A Small-Scale Wonder

In Placentia, size matters.

With fewer than seven square miles, it’s one of Orange County’s smallest cities.

And with about 50,000 residents, it is far smaller than its north Orange County neighbors Fullerton and Orange, which both top 120,000, and Anaheim, with 300,000 residents.

But even Placentia has grown so explosively in recent decades that longtime residents can’t help but complain a little.

“It’s almost all grown up. They don’t have too much room for more folks,” said Alfred Aguirre, 80, who was born in Placentia and saw the population expand by about 60% in the decade between 1970 and 1980.

Aquirre remembers when there were just two area grocery stores-and only one was within the city limits.

For residents who didn’t know the Placentia of 30 or 40 years ago, the city still has that small-town feeling that has slipped away from so many Orange County municipalities. It’s not just the neat houses and the comparatively small number of residents that create the feeling. It’s that Placentia’s small-town origins are right there: In Placita Santa Fe-Placentia’s old town-where the city got its start, and in the many residents who have deep roots in the city.

Longtime Placentia resident Virginia Bannister recalls when she and her husband, Paul, a microchip design consultant, bought their house in 1962. It was the last one in the city to sell for less than $20,000, she said. Now the mother of four estimates that her home’s value is at least $250,000.

Bannister said the city has changed for the better. Fellow Placentians are friendly, she said, and she believes cultural diversity is on the rise across the city (Asians account for nearly 10% of the population and Latinos more than 28%). Even smog has decreased over the years, she noted.

The city isn’t perfect, of course. Bannister, an artist, is focused on opening a Placentia Cultural Arts Center, where residents and visitors would enjoy art exhibits as well as plays and musical performances.

“Growth is sometimes a struggle, because everybody does need to have their voice heard,” she said. “I think we should be a cultural arts community.”

However, finances are a major issue for the Placentia, Yorba Linda and the Fullerton Art Assn., which has not been able to purchase a site for a cultural arts center. In Placentia, though, Bannister is confident that the problem soon will be solved.

“We do have more willingness in the community [to help us find a location to display our art],” said Bannister. In the meantime, Placentia Library has given the group’s members permission to exhibit their works in the foyer.

That sense of small-town cooperation appeals to newer residents, too.

“I enjoy living in Placentia very much,” said 10-year resident Rosalinh Ung. “It’s a small city. It’s essentially a bedroom community.”

A city planner for Garden Grove, Ung knows what to look for in a residential community-and Placentia has it: convenient freeway access, upscale housing and a safe environment for her and her husband, David, to raise their children, Ryan, 7, and Sabrina, 4.

The couple started house-hunting in Placentia after Rosalinh’s parents moved there in 1990. At 2,500 square feet, the Ungs’ house in southern Placentia fits their family perfectly, she added. It has four bedrooms and three baths, and it cost $260,000 when the Ungs purchased it in 1994.

Rosalinh Ung’s only complaint is that she is not satisfied with the Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District. Sabrina is in private school, and the Ungs hope to place Ryan in private school next year.

“With all the new homes, all the new tracts coming up-where are we going to keep the kids? There’s a lot of portables [at the schools] already,” said Ung. “It’s a big concern.”

New tracts are being developed on the southern and eastern sides of the city, but according to district representative Karen Bass, the student population growth is expected to be minimal. If it should suddenly spike, the district could have a problem.

“We are almost at build-out,” Bass said. “We have very little land space available.”

Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified has 28 schools across the two cities as well as in Anaheim, Brea, Fullerton and the unincorporated county. The district covers 45 sprawling square miles, and serves 27,000 students from kindergarten through 12th grade.

“Every spring we’ve conducted our own recruiting fair, and we’ve had hundreds of people show up, wanting to work here. We have an outstanding reputation,” said Bass.

And local test scores are solid enough to catch parents’ attention. In the most recent Stanford 9 standardized test, every grade level earned scores in the 50th percentile or higher in every subject, except for ninth-and 10th-grade reading scores (they ranked in the 48th percentile). Math and most grades’ language and spelling scores spread across the 60th and 70th percentile levels.

Area schools have always been a strong selling point, said Marty Richards, a Realtor with RE/MAX Realty Center in Yorba Linda. She has been a real estate agent for 30 years and a Placentia resident even longer.

Over the years, Richards has seen the cost of housing increase dramatically. In 1970, she recalled, housing prices ranged from a low of $22,000 to a high of $45,000.

“Today, those are the down payments,” she said. For house-hunters today, it is not unusual to see asking prices up to $550,000, Richards said. Those half-million-dollar homes generally have from 2,700 to 3,300 square feet, with five bedrooms and three baths, she said.

Placentia’s lowest-priced homes range from $249,000 to $265,000. At about 1,700 square feet, they typically include three bedrooms and two baths. In general, these homes are 30 or 35 years old and in the southern part of the city. Mid-range homes-2,200 square feet, with four bedrooms and 21/2 baths-cost about $350,000, said Richards.

Housing is at a premium in Placentia, she added. Residents tend to stay in their homes from their child-rearing years into their retirement years, sometimes making it difficult for new residents to move in.

