By Jennifer Karmarkar –
In a special meeting, the City Council elected Tuesday to have the city of Fullerton serve as the successor agency to the soon-to-be defunct Fullerton Redevelopment Agency. As such, the city is tasked with winding down the affairs of the agency, paying off enforceable obligations and disposing of agency assets.
The 4-0 vote (Dr. Jones was absent), came less than two weeks after the California Supreme Court upheld Assembly Bill AB26, dissolving the state’s nearly 400 redevelopment agencies. At the same time, the state high court struck down Assembly Bill AB27, which would have allowed redevelopment agencies to remain in existence under a voluntary program that required them to pay a portion of their tax revenues to the State.
Cities were given a deadline of Jan. 13 to elect to serve as successor agency.
The only public comment at Tuesday’s brief meeting came from Jane Rands, who voiced concern about the city doing a “creative interpretation” of the law without public input on decisions.
“I would like things to be made available to the public so there’s a little more above-board visibility as to what’s going on with the city’s resources and money and the bonds that are currently out there and how they will be spent,” Rands said.
City Manager Joe Felz explained that the City Council will act as a processing agency to manage what is already dictated by AB26 on the dissolution of redevelopment. A seven-member oversight committee, already determined by the state, will be formed, Felz said. It will include the mayor, two members of the Orange County Board of Supervisors, one Redevelopment Agency staff member, one Fullerton School District trustee and one North Orange County Community College District trustee.
“They will be taking all the enforceable obligations, the projects the agency currently has, and determining which will continue and which can’t,” Felz said. The committee will also approve payments for the bonds that have already been sold.
Felz added that projects that are ongoing like the Transportation Center parking structure and the new Community Center will be brought to conclusion.
One thing AB26 did not make clear was whether the 20 percent “set aside” funds for low- and moderate-income housing would continue to exist. Legislation (SB654) has been proposed that would allow a city or county to retain the funds on deposit in the agency’s L&M fund.
“We have several million dollars in our accounts in active projects that are frozen until we get more clarity from the State on this,” Felz said.
Story by Jennifer Karmarkar/FullertonStories.com
Could you clarify and the sentence, “Felz added that projects that are ongoing like the Transportation Center parking structure and the new Community Center will be brought to conclusion.”
Does that mean that these projects will be brought to a (hasty?) conclusion and differ from the original plan in an effort to wrap them up quickly? Or does it mean that the projects currently under construction will be seen through to the end and reflect what was originally planned for the sites?
Good questions. We will follow up on that asap.
Thank you for your comment.
Here is a clarification from City Manager Joe Felz:
“Projects currently under construction will be completed as originally designed and approved by the City Council. The two most notable are the new parking structure and the Fullerton Community Center.”
Recently the City “awarded” million in taxpayer dollars to several developers of overpriced and poorly located affordable housing projects near Downtown. Since these projects have not been zoned, approved or appraised it will be interesting to see if the City tries to say these boondoggles are a commitment. One of them is coming to Planning Commission on February 8. I will be interesting to see if the City attempts to grant further approvals to this project even though they don’t technically have the money to subsidize it. Note that the City is paying over $3 million per acre for land worth no more than $1 million per acre.