Road Panel Wants to Block Irvine Funds

Irvine may soon join Laguna Beach in being deemed ineligible for a share of a multimillion-dollar fund used to help improve major roads throughout Orange County.

An advisory committee for the county’s Arterial Highway Financing Program is recommending that the city be denied any of that money during the next fiscal year because, the committee contends, the city’s road improvement plan is not compatible with the county’s master road plan.

Laguna Beach has been on the list for the same reason for a year. The committee is recommending that it remain there for at least one year more.

The fund for the 1989-90 fiscal year, which begins July 1, is $9.8 million. The advisory committee is recommending that the money be used to pay for 47 projects in 24 cities.

Anaheim would get the most money under the committee’s plan: up to $600,000 for improvements to Anaheim Boulevard from Cypress Street to Lemon Street.

The advisory committee members are County Supervisors Don R. Roth and Roger R. Stanton, Buena Park Mayor Donna L. Chessen, Fountain Valley City Councilman James E. Neal and Villa Park City Councilman Wayne W. Silzel.

The Board of Supervisors is scheduled to consider the committee’s recommendations next week.

Neal said the committee ignored a recommendation from its technical staff to merely warn Irvine that its eligibility status was in jeopardy.

“Some other cities have streets that don’t comply with the master plan, but Irvine and Laguna Beach are the only ones with major roads that don’t comply,” he said.

Irvine officials could not be reached for comment. Laguna Beach Mayor Robert F. Gentry said officials from his city would try to persuade the supervisors to ignore the advisory committee’s recommendation as it applies to Laguna Beach.

“We have a number of aging roads in our city that need repair,” Gentry said. “We not only need that money, we count on it.”

David Updegraff, a senior civil engineer for the county, said the purpose of the county’s master plan is to coordinate the major road programs countywide.

“We don’t want a six-lane road suddenly to become a two-lane road when it leaves one city and enters another,” he said.

Irvine, he said, has for years omitted from its road plan several linkages that show up in the county’s master plan.

“Those problems were supposed to be studied and worked on,” he said, “but there really has been no progress.”

Laguna Beach and the county, Updegraff said, have reached a compromise “in principle” on the major dispute between them: what to do about a section of El Toro Road just north of the San Joaquin Hills Transportation Corridor route. But, Updegraff said, Laguna Beach has not submitted documents to show that it is now in compliance with the county rules.