The smallest, most inexpensive homes-even 1,600-square-foot town homes, ranging from $220,000 to $230,000-get snatched up almost as soon as they go on the market.

Fred and Monae Spivey are newcomers to the city. They had been looking for their ideal house for two years when Fred, 46, walked into the house they now occupy in the northernmost quadrant of the city.

“This is the house,” he said to himself.

After she saw it, Monae, 36, agreed that it was perfect. The asking price was $299,900, and the Spiveys paid $299,000.

The 1,800-square-foot house sits on an 8,000-square-foot lot on a cul-de-sac. It has four bedrooms, 11/2 baths and a frontyard slightly larger than the backyard. The only thing Fred Spivey would change if he could would be to have a slightly larger backyard. But compared to the newer homes going on the market, this house boasts a huge yard. (According to Richards, the average lot size of new homes in Placentia is 6,000 square feet.)

“I’m from the old school,” Spivey said. “All the new houses today are big houses with no yard.”

This house immediately appealed to him, not only because of the yard and the layout of the rooms-which allow for a home office-but because of the obvious care the previous owners gave the property.

“The landscaping doesn’t say ‘house,’ it says ‘home,”’ he said.

The security that residents feel living in Placentia seems to be well-placed. According to Placentia’s Police Services Manager Matt Reynolds, major crime (including assault, rape and murder) is down this year-except for robberies, which are up 25%.

“We do have three active gangs in the city,” Reynolds said. “[But] they don’t cause constant, horrible problems. Those areas [where they hang out] do have a higher crime rate, but you’re talking 15 crimes compared to 10 crimes. It’s not that huge of a difference.”

The gangs tend to cluster in the southern areas of Placentia, he added.

“As far as calls for service and numbers of reports taken, south of Chapman Avenue those numbers are higher than anything north of Chapman,” said Reynolds. “We really try not to make a distinction between north and south Placentia in any way, but certainly the numbers do show we have a lot more activity there.”

Nevertheless, the city as a whole is low in crime. Neighboring Fullerton had more crimes reported in just one quarter last year than Placentia had for the entire year.

“We have traditionally not had a very high crime rate here,” said Reynolds, who has worked with the Placentia Police Department for 20 years.

That may be why crime is not one of the issues on Alfred Aguirre’s mind when he reminisces about Placentia.

Aguirre, whose house stands on a street named for his family, built the 2,000-square-foot home himself in 1947. It has three bedrooms and two baths, and the cost, he said, is inestimable.

“When you get older, you don’t want to leave here. Where are you going to go? Go to a new neighborhood, you don’t know anybody.

“[Here,] we’ve got everything we want,” he said.

Deffner is a freelance writer living in Orange.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Community Guidebook: Placentia

Zip Code: 92870

Population: 50,000

Size: 6.6 square miles

Housing Information

Number of Households: 14,911

Percentage of Homeowners: 65.2%

Percentage of Renters: 34.8%

Average Home Age: 28-30 years

Average Square Footage: 1,750 square feet

Average Lot Size: 7,000 square feet

Median Home Prices*

Year Amount

1990 $228,500

1991 $226,250

1992 $221,500

1993 $210,000

1994 $202,000

1995 $200,500

1996 $199,000

1997 $203,000

1998$227,500 1999 $249,000 2000 $275,000

Schools and 2000 API scores**

Brookhaven E.S.: 10

Golden E.S.: 10

Key E.S.: N/A

Morse E.S.: 5

Ruby Drive E.S.: 2

Sierra Vista E.S.: 9

Tynes E.S.: 3

Van Buren E.S.: 9

Wagner E.S.: 8

Kraemer M.S.: 5

Tuffree M.S.: 10

El Camino Real H.S.: N/A

El Dorado H.S.: 9

Valencia H.S.: 5

Transportation

No bus or train station; six Orange County Transportation Authority bus routes go through the city.

Crime Statistics

For the year 2000:

Homicide: 1 (down 50% from last year)

Rape: 1 (down 50%)

Assaults: 194 (down 20%)

Robberies: 27 (up 23%)

Commercial burglary: 99 (down 12%)

Residential burglary: 79 (down 10%)

Theft: 517 (up 4%)

Auto theft: 114 (up 6%)

Attractions

Bradford House: historical home, open for tours.

George Key Ranch: historical home, open for tours; often the site of community events, concerts and historical re-enactments.

Placita Santa Fe (Placentia’s old town): small businesses and restaurants.

Alta Vista Country Club

Los Vaqueros Recreation Center

Web Sites

https://www.placentia.org,

https://www.bradfordhouse.com

*Prices are for single-family resales. Source: DataQuick Information Services, La Jolla.

**The Academic Performance Index, based on students’ scores on the Stanford 9 standardized basic skills test, ranks schools from 1 to 10 showing how they compare with schools statewide.

Other sources: Orange County Department of Education Web site, Placentia Police Department, Placentia Chamber of Commerce, City of Placentia Average, Marty Richards of RE/MAX Realty Center in Yorba Linda.