O.C. Less Satisfied With Finances, Family, Love : Poll: The corrosive effects of the recession appear to have spilled over into residents’ personal and social lives.

Orange County residents feel that their financial security over the past three years has dramatically eroded, as has satisfaction with their love lives and families, The Times Orange County Poll found.

Mirroring the national melancholy over economic health, only one in four Orange County residents say they are content with their financial security, compared to 43% in 1990. And 59% say they are satisfied with their marriage or love life, a sharp drop from 70% in 1990. A majority of residents who are parents--66%--are satisfied with their family and children, but that is down from 83% three years ago.

“The biggest trend over the last three years in Orange County has been a growing dissatisfaction with finances,” said Mark Baldassare, director of The Times Orange County Poll. “And that seems to be creating lots of personal and social strains in Orange County.”

Richard Weinmann, 58, of Irvine, is happy with his wife and family. But losing his $75,000-a-year job six months ago has left him financially traumatized. For 12 years he managed a manufacturing plant. But the firm, reeling from the recession, consolidated its operation in North Carolina. He and his wife are getting by on his severance package, but it is a two-thirds’ cut in income.

If work is not found soon, they will have to sell their house and move, possibly to Oregon or Idaho.

“When I had the job, I enjoyed it very much, and with the kids finally getting out of the house, we’d started to travel and do the things we’d like to do--weekend trips, long trips,” Weinmann said. Now, “it’s scary.”

His own outlook--happy with personal life, unhappy with finances--is shared by two of his three children, ages 35, 30 and 26. Weinmann’s oldest son, a teacher in the Newport-Mesa Unified School District, is unhappy with cutbacks there and his lack of leisure time. Weinmann’s youngest son, who has worked as an auto mechanic and store clerk and is the happily married father of a newborn, has still had trouble finding jobs.

Parents like Weinmann admittedly were not faced a generation ago with the same anxieties about raising families. They may have worried about providing for their kids or whether their sons would fight in the Vietnam War, but street violence and drug abuse were far less evident on the landscape.

Just since 1990, there have been dramatic shifts in what people view as the major problems confronting parents raising children here. Three years ago, county residents named drugs and alcohol in The Times Orange County Poll as the No. 1 concerns for parents. Only 7% named crime and gangs.

This year, one in three adults, regardless of whether they have children, said crime and gangs have surpassed drugs and alcohol as the No. 1 problem for parents raising kids here, The Times Orange County Poll found.

When asked about their own kids, however, it was a different story. One in four parents named discipline and morals as their biggest problems in child-rearing, and only 4% of parents called gangs and crime the primary concerns in bringing up their children.

Perhaps it is not surprising that in the year after the Los Angeles riots, crime and violence would emerge with such prominence in relatively suburban Orange County.

“Part of the anxiety is related to trends that are occurring in Orange County and part is a fear that grew out of experiencing the riots,” Baldassare said. “That’s a fear that is felt throughout Southern California.”

Otieno Jackson, 34, of Garden Grove, does not worry that his three children--ages 9, 5 and 4--will join gangs or abuse drugs. “Not as long as I have that day-in, day-out interaction with them,” he said.

Jackson, a native of Kenya who now runs inventory control for a Huntington Beach plastics maker, worries only somewhat that they will be victims of violence in their neighborhood or school. He is most troubled over the impact of the media’s daily chronicle of urban bloodshed on his children.

“With all the gang-related shootings, there’s graffiti all over the place, and . . . kids are fighting not with fists but with guns,” Jackson said. “Every time you open the paper, there is another story about it.”

His wife works full time at night as a nurse while he holds a day job, and together they earn between $25,000 and $50,000. His ability to provide for his family in the future worries him a great deal, he said, because plastics are a fiercely competitive business and California’s economy is in poor health. His fears are shared by many poll respondents who said they lack faith in their future financial security.

“I have a good job, but my raises are not keeping up with the (recession), so the money comes in and goes straight back out,” said Jackson, leaving him with nothing extra to save.

“A lot of people are losing their jobs, people who are professionals, like at McDonnell Douglas, for the last 10, 20 or 30 years. And I’ve only been here for seven years at my job,” he added.

Despite increased worries since 1990 about their financial security, residents remain about as satisfied now with their work and careers as they were three years ago. A Times Orange County poll on the economy conducted in March found similar results.

“At this point, people are happy to be working and employed, given the state of the economy,” Baldassare said. “They’re worried about their finances but happy to have jobs.”

While financial woes have seeped into otherwise happy personal lives, other elements are battering the love lives of Orange County residents, particularly single people. Some said their problem is that the county is a romantic Death Valley, devoid of fertile turf on which to meet members of the opposite sex.

Patricia Tait of Tustin is a 34-year-old single mother working full time in cable advertising sales. She is unsatisfied with her love life, she said in an interview, “because there isn’t one.”

