Workers at Some City Halls Are Getting a Vacation Windfall

Employees in at least three Orange County cities are getting a treat many Americans don’t experience anymore: a genuine Christmas vacation.

Irvine and Garden Grove city halls will be closed more than a week beginning today. Mission Viejo’s will be closed Monday through Jan. 2.

Workers, who will receive full pay, are feeling merry.

But some residents and others who do end-of-the-year business with the cities are a little less joyful.

“I need to get an extra bedroom on my house, I’ve got a baby in here,” said Sherri Plooster, who is more than seven months pregnant with her fourth child. She was rushing into Irvine City Hall to submit revised blueprints Thursday, the last day planners and inspectors told her they would be available until after New Year’s Day.

“Now I’ve got to wait at least two weeks to have the guy check my plans and before my contractor can begin demolition,” she said. “It’s one more frustration. I personally don’t think this is a good idea.”

She said her husband, a senior vice president at a mortgage firm, gets one day off: Christmas. The end of the year is one of his busiest times, with people eager to complete purchases, refinance for tax purposes, or just get into their new homes.

Mission Viejo has taken what it calls a “winter closure” between Christmas and New Year’s Day for four years, said City Manager Dan Joseph. He thinks most residents have grown used to it.

This year, by a quirk of the calendar, there was a little something extra for vacationing employees in all three cities.

In Mission Viejo, with Christmas Eve falling on a Monday, the City Council elected to make that a day off too, rather than have the offices open for one day, then closed again.

In Irvine and Garden Grove, employee associations negotiated the Christmas break into their contracts. They already have every other Friday off because of staggered work schedules, and the day off happened to fall today.

Garden Grove has closed during the holidays for eight years, but Irvine began Christmas vacation in the July 2000 two-year contract. Employees will be required to work Dec. 31; Garden Grove employees get that day off, for a vacation spanning almost two weeks.

Rick Paikoff, director of administrative services in Irvine, said managers considered it a nice incentive that actually saved money, because it was granted in lieu of a larger raise.

He also said that in spite of some last-minute, year-end needs, it typically is a slower time of year for city business.

Irvine senior planner Jennifer Winn said more American cities should go the way of Mexico, where two weeks’ holiday break is the norm. But she said that as it is, “We’re very lucky.”