LAGUNA HILLS/LAKE FOREST : New Cites Put on Hold by Pac Bell

When Laguna Hills and Lake Forest held their official incorporation celebrations on Dec. 20, celebrants in both communities thought they had cleared their last hurdle to becoming official cities.

But they forgot to ask Pacific Bell for its seal of approval.

Although it’s been more than a month since the cities moved into their respective city halls, Pacific Bell directory assistance as of Friday still did not list municipal phone numbers for either city, much to the chagrin of residents and officials.

“It’s been frustrating because calls go to the Lake Forest Community Assn. or somewhere else,” said Lake Forest Mayor Helen Wilson. “I can’t believe this is being done on purpose. I guess it’s just red tape.”

Apparently red tape isn’t the exclusive domain of governments. City officials say they’ve jumped through a series of bureaucratic hoops over the past few weeks without success.

In Laguna Hills, city officials had to use their imagination at least once to even qualify for a listing in the phone directory. Last month, the city was told by Pacific Bell that it had to show phone numbers for at least two departments to be listed.

Unfortunately, at that point, the newly incorporated city had only three employees and one official department. Thinking quickly, city workers created a new department and assigned it a phone number.

That was about 10 days ago. But as of Friday, neither city was listed under government agencies.

“Actually, the (Pacific Bell) people we’ve talked to have been very nice and cooperative,” said Jeanne Hulse, administrative coordinator for Laguna Hills. “I think it’s the system that’s fouled up. I can’t believe what we’ve had to go through to get a listing.”

A check with directory assistance shows that Lake Forest is listed, but in the wrong place. Instead of being grouped with government agencies, the city is found in Pacific Bell’s listings of private residences.

However, a Pacific Bell spokeswoman said the situation was being expedited and that the two cities could expect to be listed by this morning.

Part of the problem was that Lake Forest bought a phone system from a private business and that vendor didn’t submit paperwork for the listing until recently, said Linda Bonniksen, a Pacific Bell spokeswoman.

As of Friday, “we’ve physically sent messages to each (directory assistance) operator in Orange and San Diego Counties” highlighting the two cities’ phone number,” she said. “We want to make sure we have good service to our customers that use 411” directory assistance.