New Mayor’s Priorities Are Streets, Coyotes

Barry L. Denes, the city’s new mayor, said this week that one of his main goals is to fix the streets.

“We need to be more pro-active in addressing the street conditions of Villa Park,” Denes said. Orange County’s late 1994 bankruptcy “put us in a bad spot and made for a lean couple of years. . . . We couldn’t devote the dollars to street repairs that we should have.”

Now that the county has recovered, he said, “it’s time for us to become more aggressive in our street-maintenance program.”

Denes, elected unanimously by his City Council colleagues to a one-year term as mayor, said another goal will be to solve the problem of coyotes that have been wandering from the wild into neighborhoods.

In September and October, standing-room-only crowds of residents came to City Council meetings to demand action on the coyotes. Several residents said their dogs and cats had been killed and that they feared future attacks might be on young children.

At the council’s Oct. 22 meeting, Denes proposed hiring a professional trapper. His motion, however, was defeated 3 to 1.

Denes said his other goals as mayor are to preserve the city’s library branch and to provide ample support for public safety.

“We want to ensure that Villa Park remains the safest city in regard to crime,” Denes said.

Denes, 51, was first elected to the council in 1990. He had also served as mayor in 1994-95.

Newly elected Councilman Richard A. Freschi was selected as mayor pro tem for the coming year.