Three years on, not a lot "great" yet about the Great Park (7/11/08)

I listened to Agran so you don't have to

By FRANK MICKADEIT / The Orange County Register

Hanging out with Angelina Jolie lookalikes, eating gourmet baby food - I've been having way too much fun. The guilt kicking in, I decided to attend some excruciating public event and report my findings. What mind-numbing exercise in self-flagellation could I undertake? How about listening to Larry Agran's State of the Great Park speech?

As I was walking up to Irvine City Hall a couple of minutes late Thursday, I ran into Santa Ana Mayor and Great Park board member Miguel Pulido bailing out. Not a good sign.

In the City Council chambers, Agran was already at the lectern. A friend whispered to me: "You missed the history of the lima bean." Tragically true. Agran had started his speech (a printed copy of which I obtained) by going through the history of the 4,700-acre site. By the time I entered the room, he was halfway through the 20th century.

George W. Bush, in his State of the Union speech this year, took 53 minutes to inform the populace on the welfare of the entire republic. LBJ, during the Vietnam War buildup, took 43 minutes in his 1966 State of the Union. Richard Nixon, at the height of Watergate in 1974, also went 43 minutes. And Ronald Reagan, at the height of the Cold War in 1986, took 31 minutes.

Agran yesterday took 55 minutes.

The prepared part of his speech went 40 minutes. The ad-libbed post-speech introductions of nearly every person in the council chambers and what great things they'd done went another 15. (Even I was introduced, under the category of "doubters, defeatists and professional pessimists" that he railed against. Not quite the same as being a "nattering nabob of negativism," but then Agran is no Agnew.)

And that would have been OK, except Agran left out what I think your average political scientist would agree should be a major part of any annual "State of â¦" speech: What, specifically, had transpired in the previous 12 months. We get a lot of "a vast and beautiful civic space where the restored natural environment and uplifting human experiences are in harmony," but not much in the vein of, "This is where we were exactly one year ago and here is where we are today."

In the nine-page speech, it wasn't until the fourth that he got into anything that's (supposedly) been accomplished in the last 12 months. And even some of that is suspect. He said we have "activated the Irvine Redevelopment Agency" and "concluded a successful $134 million three-way financing plan." As Councilwoman Christina Shea says, the agency was created years ago and the $134 million plan is little more than a "shell game" in the form of a loan.

He talked about having "current fund balance of $299 million" in the Great Park coffers. If you take out what's already been committed to contractors and on loans, the actual balance is about $100 million, Shea says.

But all that's bureaucratic gobbledygook anyway: Bottom line: Three years into this, is there a single ball field? Is there even a specific date by which we'll see a ball field? Finally, on page eight, he addressed the "delivery of a number of public sports fields in the next 18-24 months â¦ "

Firstly, this topic was wedged into a sentence that contained a bunch of other topics, and was never mentioned again. (Meanwhile, he went on about the "stunning achievement of the Great Park Balloon." Which reopens tomorrow. Bring your own parachute.)

Secondly, "delivery of"??? Are the ball parks coming by UPS? I kind of hope so, because that seems to be the only way we're going to get them. Thirdly, so it might be another two years before we get a place for the kids to play soccer - or five full years after the planning began? How hard is it to lay down a few acres of sod and sprinklers?

Also, how about the history Agran left out of his speech? The walkout of board member Dick Sim, the former Irvine Co. exec, who I guarantee you would have had some ball fields built by now. The lavish contracts to the Forde &Mollrich P.R. machine. The revolving CEO door.

So what do we really have to show for the last year? A 27-acre "preview park," much of which will probably have to be torn out anyway, and the resuscitation of that damn balloon.



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