Accommodating Growth by Devin Garcia
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COMMUNITY Fullerto♥ n bsCeALErNDAvR Peage 1r 4-15 O EAR FULLERTON’S ONLY INDEPENDENT NEWS • Est.1978 (printed on 20% recycled paper) • Y 39 #2 • EARLY FEBRUARY 2017 Submissions: [email protected] • Contact: (714) 525-6402 • Read Online at : www.fullertonobserver.com Fox Block Development A community meeting to receive information and public input for development of several city-owned properties near the Fox Theater and Angelo’s & Vinci’s Ristorante will take place Wed, Feb. 1 at 6pm in the Fullerton Public Library, 353 W. Commonwealth Ave. If you can’t make the meeting you can send com - ments to Senior Planner Matt Foulkes to [email protected]. Short Term Rentals A study session regarding proposed regulations for short-term rentals is scheduled at the regular Tuesday, February 21 council session at 6:30pm at City Hall, 303 W. Commonwealth Ave. Public com - ment will be taken and the issue will be brought back to a future meeting for approval. Information and back - ground on this issue are available by visiting www.cityoffullerton.com and clicking on Government, Community Development, and then Short-Term Rentals. Also on the agenda should be Womens March: Lots of Fullertonians participated in the Jan. 21, 2017 historic Womens’ March. Above, Swan Chang with a public hearing about creating a Joint friends, holds a copy of the Observer at the LA March where 750,000 people came. PHOTO BY ERIC CHANG More photos on pages 12 & 13. Powers Agreement for Fullerton/Brea fire departments. Plan to Bury Radioactive Accommodating Growth by Devin Garcia More than 50 residents filled the ing?” Haluza thinks so. Seven thousand Waste in Casks 7 . Osborne Auditorium at the Fullerton new residents called Fullerton their A 7 at San Onofre Beach S D . 5 C I D 1 Library on January 26, to discuss new home in the years from 2010 to 2016. U A E . N P by Bea Foster T D development citywide. Neighbors According to the US Census Bureau, O O E R R N T G A United for Fullerton hosted the evening “the population of Fullerton in 2016 was O R The great-great-grandson of Chief Sitting T A S D I E T E forum where Fullerton Community about 142,000 people.” L N Bull, Chief Delbert Black Fox Pomani, of the S M R L A O P R Development Director Karen Haluza How is our housing stock keeping up T U Wanagi Ska Dakota gave a talk about the pre - P E S F P spoke about the concerns regarding with the growth of our city’s population? ciousness of water and the San Onofre Power future developments in the city. Well, it isn’t, said Haluza. For the 7,000 Plant, where 3.6 million pounds of radioactive “Good things can happen when people new people coming into the city, only waste is scheduled to be stored 100 feet from care about our community and are 928 units were built. The US Census the ocean shore. The Anaheim Unitarian informed and involved,” read a slide in reported that there are about three peo - Church hosted the session on Jan 14. Haluza’s powerpoint, as she discussed the ple per household in Fullerton. This Also speaking was Charles Langley, San importance of making decisions “bene - means that ideally the units needed to Diego resident and Executive Director of fitting the entire city.” accommodate the population coming in Public Watchdogs.com. Charles is challenging Many Fullertonians may ask them - should have been more than double this imminent danger at San Onofre Nuclear T selves, “ Do we really need more hous - those built. Continued on page 5 Power Plant. He related how the thin metal N E L casks that will house the spent uranium rods L D measure a mere 5/8 inch. The Holtec manu - A I C Residents Launch Ballot Petition S 2 E factured casks are guaranteed for only 25 years S E 0 R I by the company. They are vented, thus leaking E 4 R T to Block Red Oak Development V 6 R radioactive vapors into the air, contaminating - R T E E 5 V Local residents who disagree with the Zoning Ordinance, General Plan the surrounding environment. If these casks S N 2 D B E 5 recent city council approval of the Red Revision, and an environmental impact are disturbed, once buried, by an earthquake, A - R O 4 Oak high-density development are circu - Mitigated Negative Declaration. These tsunami or climate change affected rising tides, O R E 1 cracks are inevitable. T lating a petition for a referendum to put entitlements allow the project to be built 7 U H T C the issue to a vote before Fullerton resi - once a Major Site Plan is approved. Each cask will