Irvine Rated as State’s 2nd-Best City for Business : Recognition: California Business magazine’s list of top 100 cities is based on license costs, lease and rental rates, crime rates, Scholastic Aptitude Test scores and commuting time.

There has been much talk among city leaders in recent years about making Irvine one of the state’s most “business-friendly” cities. The September issue of California Business magazine says that Irvine has arrived, selecting it as the second-best mid-size city in the state in which to do business.

“We’ve had an unjust reputation that because of being a new city, we had some unnecessary regulations in place,” said Irvine City Manager Paul O. Brady Jr. “It was more perception than reality.”

The magazine’s list of the “100 Best Cities to Do Business in California” is based on the cost of business license fees, lease and rental rates, crime rates, Scholastic Aptitude Test scores and commuting time. Lancaster was ranked No. 1 among the 49 mid-size cities--those with populations between 85,000 and 200,000.

“Four years ago, we definitely had a reputation of being against business,” said Irvine Councilman Barry J. Hammond, citing previous proposals to raise business taxes to fund social programs. “Over the last few years, all of those additional business taxes that were proposed were killed.”

Irvine also established a flat $50 business license fee, eliminating fees that had been based on a company’s number of employees, according to Brady.

Costa Mesa was the only other Orange County city among the list’s top 10 mid-size cities. City Manager Allan L. Roeder said that Costa Mesa’s eighth-place ranking is a reflection of what the city has not done.

“A lot of cities have set up separate departments and spent quite a bit in financial resources to go out and do a lot of promotion,” Roeder said. “We do very little of that. If you keep taxes to an absolute minimum and limit regulation, the word gets out that it’s a good place to locate your business.”

Other mid-size Orange County cities on the list include Orange, Fullerton, Huntington Beach and Garden Grove.

In the large-city category--those with populations of more than 200,000--only two Orange County cities made that smaller list of 12: Anaheim was ranked third, and Santa Ana ranked seventh. San Diego was ranked first, and Los Angeles came in 10th.

Of cities with populations below 85,000, the magazine listed 39, including six in Orange County. Tustin ranked fourth, and Fountain Valley ranked eighth, followed by Newport Beach and Brea.