WILDOMAR: Cityhood dreams realized

Community officially incorporated on Tuesday

By AARON CLAVERIE - Staff Writer | Tuesday, July 1, 2008 11:19 PM PDT ∞

Wildomar celebrated the first baby born in the city with the birth of Cody Diep on Tuesday. Cody's family, who lives in Lake Elsinore, shown here, includes mother Thuy Diep, father Long Diep and sisters Beatrice Diep, 8, and Allison Diep, 12. Cody was born at 4:52 a.m. and weighed 7 pounds, 15 ounces. (Photo by Steve Thornton - Staff Photographer)

Riverside County Supervisor Bob Buster administered the oath of office to the Wildomar City Council on Tuesday at the city of Wildomar Inauguration Celebration. From left are Sheryl Ade, Scott Farnam, Mayor Bob Cashman, Bridgette Moore and Marsha Swanson. (Photo by Steve Thornton - Staff Photographer)

County Supervisor Bob Buster pins a flower on Wildomar City Councilwoman Marsha Swanson's jacket lapel Tuesday at the city's inauguration ceremony. (Photo by Steve Thornton - Staff Photographer)

The audience at Tuesday's inauguration ceremony applauds after the Wildomar City Council is seated. (Photo by Steve Thornton - Staff Photographer)

WILDOMAR ---- If William Collier, Donald Graham and Margaret Collier Graham were watching over Wildomar on Tuesday night, they surely were beaming with pride.

During a special meeting held at Elsinore High School's football field, the small town the landowners mapped way back in 1885 incorporated as a city, the 25th city in the county and the first city formed in the state during the tenure of Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

The meeting was attended by more than a thousand residents and area dignitaries, including council members from neighboring cities and representatives from the offices of Schwarzenegger, Rep. Darryl Issa, R-Vista, state Assemblyman Kevin Jeffries, R-Murrieta, and Assemblyman John Benoit, R-Riverside.

After Supervisor Bob Buster, a supporter of Wildomar's cityhood efforts, swore in the inaugural council, the audience rose as one and gave the city's elected leaders a standing ovation.

In its first act as a City Council, the council adopted all of Riverside County's ordinances, an action required by state law.

That act fulfilled the last remaining requirement imposed by the county's Local Agency Formation Commission, the agency that approved putting the incorporation question before voters, and Wildomar was officially a city.

"Now, we're legal," said council member Bob Cashman.

Interim City Attorney Julie Hayward Biggs replied, "Now, you're legal."

And the audience applauded en masse once more.

In its second act as a council, members voted 5-0 to name Cashman as its first mayor and Bridgette Moore as mayor pro tem, the council member who fills in for the mayor in his or her absence.

The other members of the council are Sheryl Ade, Scott Farnam and Marsha Swanson.

Wildomar area voters elected the five members in the February election, which also saw voters approve incorporating the community and dividing the city into five districts to elect future council members.

According to historical accounts, Collier, Donald Graham and Margaret Collier Graham always thought Wildomar ---- a name pieced together from the first three letters of their first names ---- would eventually become a city. It had a school in 1886, a hotel in 1887 and a church in 1888, the year Lake Elsinore to the north was incorporated.

But flooding that washed out the railroad, the lifeblood for Lake Elsinore and the other small towns in Southwest County, conspired to put cityhood plans on hold.

As Lake Elsinore's fortunes rose and fell with the level of its namesake lake during the 20th century, Wildomar remained a rural haven for ranchers and retirees.

When housing prices soared in Orange County in the latter part of the last century, the area received an influx of new residents attracted by affordable housing and the area's wide open spaces.

It was those newcomers, a group that included Cashman, who teamed with longtime Wildomar residents to tackle the flooding problem and put the area on the track to cityhood.

There were plenty of obstacles along the way ---- a fact noted by both Buster and Cashman during the meeting ---- but they were cleared in due course.

Buster said that in recent years the residents teamed up to fight for ZIP code unification, which established Wildomar as a distinct mailing address. They also fought off an annexation attempt by Murrieta, which a few years ago was looking to scoop up valuable commercial land along Interstate 15 and new tract homes east of the freeway.

"You have shown that you are a strong and unified community and you have the wherewithal to be an even stronger city," Buster said.

So far, so good.

On Wednesday morning, the city of Wildomar will have a City Hall, temporary office space located in the Oak Creek shopping center, that will be open for business. It has an interim city manager, city attorney, finance director who has served as Pasadena's finance director, and a contract with a consulting firm to provide public works and engineering services. Contact information for those staffers is listed on the city's Web site, www.cityofwildomar.org.

During the meeting, the members of the council and the master of ceremonies, Stan Crippen, thanked all of the volunteers and community leaders who helped make it all happen.

During the business part of the meeting, the council adopted a 4-inch thick stack of ordinances that will serve as the legislative backbone for the city.

In that stack of paperwork, the council approved taxing policies, specified how the mayor and mayor pro tem will be elected by council members in the future, declared the council members as the inaugural planning commission and approved the contracts with the interim staff members. The council also adopted a tentative budget for the fiscal year that started Tuesday. The budget is tentative because many of the economic assumptions in the fiscal analysis used to justify putting incorporation before voters have changed.

Buster addressed the dire financial news, saying that Wildomar will be able to weather the economic downturn while providing better services and a better quality of life for residents.

One of the ordinances that wasn't addressed Tuesday is an agreement with the county Sheriff's Department for contracted police service.

Interim City Manager John Danielson has said that will be addressed in the near future. In the meantime, traffic enforcement is handled by the California Highway Patrol.

Contact staff writer Aaron Claverie at (951) 676-4315, Ext. 2624, or aclaverie@californian.com.

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