Married for a decade and now divorced, she bemoaned what she considers Orange County’s barren social landscape, a place that is “very superficial” and offers few opportunities to meet other singles outside of pickup bars. She is moving from Tustin to Mission Viejo because of what she views as gang encroachment into her neighborhood but thinks her love life will improve only if she moves to another county.

But she grew up in Orange County and wants to be near her children, who live in Mission Viejo.

She is also not financially secure, Tait said.

“Part of that is geographic,” Tait said. “It is so expensive to live here in Orange County. I grew up in Irvine, from 7th through 12th grade. But there is no way I could afford to live there.”

Echoing comments of others, Tait said the sprawl of suburban Orange County and the lack of a central downtown like Chicago’s or Seattle’s result in a lack of community and venues at which people can socialize. Coffeehouses and bookstores, she said, are the exception.

“When you have a downtown area like that, people do use public transportation. It’s so spread out here; nobody walks,” Tait said. “Unless you’re out power walking, trying to drop five pounds. You don’t stroll, you know, you power walk.

“I spend a lot of time at (the bookstore) Bookstar,” she added.

Still, the majority of Orange County residents are very content with their children and love interests, and find this an excellent or good place to raise their families, with 61% expressing great satisfaction with their families and 59% rating their romantic life good.

“I’m really happy, and I have a very good husband and family,” said Raisa Zavelion, 38, of Huntington Beach, the mother of 3-year-old twins and a 20-year-old daughter.

A Russian immigrant, she and her family came here five years ago for a better life. She is an accountant who has been unable to find work, while her husband works part time as an appliance repairman while attending college.

Finances are extremely tight, and leisure time rare.

“But we have lovely kids, and we are happy we live in the United States, because it’s much easier than Russia,” Zavelion said. “Life is much easier here.”

Troublesome Times

Contentment is more elusive in Orange County. Residents are less satisfied with key elements of life than they were in 1990.

How satisfied are you currently with each of these features of your life?

Percent saying “very satisfied” with:

1990 1991 1993 Family & children 73% 71% 61% Marriage / love life 70% 68% 59% Work & career 48% 52% 46% Financial security 43% 36% 25%

Source: Times Orange County Poll

Perceived Parental Problems

Orange County parents think the biggest problem with raising children today is the threat of crime and gangs. Since 1990, crime has gained substantially while concern over drugs and alcohol has receded. When it comes to raising their own children, however, parents are most worried about discipline and morality.

What do you think is the biggest problem for parents who are raising children in Orange County today?

1990 1991 1993 Crime and gangs 10% 17% 35% Drugs and alcohol 23% 19% 15% Schools 13% 12% 10% Lack of morals 8% 3% 6% Expenses 13% 11% 6% No Time 7% 7% 4% Other 19% 24% 19% Don’t know 7% 7% 5%

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Parents’ Own Biggest Problems

What would you say is the biggest problem, if any, that you are having in raising your children at this time? 1993 Discipline/morals: 25% Lack of time: 9% Financial: 8% School: 7% Peers/role models: 7% Crime/gangs: 4% Child care: 4% Other: 8% Nothing: 28% *

Orange County Living

How would you rate Orange County as a place for family life and raising children? All Adults Excellent: 18% Good: 41% Fair: 29% Poor: 11% Don’t know: 1%

Less than $50,000 North South $50,000 and more Excellent 16% 22% 17% 20% Good 39% 50% 39% 46% Fair 32% 19% 29% 26% Poor 12% 8% 14% 7% Don’t know 1% 1% 1% 1%

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In the past three years, do you think Orange County has become a better or a worse place to raise children, or has it stayed about the same?

All Adults North South Worse 57% 59% 49% Same 31% 29% 37% Better 6% 7% 5% Don’t know 6% 5% 9%

Source: Times Orange County Poll

How the Poll Was Conducted

The Times Orange County Poll was conducted by Mark Baldassare & Associates. The telephone survey reached 750 Orange County adults during a four-day period ending June 6. Using a computer-generated random sample of listed and unlisted telephone numbers, the poll contacted residents on weekday nights and weekend days. The error margin for all respondents is plus or minus 3.5 percentage points. For the subgroup of parents with children at home, the margin of error is plus or minus 5.5 percent.

The Embattled Family

* SUNDAY: Exposure of their children to sex and violence depicted on television and other entertainment media is the worry parents cite most often.

* TODAY: Most Orange County residents are content but feel much less secure about their finances than three years ago, a concern that’s bleeding into other areas of their personal happiness.

* TUESDAY: Moms and dads fret about different issues, and this may reflect not only traditional male and female reactions to threats but also may explain a gradual evolution in the roles of each parent.

* WEDNESDAY: Divorce, remarriage and economics may be reshaping many families, but three-fourths of Orange County parents still believe their clans are close, especially young families.

* THURSDAY: More people still believe medicine will be the best job path for their children but, shaped by perceived dark economic winds, they have scaled back other expectations for the future of their offspring.