After 30 years, city’s seal could be changed

BURBANK — The Burbank city seal is celebrating its 30th anniversary this year, prompting some to call for a change to the official insignia, which bears the likeness of two industries that helped define the area, one of which no longer plays a pivotal role.

Found on official city documents, the city’s website and other places, the current hexagonal seal, enacted in 1978, features three iconic testaments to Burbank’s professional environment: a commercial plane, City Hall and a movie reel with a Klieg light.

All three are encased in hexagons above a sun rising over the Verdugo Mountains with the words “Incorporated 1911” underneath and a city of Burbank banner waving from above.

“It is a certificate of authenticity for a city because it’s one of a kind,” City Manager Mary Alvord said. “The city seal is the city’s stamp.”

This is the fourth stamp in Burbank’s 97-year history.

The first seal was adopted in 1911, two months after Burbank became the first incorporated city in the San Fernando Valley.

That seal featured a circle with cantaloupe floating in the center, representative of the principal crop for the 500 residents living in the agricultural community.

Twenty years later, prompted by a desire to accentuate the transformation of Burbank from an agricultural to an urban society of more than 16,000, the city changed its seal. The new insignia featured a plane flying over a shining sun and farmland that sat in the shadow of the Verdugo Mountains.

The change was driven by Lockheed’s move to Burbank in the 1930s, providing a professional boon for the residents.

That theme held until 1946, when the third seal was adopted.

Shifting in shape from a circle to a square, the seal prominently showcased a military plane above factories with a movie reel near the bottom, highlighting, for the first time, the major role the film industry played in the city.

The story of the current stamp is mired in debate and revision, said Mary Jane Strickland, director of the Burbank Historical Society and the Public Information Coordinator in 1973, when she helped craft the seal’s trajectory.

“I was in charge of getting a company to design the seal and everybody chimed in, everybody had something to say,” she said. “We originally had stick figures at the bottom and no banner at the top. [One councilman] wanted a city of Burbank banner. One didn’t care what it was as long as it was blue. The artist, who was sitting in the back, just rolled his eyes.”

After many suggestions, designs and revisions, a new city seal was adopted by the City Council on Jan. 1, 1978.

But in 2011, the city will celebrate its centennial, an occasion that some say demands a new insignia to better reflect the standing of Burbank’s industries and its population.

“I like the one in ’27,” Strickland said. “It was simple but said ‘This is Burbank.’ This one is too busy. I prefer something simple and sweet. Something that identifies us.”

Capturing the essence of a city that is more diverse 30 years later, with a changing industry and population demographic, is no easy task, Alvord said.

“It’s hard in one single field to capture the essence of the community,” she said. “They might portray the uniqueness of neighborhoods, such as Rancho, or they may opt to do something that just represents the centennial.”

Updating the seal might require changing some of the symbols.

The aviation industry is not as big an employer as it once was when Lockheed ruled the professional market, while media-related companies are the major employer, accounting for about 30% of Burbank’s workforce.

Some would also like the process of choosing the seal to change as well.

When the current seal was adopted in 1978, the City Council was the sole arbiter of the final product, a process Strickland would like to see changed.

“The council had a lot of control at the time,” she said. “I kept thinking, ‘This is going to be here a long, long time and for five people to decide . . . well, the public has to live with it.’ We should have people submit ideas and put it up for public vote.”

That could be difficult as the city seal may not register on the public’s radar, Alvord said.

“The average resident doesn’t think about the seal,” she said. “But it’s a big deal. It’s a symbol of pride for who you work for and what you represent. Every community has one. It’s a big part of your identity.”