Home to a Low-Rent Attitude
Who speaks for Mission Viejo? Who can tell us, with authority, what kind of heart now beats in this community of 95,000 that was bred nearly 40 years ago with every conceivable advantage to achieve suburban success?
Let’s narrow the question. Is the heart of this paradise in 2004 defined by the recent fliers and public statements that describe a proposed affordable-housing development as “the nightmare” or “a ghetto” or, in broad strokes, as the likely repository for all kinds of societal problems?
Is that where the trail has led for this planned community that welcomed its first residents in 1966 and incorporated in 1988?
If so, it’s a sorry path.
The question is on the table because the city Planning Commission has unanimously rejected a proposal that would bring 168 “affordable” apartments to a ridge near a commercial complex. The project would include 99 single-family homes priced at market rates now pushing $825,000.
The project would require a zoning change, and the commissioners are certainly within their bounds not to recommend it. But it did so amid a flurry of citizen complaints about how the lower-income units -- a cluster of one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments -- would diminish the city.
“Stop the Nightmare Before It Starts” was how one flier put it. A flier depicted a face with clearly African American features and referred to graffiti and gang violence. Another resident told the commissioners, “We’ve worked too hard our entire lives to have our neighborhood changed into rentals and low-income projects.”
No matter that the apartments would rent for as much as $1,115. No matter that the income levels needed to qualify would probably include nurses. Or cops. Or teachers in the early years of their careers. Or even some employees at Mission Viejo City Hall.
Or, yes, the feared “service workers” who do things like provide day care for Mission Viejo families or clean their homes. Even then, a housing expert says, the minimum income threshold means a single person making minimum wage probably wouldn’t qualify. It would probably require a couple making minimum wage.
Even that isn’t the point. The point is that, in the face of the thinly veiled racism or heartlessness, not a single commissioner denounced it. Not a one said that isn’t what Mission Viejo is all about.
It’s not as though most communities are begging for low-income housing. But how they react to it says something about them. To name two, Anaheim and Irvine -- through their mayors -- have recently talked about the need for such housing, according to Scott Darrell, the head of a countywide group that pushes for affordable housing.
What about Mission Viejo? “They’re probably at the bottom of the list,” Darrell said.
Michael Hall, a vice president of the company proposing the project, doesn’t want to stir the pot. He notes that the City Council will have the final say in the weeks ahead, and he’s hopeful it will approve the project. But he did say, “I’d like to think some of the things said here were said by individuals and in no way reflect on the community’s sentiment.”
There are defining moments for communities. Some are obvious, some less so.
This is one for Mission Viejo. Commissions and councils have turned down developments before; they’ve refused to change zoning ordinances before. There are often good reasons for doing both.
There are never good reasons to nod while others appeal to baser instincts on race or low-income people.
The Mission Viejo City Council has a couple of decisions to make.
One of them is over a housing project.
The other is over what kind of city it is.
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Dana Parsons’ column appears Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays. He can be reached at (714) 966-7821, at dana.parsons@latimes.com or at The Times’ Orange County edition, 1375 Sunflower Ave., Costa Mesa, CA 92626.
