we haven’t had progress--we’ve had an explosion,” said 13-year-resident Robert Daniell ruefully.

Incorporated in 1984

Most of the current city didn’t exist 10 years ago. Until the growth boom started in the early 1980s, the area was home to farmers and people associated with March Air Force Base.

After home builders discovered the area’s cheap land and began developing housing tracts, the communities of Moreno, Edgemont and Sunnymead incorporated in self-defense to form Moreno Valley in December, 1984.

Bill Doughty is part of both the farming and military traditions. He was born in Moreno Valley, where his mother was an Air Force secretary.

Doughty, 38, has spent the last 15 years working at UC Riverside’s Moreno Valley field station. However, the research fields are being surrounded by development and the school is considering selling its 840 acres or swapping the site for land elsewhere.

Doughty has mixed feelings about the changes--he likes the new stores but dislikes that what used to be a five-minute trip across town now takes 25 minutes.

Represents Major Opportunity

Even Edith Long is finding the place a little too crowded, and is considering moving outside the city limits.

If longtime residents are nostalgic for small-town Sunnymead, new arrivals see a chance to stake out the future. From the religious to the retail sector, Moreno Valley represents a major opportunity.

“When I first moved here 19 years ago, it was all gas stations and bars,” said Doughty’s wife, Karren. “Now it’s all churches and pizza parlors.”

MorningStar Community Church started services four months ago, and now has 150 worshipers each Sunday. “I was hoping to have 100 in a year,” Pastor Bill Hampson said.

Hampson said he didn’t want to play “musical pews” by raiding other congregations, so he concentrated on recruiting folks who hadn’t found a church. Moreno Valley has more than 50 churches, although many, like MorningStar, meet in schools until they can afford a building.

“I don’t think there’s much competition between churches because there are so many people here--it would be like ants arguing over who’s going to eat the elephant,” Hampson said.

Much harder to compete against is freeway fatigue. “When we asked why people don’t go to church, the biggest answer--over 50%--was commuting,” Hampson said. After a week on the road, couples said they cherished their Sunday hours together.

Hampson, 38, said he encourages them to bring their families to church and find out that there’s more to life than sitting on the freeway.

Geared to Commuting

He wasn’t alone in discovering how the commuter culture dominates Mo Val life.

Baby sitters advertise “commuter hours” from 4 a.m. to 7 p.m. Cassette tapes of best sellers are popular. And there’s the commuter mug, a chubby jug with a narrow neck to minimize splashes when slamming on the brakes in heavy traffic.

“We sell quite a few of those,” said Don Pequignot, proprietor of the Coffee Grinder. Former Santa Barbaran Pequignot found Moreno Valley by accident two years ago when he took a wrong turn off the freeway.

He paused long enough to notice a rapidly growing city without a coffee store. A short while later he opened his antique-furnished shop where java fans can nibble madeleines while they sip cappuccino, and buy a pound of Jamaican Blue Mountain to take home.

Pequignot, 37, found he had to adjust his hours, staying open later in the evening, including 9 p.m. Saturday. “We do 75% of our business after five o’clock,” he said.

Creating More Jobs

Other local merchants may have to adopt the same approach, because many residents shop where they work.

Although city officials are asking the state to name part of California 60 the “Moreno Valley Freeway,” they want to get more residents off that thoroughfare.

“One of our top priorities is job creation,” said Cheryl Dye, assistant to the city manager. “By having jobs here, our people will shop here. We need those sales tax dollars.”

Job growth has lagged far behind home building. However, a study released last month showed the number of residents working within Riverside County increased from 54% in 1986 to 66% in 1989. The average commute for a male Moreno Valley resident is 42.4 minutes; female residents commute an average of 27.6 minutes.

Some people, like Terri Lopez and Edith Long, decide to switch jobs rather than fight traffic. Lopez, 33, quit her restaurant job in Downey to open a drapery business, while Long, 38, a registered nurse, gave up her Anaheim job for one nearby in Riverside, even though it meant taking a $5-an-hour pay cut.

Air Base Employment

The city is trying to attract industries with salaries comparable to those in Orange and Los Angeles counties. Officials hope that more residents will find local jobs with the addition of Moreno Valley’s first hospital, now under construction, and several other projects, including a planned auto mall and a Riverside Community College campus.

Neighboring March Air Force Base is the city’s largest employer, with 1,900 civilian and 4,000 military jobs. That number is expected to double in the next five years when San Bernardino’s Norton Air Force Base is scheduled to transfer most of its functions to March.

The second largest job source is the Moreno Valley Unified School District, which added 125 new teaching slots last year.

Moreno Valley, which typically opens four or five new schools a year to house the about 3,000 new pupils added annually, plans to switch some students to year-round programs in 1990 to qualify for priority state funding for new facilities.

Other major employers include aircraft parts manufacturer Rohr Industries Inc., mobile home manufacturers, grocery and department stores and city government.

Home Prices Rising

Moreno Valley’s trend toward fancier housing should help recruitment, said J. David Horspool, mayor pro tem. “Corporate executives like to live where they work,” he said. “If they like to live here they might relocate their business.”

The city isn’t as affordable as it used to be. Several years ago, plenty of houses were available for $60,000. Now, few are less than $100,000, and some are in the $200,000-and-up range. (The median home price in the third quarter of 1988 was $124,615.)

More of the new housing is in planned developments nestled near the Box Springs Mountains, complete with lakes, parks, golf courses and horse trails. Home builders include Lewis Homes, Kaufman & Broad, John Laing, Century, Brock, Barratt American, Griffin, Serrano and Presley.

Moreno Valley’s old reputation as a bad example of suburban sprawl is undeserved, Horspool said. “We recognize it’s not Utopia out here but it is a growing, vital community.”

Recreational Facilities

The new city has scrambled to catch up with the demand for parks, planning and permits. After four years, efforts are beginning to pay off, Horspool said, bringing in eagerly awaited commercial and retail development. One such development, the Fritz Duda Co.’s TownGate, is taking shape on the site of the former Riverside International Raceway.

Although many residents take advantage of the adjacent Lake Perris State Recreational Area, Moreno Valley still needs more city recreational facilities and improved roads to cope with traffic, Horspool said.

A little more culture is what Olivia Rodriguez would like to see. Rodriguez, 45, a physical therapist assistant and poet, took part in a local literary reading last month.

The monthly events were launched by John Love and Bob Harrison, two guys who came to Moreno Valley the old-fashioned way: The U.S. Air Force sent them.

Cultural Activities

Last year, after both retired from the military, Harrison opened a Little Professor Book Center franchise and hired former weather forecaster Love to manage it. They invited authors to discuss their books because “we’ve got to have something ,” Love said. He also actively supports the local library, one of the busier spots in town on a weeknight.

This month, the second annual Moreno Valley Festival of the Arts is scheduled to highlight local musicians and artists. A performing arts center is on the drawing boards for the planned college campus.

“There are so many opportunities to develop things,” Rodriguez said. “It’s still country, sort of, even though it’s building up real fast.”

MORENO VALLEY AT A GLANCE Population

1989 estimate: 105,000

1980-88 change: 296%

Median age: 28 years

Racial/ethnic mix

White (non-Latino): 73.9%

Latino: 10.2%

Black: 7.9%

Other: 8%

Annual income

Per capita: $14,224