hold cesium-137, much dead - N I dents. Because a majority of councilmembers lier than the toxic refuse dumped at R O Red Oak is a two-block, 295-unit, 4 said that they wanted to revisit the pro - Chernobyl. Fifty casks were loaded at San story, 610,182 square foot mixed-use ject’s parking deficiencies and ask the Onofre in 2003, which could possibly be luxury apartment project on the former developer to significantly reduce the cracking already. The walls of those casks at site of the Mullahey Chevrolet dealership height and large massing of the build - 1/2 inch are even thinner, and were guaranteed at 600 W. Commonwealth. ings, the project’s Major Site Plan was for only 2 years. Other countries use 20-inch The city council approved key devel - not approved and will instead come back thick casks to store their nuclear waste. opment entitlements in a 4-1 vote before the council at 6:30pm, Tuesday, The Nuclear Regulatory Agency blasts (Whitaker opposing) on January 17th. March 7th at the meeting at city hall. Southern California Edison for these danger - Approved items include: a Specific Plan Continued on page 5 ous problems. “San Onofre Nuclear Power Plant has the worst safety record of any of the 4 Nuclear reactors in the U.S.,” according to 3 Homeless Veteran’s Village Approved 8 N 2 NRC documents. R 9 1 The Orange County Board of units and on-site offices for support serv - O 5 E Orange County Geologist Robert Pope A 0 T Supervisors, on January 24, approved a ices on 2.34-acres of unimproved vacant V 7 C highlighted the probability of a large earth - R R X N lease agreement with Mercy Housing to land owned by the Orange County E E O quake near the San Onofre location. The O L S B develop a proposed Veteran’s Village in Flood Control District. The Village will T Inglewood-Newport Fault stretches forty seven R L B O Placentia that will provide housing for provide a wide range of on-site services E P U miles, from Culver City to Newport, and L O L 49 homeless and/or disabled veterans. such as job training and placement, VA F beyond, five miles into the Pacific Ocean. U F Mercy Housing will construct an benefits assistance, and healthcare and apartment complex of 29 fully furnished wellness programs. Continued on page 5 Page 2OBSERVER COMMUNITY OPINIONS CONTINUED ON PAGE 3 EARLY FEBRUARY 2017 Ethics OUT OF MY MIND ullerton What body of power F by Jon Dobrer © 2017 [email protected] in America working Observer at the highest level Thank Trump for Wake-Up Call has never had ethical behavior? The Fullerton Observer Community The U.S. House of Representatives. Newspaper, founded by Ralph and Natalie I want to thank God for Trump. He shows us the weaknesses in our system Kennedy and a group of friends in 1978, is Now they want to shred themselves staffed by local citizen volunteers who create, will rescue us from our idleness and (Electoral College for one) and the of any indication of ethics publish, and distribute the paper throughout complacency. I want to thank all the hypocrisy so abundant with both major by abolishing an Office of Ethics. our community. people who didn’t bestir themselves to parties. This venture is a not-for-profit one with all vote because it was “in the bag,” and all Trump is, I hope, a one-off, a freak of But you can’t abolish ad and subscription revenues plowed back into maintaining and improving our independent, the people who voted for the Green nature, unlikely to be able to pass his what you never had. non-partisan, non-sectarian community news - Party’s Dr. Stein or the Libertarian’s Gary political genes on. He’s not, in any way, The body most associated paper. Johnson and who believed Ralph Nader a true and principled conservative. He with common man Our purpose is to inform Fullerton residents that it really didn’t make any difference didn’t even try to run as one. He grasped has taken the about the institutions and other societal forces since “both parties are the same.” Your two of the “third rails” of conservative lowest common denominator and which most impact their lives, so that they may be empowered to participate in constructive apathy, laziness and irrational faith that doctrine by rejecting interventionist for - elevated it to its highest position. ways to keep and make these private and public good triumphs unassisted without our eign policy and free trade. He also prom - entities serve all residents in lawful, open, just, passionate involvement, has made us ised to save both Social Security and If the roll was called and socially-responsible ways.