By Rick Wagner, Vice President
This document is in the public domain, for presentation to the club membership at the December 13, 2006 meeting at the Torrance Airport, 7:00 PM.
President: Bob Dye. Secretary: Andrea Wagner. Treasurer: Carrie Lang.
The Torrance City Council meeting of Tuesday, December 12, 2006, was held at Torrance City Hall in the Council Chambers. Scheduled to begin at 7:00 PM, the meeting started 10 minutes late. All council members were present (Tom Brewer, Paul Nowatka, Hope Witkowsky, Frank Scotto (Mayor and council chairman), Pat McIntyre, Paul Sutherland, and Gene Drevno) and the published agenda was followed exactly, as usual.
Club member and Councilwoman Hope Witkowsky gave the non-sectarian invocation, asking that the best interests of the city be among our guiding principles. The Consent Calendar was not modified and passed unanimously.
Of the administrative matters on the agenda, the first one (12A), to set priorities for submittal of funding requests for State bond money for transit and parks infrastructure, was perhaps the most important. The Torrance Democratic Club (TDC) endorsed the recently passed State bond measures (propositions 1B, 1C, 1D and 84) and many of us worked for their passage. I am pleased that Torrance is “on the ball” and getting its priorities straight and its funding requests in early. There was some discussion and some slight changes requested. The recommendations of the City Manager for funding priorities were then passed unanimously.
My son, Thomas Wagner, a senior at West High, also attended the City Council meeting as part of a school project. Councilman Tom Brewer greeted my son and chatted with him for a time during the brief mid-session recess.
The public hearing item on the agenda (13A) concerned a resolution to establish fees associated with the parking of oversized vehicles (includes RVs and trailers) on public streets. The ordinance regulating RV parking was passed earlier this year and this resolution concerned only the fee structure. This item stimulated a lot of public comments. There was considerable expressed sentiment that the fees were unreasonable and a hardship on many RV owners. A few citizens, including former Mayor and RV owner Dee Hardison, [1] spoke for the “responsible RV owners” who assume storage and registration costs when they make their decisions to purchase RVs. They know that storing an RV on the streets is externalizing the RV owner’s costs (to the community) and presents a nuisance for their neighbors. Therefore, the responsible RV owners store their RVs at storage facilities and only keep them on the street in front of their own homes when preparing for a trip or on return for unloading. The resolution was modified slightly to specify a one-time registration fee and to reduce the cost impact for seniors with low incomes.
[1] See The Congressional Record, April 9, 2002, “Honoring the Career of Torrance Mayor Dee Hardison,” by Jane Harman. http://www.house.gov/harman/issues/statements/107/040902ST_Hardison.html