BUENA PARK : Bone Elected Mayor by City Council

Newly selected Mayor Donald L. Bone has a challenging year ahead.

Bone was chosen as mayor by the five-member City Council this week.

He replaces Councilman Arthur C. Brown, who as mayor attended 137 public events, 23 employee events and 201 meetings and received 100 phone and letter complaints.

“I made being mayor my full-time job,” said Brown, who is retired. “It was something I enjoyed doing.”

Serving for the second time as mayor since first elected to the council in 1987, Bone said he ran for public office because of his philosophy that “everybody owes a debt to this country.”

“How each person chooses to pay that debt is up to that person. I choose to pay that debt through public service,” said Bone, who also served on the Fullerton Union High School District Board of Trustees in the early 1980s.

Bone said issues facing the city include contracting fire services with the county and incorporating the independent library district as a city department.

Another issue is negotiating labor contracts. This year, the City Council imposed police and fire contracts after the labor groups refused to accept Buena Park’s offer.

Bone said at the top of the list are the city’s budget problems, revenue cutbacks from the state and a project to realign Dale Street and build a railroad track underpass.

“Any one of these issues is a tough issue,” said Bone, 50, a 24-year resident and painting contractor. “Putting them all together says that 1994 is going to be a decision-packed year.”

Bone, who is married and the father of two sons and has three grandchildren, said that another goal is to bring his vision of a human relations commission to fruition.

“I see the whole Southland in the middle of a drastic change demographically,” he said.

“We have a mixture of cultures living side by side, and in my opinion, government must find a way to pull those cultures together and make sure we’re meeting the needs of the individual cultures.”