GLENDALE : Officials, Vets Seek Funds for Memorial

City officials and a group of about 20 veterans hope to raise up to $100,000 in the coming year to construct a memorial to Glendale’s war dead.

Glendale has a small memorial to its Vietnam veterans in the Montrose area but the proposed monument in front of City Hall would honor all the city’s men and women killed or missing in action in every military conflict since 1906, when Glendale was chartered, supporters said.

“We want to encompass as many of the wars that citizens of Glendale have participated in since 1906, as far back as the Spanish-American War and as recent as Desert Storm,” said Roy Lopez, an engineer in the city’s Public Works Department and a member of the Glendale-Montrose-Crescenta Valley War Memorial Committee.

The memorial is to be located next to the Peace Globe at Broadway and Isabel Street. That is Glendale’s only other tribute to its war dead aside from the Montrose memorial and the site of the city’s annual Memorial Day ceremonies.

The staff of Rep. Carlos Moorhead (R-Glendale) is helping the memorial committee compile, from Defense Department statistics, a list of all of Glendale’s war dead and MIAs, but that task could take months.

“The number could be in the hundreds, maybe even in the thousands, but we really can’t even speculate at this point,” said Ray Cruz, an assistant in the city manager’s office who is coordinating the efforts to build the monument.

“That will really be a factor as far as how big the memorial is going to be and how much it’s going to cost,” Cruz said. “In Pasadena, they have a simple square block that cost $30,000, but we’re thinking something bigger and much more elaborate.”

So far, architectural sketches have been completed on four possible designs. Lopez said the memorial will have one to three panels and will likely be expandable to include the names of soldiers lost in potential future conflicts. Before a design is approved, it will be voted on by the memorial committee and presented to the public before consideration by the City Council, he said.

“Ultimately, the design depends on how much money we can raise from the citizens,” Lopez said.

Last week, the memorial committee deposited a check for $1,000 with the Glendale Community Foundation to establish a donor fund. Donations can be sent to P.O. Box 313, Glendale 91209.