Orange County Gives Birth to 2 Cities in 1 Day

In a culmination of years of grass-roots efforts, two cities were officially created in Orange County Friday, and two women who had been leaders in the incorporation drives were chosen their first mayors.

Laguna Hills became the county’s 30th city and, 90 minutes later, neighboring Lake Forest became the 31st, continuing an incorporation boom that has seen the South County produce five new cities within four years. Both communities have experienced building and population explosions over the past few decades.

Hundreds of residents turned out for the inaugural ceremonies. The festivities began at 9 a.m. in the Laguna Hills High School gymnasium, where the Laguna Hills City Council unanimously elected homemaker Melody Carruth, 38, its first mayor. Carruth was the top vote-getter in the March incorporation election, and she is the only woman on a council that includes three lawyers.

As she was inaugurated, Carruth said she was “absolutely thrilled.” “My goal is to get us a strong financial city,” she said. “I believe this is going to be a tremendous responsibility.”

Councilman Joel T. Lautenschleger was elected mayor pro tem. This is “the start of an exciting adventure,” he told the 200-member crowd. “I could not think of anyone giving me a better Christmas present.”

Laguna Hills was once home to the nomadic Juaneno Indians and a number of wealthy ranchers. The past 20 years have brought a transformation to the rolling hills of the area, adding neighborhoods of condominiums and expensive ranch-style homes. The city now counts a population of 22,666 mostly upper-income residents within its 5 square miles. It is expected to be one of the best endowed municipalities in the county, primarily because of the sales-tax revenue generated by the Laguna Hills Mall, the large regional shopping center.

Just across the San Diego Freeway, the city of Lake Forest was born shortly after 10:30 a.m. in an outdoor ceremony next to an adobe that recalled the rancho beginnings of the area.

The five members of the Lake Forest City Council were sworn in, and they unanimously chose Helen Wilson, a 41-year-old community volunteer, their first mayor, and Ann Van Haun, a 57-year-old university administrative employee, mayor pro tem.

“We’re real now,” Wilson told the hundreds of well-wishers who had gathered under sunny skies on a knoll at Heritage Hills Historical Park. As a city, she said, Lake Forest can “protect and direct our future for ourselves, our children and our children’s children.”

Wilson, who spearheaded the incorporation drive and received the most votes in the City Council election in March, thanked the Lake Forest residents who joined the effort. “I think the message is that this is a community that doesn’t give up,” she said.

Lake Forest has about 10.3 square miles within its borders and a population of 62,685 people, making it about twice as large in area and nearly three times as large in population as Laguna Hills.

It is an “interesting” phenomenon, Wilson said, that two other South County cities also chose women as their first mayors: Judy Curreri for Dana Point and Patricia C. Bates for Laguna Niguel.

“I don’t believe it is a gender issue at all,” she said of the ability to govern. She adding that she is pleased that “such a high level of confidence is being placed in women in local politics. It probably works hand-in-hand with more women involved in professional fields than in the past.”

State Sen. Marian Bergeson (R-Newport Beach), who was among the notables at the ceremonies, received an burst of applause when she told the crowd at Heritage Hills park that she took special pride in the fact that “both of our mayors of new cities happen to be outstanding women.”

The area that is now the city of Lake Forest had for more than a century been known as El Toro, after the bulls on the ranch of Don Jose Serrano, who received a 10,668-acre land grant from Mexico in 1842. The Serrano Adobe in Heritage Park belonged to the ranch. However, voters chose Lake Forest as the name for the city, after two upscale housing tracts built around man-made lakes in the heart of the community.

Ray Prothero, 68, whose family has been associated with the area since the early 1900s, is one of those who objected to the name change. “You can never take it away from me,” he said of the name El Toro, and he was in the audience cheering the new city.

Others on hand included Marine Brig. Gen. Drax Williams, commander of the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station, who brought along a Marine color guard, and the El Toro High School band and chorus.

A large contingent of congressional representatives, state legislators, county officials and council members of other Orange County cities presented congratulatory messages to the new city councils. In fact, many attended both ceremonies.

The seasoned officeholders also had advice to share.

Dana Point Mayor Mike Eggers, whose city was formed three years ago, told both new councils: “Enjoy today’s meeting. It will be the shortest one you’ll ever have, and it’ll be the only one where the audience will still be smiling back at you.”