Bremberg New Glendale Mayor : City Council: The officials welcome newest colleague Eileen Givens and give send-off to retiring Jerold Milner.

In a ceremony flavored by laughter and applause, the Glendale City Council on Monday elected a new mayor, welcomed a political novice as its newest councilwoman and gave a glowing farewell to a retiring councilman who spearheaded a growth-control effort.

Eileen Givens, the top vote-getter of eight council candidates in the April 2 election, was sworn in, along with Larry Zarian, who was elected to a third four-year term on the five-member council.

Givens’ first act was to join in a unanimous vote to elect Ginger Bremberg mayor.

About 140 people packed the council chambers at City Hall for an hour to watch the installation of Givens, Zarian and two members each of the Glendale Board of Education and the Glendale Community College Board of Trustees. The four education officials were also elected April 2.

Bremberg, who has already served twice as mayor since her election in 1981, replaced Zarian in the largely ceremonial post, following a rotation system used by the council.

The council member who is chairman of the Glendale Redevelopment Agency, which is made up of the five council members, typically takes over as mayor. Councilman Carl Raggio on Tuesday succeeded Bremberg as agency chairman.

“I may not have the vision of an oracle, but I see a wonderful future for Glendale,” Bremberg said Monday as she took over the center chair at the council table.

Zarian said the council’s greatest tasks in the next year will include overseeing development of a mass-transit system, creating stricter guidelines for hillside development, increasing use of reclaimed water, extending the city’s free shuttle service and solving a long-running dispute over expansion of the Brand Boulevard auto district between auto dealers and residents.

Despite upbeat predictions of the city’s future by Bremberg and Zarian, the high point of the ceremony focused on the past--of Jerold Milner’s campaign to put growth control at the top of the municipal agenda.

The departing councilman was a visionary who spearheaded a successful seven-year effort to revise the city’s zoning and development guidelines, council members and city staff agreed.

“I think Jerry should get full credit for that,” Raggio said. “If he hadn’t seen the future, we’d have an awful lot of problems today.”

Milner, 60, who has lived in Glendale for 29 years, served on the public service and civil service commissions, the boards of numerous civic groups and a redevelopment task force before being elected to the council in 1983.

As chairman of the task force, Milner was successful in bolstering public opinion about redevelopment, his council colleagues said. But he also brought attention to the issue of growth control by questioning whether the city’s zoning conformed to its General Plan for slow to moderate growth, they said.

After Milner was elected to the council, he directed a study of the zoning code by city planners, who learned that the code would allow far more development than called for by the General Plan. As a result, the council in 1986 passed a “consistency plan” that aligned zoning more closely to the General Plan, council members said.

Milner then pushed on with an effort to strengthen the consistency plan. The council in 1988 passed a moratorium on construction of apartments and condominiums, dropping it late last year when a building cap and downzoning ordinance was approved.

Those measures are aimed at restraining development and limiting the city’s population to about 225,000 by restricting the number of houses, apartments and condominiums that can be built each year.

Raggio and other city officials said the growth-control effort reduced the number of potential housing units in Glendale from 170,000 to no more than 85,000.

Milner, wearing wire-rimmed glasses and a neatly pressed suit and tie, sat straight-faced as his colleagues lauded him. His seriousness was typical of his demeanor during council meetings.

During his tenure, Milner sometimes poked fun at other council members or made wry references about his baldness. But he was best known for being resilient in his opinions, for remaining calm and emotionally detached during highly charged debates, and for envisioning the future when making decisions, his council colleagues said.

At times, Milner’s long-term outlook involved some controversy. During his second stint as mayor from 1989 to 1990, he appointed 11 white men to a task force to study Glendale’s future. After minority and women’s groups criticized the appointments, Milner added two women and a black man to the committee.

He also was criticized for supporting a proposed ban on overnight parking on city streets, which the council narrowly defeated early last year. Milner had maintained that such a ban was needed to help the city control growth.

And while heavily applauded by homeowners for his staunch advocacy of growth-control measures, Milner sometimes drew fire from developers who thought that he was too restrictive.

But none of those criticisms were evident Monday evening as the council and audience cheered and gave Milner a standing ovation.

Milner hugged Zarian and wiped away a few tears. He attributed his emotional response to news that his first grandchild had been born earlier that day, and told the audience that he looked forward to traveling and starting a new job.

“I’m starting on a new beginning, not only as a grandfather,” he said. “There’s a new adventure out there. I’ve enjoyed almost every minute of this, but I’m ready to try something new--even if I don’t know what it is yet.”

Milner said he decided not to seek reelection primarily because he believes that council members should serve only two four-year terms. He also recently had a heart valve replaced and wants to try a different line of work, he said. He retired in 1987 after working 33 years for Pacific Bell.

Before the installation ceremony, he said: “I’ve spent a lot of time in various organizations in Glendale, but being on the City Council is the epitome. It’s the culmination of everything else one has done.”

On Monday, his seat was soon occupied by Givens, 47, a community activist who garnered broad-based support, won several key endorsements and raised at least $27,000 in contributions during her nearly six-month campaign.

“I come to this office with a four-year warranty on parts and labor,” Givens quipped after she was sworn into office. “Last fall, when I entered the race, I was worried about failure. . . . Tonight I’m happy to report that those worries are behind me.”

A beaming Bremberg, citing Givens as a good friend whom she encouraged to run for the council, applauded her election as a step forward for local women.

“It’s not going to make a bit of difference in the way we make our decisions,” Bremberg said. “This just means that the city of Glendale has recognized that the walls will not fall down if two women serve on the council simultaneously.”

Also on Monday, two incumbents of the Board of Education and two incumbents of the college Board of Trustees were sworn in.

Blanch Greenwood, 74, returned to the school board for a fifth four-year term, while Sharon Beauchamp, 50, earned a fourth term. Rae Berry, 73, and Robert Holmes, 43, were installed for third terms on the college board.