LOS ALAMITOS : City Redevelopment Agency Disbanded

The City Council officially disbanded its Redevelopment Agency this week in the wake of voter rejection of the city’s redevelopment plan in June.

In passing an ordinance declaring that there is not a present need for an active redevelopment agency in the city, the council left open the possibility of re-forming the agency in the future.

Staunch opponents of redevelopment tried unsuccessfully to prevent future councils from ever reactivating the agency.

“They have a tendency to be rather loose,” said Ray Lecompte, one of the leaders of the citizen campaign to defeat the proposed redevelopment plan. “There’s definitely not a stake in the heart of this thing.”

Under state law, redevelopment agencies naturally exist in all cities, so the council could have left the agency in place in an inactive state. However, council members chose to disband the agency altogether, which means that the city will have to hold public hearings in order to reactivate it in the future.

In a June referendum, voters rejected the redevelopment plan the council had adopted in 1990--one that cash-strapped officials had hoped would spur redevelopment and improvements along Katella Avenue and Los Alamitos Boulevard.

But many residents opposed the plan to generate more tax revenues, fearing that the city would eventually include residential areas in the plan and use its powers of eminent domain to seize homeowners’ property.