For Officials in Moorpark, Success Is Spelled M-c-D-o-n-a-l-d’-s

Never mind that Moorpark will celebrate the 10th anniversary of its incorporation next year, or that the city now has the highest household median income in Ventura County.

Moorpark’s true initiation into cityhood won’t come until the golden arches are planted in local soil, officials said.

A proposal by McDonald’s Corp. to open its first restaurant in Moorpark will be considered at a Planning Commission hearing Sept. 19. If it’s approved, as expected, the company plans to open the facility in late December.

For Moorpark, this would mean more than just a new restaurant.

“It’s like a symbol that Moorpark has arrived,” City Councilman John Wozniak said.

Travelers and newcomers judge cities, perhaps subconsciously, according to whether they have a McDonald’s restaurant, he said.

When you’re trying to get a feel for a strange city, “that’s what you look for,” Wozniak said. “You look for the golden arches.”

The restaurant will bring an estimated $100,000 in sales tax revenues a year, about 50 full- and part-time jobs, and last, but perhaps not least, public bathrooms, Wozniak said.

“You can’t go to a gas station anymore,” he said. “If you do, you’ve got to stand in line and get a key.”

Moorpark now has only two fast-food chain restaurants--a Taco Bell and Wendy’s--for its population of 26,000, or one for every 13,000 residents. In contrast, Thousand Oaks has at least 11 fast-food chain restaurants for its population of 104,000, amounting to more than one for every 10,000 people.

McDonald’s Corp. first proposed building a restaurant in Moorpark at least three years ago, but approval was delayed because some council members initially were concerned about traffic at the proposed site at the northeast corner of Spring Road and Los Angeles Avenue.

In addition, Councilman Bernardo M. Perez and some former council members opposed the project because the site was one of the few locations designated on the city’s General Plan for affordable, high-density housing projects.

But Perez said the tide of public opinion was against him.

“I was getting beat up on this project even at home,” he said.

In the past three years, road improvements on Los Angeles Avenue have reduced potential traffic hazards at the site. And the council recently changed the General Plan to allow for the construction of affordable housing in other parts of the city.

Perez has changed his mind.

But not everyone in Moorpark is ready to welcome Ronald McDonald with open arms.

Dennis Jaynes, manager of the Wendy’s restaurant about a block from the McDonald’s site, said his supervisors are “getting bent out of shape.”

But Jaynes said he’s not too concerned about it, although he concedes that the new restaurant probably will affect his business.

“It’ll probably take something away, because a certain amount of people will want to go to McDonald’s,” he said. But “that’s the way it goes, competition.”

“Why worry?”