Californians Viewed Askance in Prescott : Migration: Huber case rekindles no-growth sentiment. Some fear Golden State ‘suburb.’

Hotel desk clerk Katie Wintrol sees them nearly every day.

Moving vans, station wagons and pickups--all overloaded with furniture, housewares, parents and kids--pull into the Best Western for a night or two of lodging before the families put down roots in this picturesque mountain community.

The only problem Wintrol sees is that most of these vehicles parked in her lot are coming from the same place: California.

“People here just hate Californians,” she said. “People are worried.”

The sentiment, similar to the aversions shared in Seattle and Portland toward Golden Staters, has been part of this town’s undercurrent for years. But nothing in recent months has done more to rekindle that feeling than the discovery of Denise Huber’s frozen body in the back of a stolen rental truck parked in the driveway of a former Californian.

“That’s your murder and you should take it back,” bartender Alan Buller barked recently to a California visitor to Prescott’s famed Whiskey Row. “That guy just hauled her over here from California. We have our own troubles here, but killing people and putting them in a freezer is something else.”

One local judge recalled sharing the road with one of Prescott’s newcomers while returning home from a recent trip.

“It was like something right out of the Beverly Hillbillies,” he said of the ramshackle vehicle. “There were clothes hanging out the back. I remember thinking, ‘Please don’t make the turn at Prescott. Please don’t make the turn at Prescott.’ ”

Sure enough. It turned.

In a touch of irony, you can get the opposite view from Prescott’s mayor, a part-time Hollywood actor who dismisses these rumblings as “a load of crap from selfish people.”

Mayor Daiton Rutkowski, who belts out Jimmy Buffett tunes while mixing milkshakes at his De Ja Vu soda fountain, said the whining is coming from no-growth advocates who have seized on the sensational murder to sound the alarm against further migration, especially from California.

“This whole thing has been overblown,” the sandy-haired Rutkowski said. “This could have happened anywhere. Hell, (Prescott) had a city councilman stand up during a public meeting and shoot himself dead. You can’t blame that on California.”

Rutkowski said Californians are only one category of new arrivals, drawn from all parts of big city America--Miami, Detroit, New York and Washington, D.C.--looking for a utopia in the Old West.

“You know (neighboring) Prescott Valley used to be called Jackass Flats in the old days,” the mayor said. “Now all the jackasses down there are from Iowa.

“Sure, we are getting a lot of people in from California, but these are wonderfully talented, upper-class people,” he said. “They fit right in here.”

The popular Rutkowski may be the only mayor in 25 years to win reelection here, but not all his constituents share his views on Prescott’s California connection.

From his courthouse office, Yavapai County Atty. Charles R. Hastings has noticed a change that disturbs him.

“I’ll tell you what,” Hastings said, “we’re just experiencing a tremendous increase in all kinds of crimes, and there are a lot of people moving here from California.”

While Hastings won’t come right out and say it, Wintrol and others are downright blunt in their assessments of how the influx of Californians is changing a laid-back lifestyle in the clean air and bright sun around the Prescott National Forest.

To locals, many of whom are transplanted Californians themselves, the Golden State has become synonymous with rioting, bad cops, skyrocketing real estate, gridlock and crime--especially crime.

Some of the most popular bumper stickers in town carry a stinging message for people arriving from the West Coast: “Prescott used to be a nice place to live--until it became a suburb of California” and “Welcome to Prescott, Calif.”

Even the state’s flagship newspaper leaves no question about how Arizonans regard their neighbors to the west. Reporting the discovery of Denise Huber’s body and the arrest of John J. Famalaro, the Arizona Republic carried the headlines: “Area gets California’s ugliness, too” and “California’s ugly side robs area’s innocence.”

At Sunday church services, visitors from California found themselves at the center of a priest’s good-natured ribbing, when he invited guests to identify their hometowns. “Oakland?” the priest exclaimed when one of several Californians called out. “Special blessings!” The congregation laughed.

On KQNA radio in Prescott Valley, the murder has been getting good play. But nobody seems to be happy to host such a grisly event, let alone put up with pushy California reporters who have arrived to cover the story.

Asked to characterize his out-of-town competitors, Prescott Daily Courier reporter Kevin Sheh told Knox: “I find them to be overbearing. I find them to be more aggressive than the local media here.”

Late last week, talk show host Jeff Knox drew comparisons between the Famalaro arrest and the flood of media coverage following the arrest of O.J. Simpson.

Neighbors near the Famalaro home in the Prescott Country Club have complained that a television satellite truck has been lighting up their street to do reports for the late-evening telecast, disrupting their sleep.

The whomping sounds of news helicopters have also drowned out their front-porch conversations.

And in Prescott, aggressive behavior is just not appreciated.

Just ask Bob Kantak, who arrived from Detroit in the late 1970s--more than enough time to be considered acceptable by local standards.

Kantak generally welcomes outsiders, but becomes quickly disappointed with folks who move here and want to remake the place. He hates remarks like, “This isn’t the way we used to do it back in California.”

“Good ideas are always welcome, but give us a break,” said Kantak, who lives just outside of town. In his rural area, new arrivals are now talking about street lights.

“Give a small-town atmosphere a chance. Don’t try to push (things) down our throats,” he said.

In brief encounters with some locals--particularly the no-growthers--it is clear that many wouldn’t mind seeing some of the major roads into town blocked completely.

Commenting on a recent Money magazine article that named Prescott as the country’s No. 1 place to retire, one resident said only half-jokingly, “That was one of the worst things ever to happen to Prescott.”

But while no-growthers dislike even migrant retirees and professionals from the Golden State, others see worse menace.

Taking precautions against the negative byproducts of increased population, Prescott Peace Justice Robert W. Kuebler Jr. created a fledgling gang-suppression task force after a recent trip to California.

There are only 95 known gang members in the Prescott area, according to Sheriff’s Department records, and no evidence of a single drive-by shooting ever, but authorities feel assured that many local gangsters have ties to Southern California.

“I see it a lot with people (who come to court),” Kuebler said. “I look at their backgrounds and see they’re from California or from somewhere else.”

Said Yavapai County Administrator Jim Holst: “Don’t get us wrong. We’re not against growth and people who want to come here and join our community. But we just can’t let this turn into another Los Angeles.”

But Mayor Rutkowski said those comparisons just can’t be supported, yet.

“I can tell you honestly that I don’t feel much of a difference in walking the streets here when there were 6,000 people back in the 1940s than I do today with 30,000,” the Prescott native said.

“If people don’t change, they become boors. It’s the same thing with cities and towns. If people want some peace and quiet, they can go down the road.”

The mayor admits some worry about a 1,000-unit housing development planned down the road, but he is also confident that the city has made sufficient plans to accommodate that growth.

“I feel a real spirit of excitement in the community,” he said.

At the same time, he said, Prescott has been able to retain the small-town feel that has brought people like U.S. Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor to a holiday retreat nearby.

It is a place where people like Rutkowski, after having a bit too much to drink (before he was mayor, of course) can get away with a practical joke. He once dropped a dead, flea-bitten beaver on the front counter at police headquarters. And never spent a night in jail.

“It just goes to show you that this town will accept people with independent values,” he joked.

The mayor said too much attention has been placed on the negative associations with California brought on by the recent discovery of Denise Huber’s body.

“An idiot goes nuts, OK. It happens. The guy could just as easily been from Missouri. They have weird people there, too, you know.

“This is still the greatest place on Earth,” Rutkowski said, rapping his knuckle on the wooden bar at the De Ja Vu. “Right here.”