© 1997 Antelope Valley Press, Palmdale, California, USA (805) 273-2700
On the upside for 1997, Palmdale was named America's fourth fastest-growing municipality with more than 100,000 residents and was selected as a job-attracting state enterprise zone.
The city is awaiting the opening of three large job-producing businesses; making progress establishing a 23-acre outdoor aircraft museum; getting a much-needed facelift for its central business district; and looking to hire six new employees.
Palmdale residents have already seen the opening of the 10acre Funland USA entertainment park with a Little Indy race track, a bumper-boat pond, three ninehole miniature golf courses, a ninestation batting cage and a videogame center with snack bars.
On the downside, the city had to lay off eight employees earlier in the year, including the assistant city manager and the deputy executive director of the Community Redevelopment Agency.
Palmdale taxpayers in half of its housing tracts voted to kill landscaping maintenance. Citizens also watched a huge masterplanned community default and they witnessed an increase in home foreclosures.
Other city developments could go either way.
Plans to revive construction of a downtown civil courthouse are in limbo. Erection of a community college campus on the city's southside might be approved or might not. Also undetermined is whether the city will let builders proceed with two smaller housing projects in the Leona Valley area.
Palmdale opened the year with a foreclosure sale against Ritter Ranch, a 10,625-acre community planned in Leona Valley. The primary lender on the project, Banker's Trust Co. of New York, purchased the property in January after Ritter Ranch Co. closed its doors and declared bankruptcy.
Banker's Trust has renewed efforts to develop the property, obtaining the extension of a conditional use permit allowing it or a co-developer to build up to 713 single-family houses, recreation areas and related improvements on about 137 acres near City Ranch Road and 40th Street West.
A second company, National Investors Financial of Newport Beach, has begun taking steps to construct 539 homes west of the Banker's Trust project and north of Elizabeth Lake Road.
Also in January, developers of the College Park housing and college-campus proposal on the southside requested an indefinite delay while they conferred with local homeowners possible options.
Project designers are preparing to submit a new plan for the 10,000-student campus and an adjacent golf complex and housing development within the next month.
Also in January 1997, the city gained its own sheriff's station commander, Capt. Harold J. "Joe" Hladky. But efforts to relocate Hladky and his deputies to a larger facility have been stymied.
Palmdale received its enterprise-zone status in February. The state tax breaks that accompany the zone have helped induce the Senior Systems Technology company to build a new 130,000-squarefoot plant. B&B Manufacturing company and Dillard's department store have opted to plan new operations in the city.
The city mailed ballots to property owners in February regarding greenbelt maintenance and whether residents wanted to continue paying fees for upkeep of greenery around their housing tracts.
Owners in 91 of 174 tracts voted to continue paying the fees in June. Since then, owners in 33 other tracts have requested a chance to rescind their negative decisions, but the initial vote left the city with $1.2 million less than previously generated through landscaping fees.
The shortfall prompted layoffs of three full-time, one part-time and one temporary worker from municipal jobs - adding to the three workers previously laid off in March in anticipation of reduced funding.
Now, the city is planning to hire six new employees to handle new jobs because Palmdale took responsibility for street-maintenance operations previously handled by the county.
The takeover was made in an attempt to limit the number of layoffs caused by reduced landscaping fees.
In June, city officials announced they would use a combination of municipal park fees, state street funds, and state and county bikeway funds to build a greenbelt park where a row of dilapidated businesses once stood.
In September, work began on a civic center park project intended to further bolster downtown Palmdale's appeal. The park projects were in addition to a $2.7 million children's library, which is at Sierra Highway and Avenue Q-6, as well as improvement to streets and sidewalks throughout the central core.
Worker layoffs and the downtown improvement projects became issues for several mayoral candidates and 10 city council candidates vying for elected office.
Also at issue was the city's increasing home forecloses by the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development and empty storefronts downtown.
As of Oct. 22, there were 453 HUD-owned homes in the city, compared to 240 in October 1996. A study by the city's Department of Economic Development showed the city's business-vacancy rate was 19% vs. 15.9% three years ago.
In November, voters re-elected two incumbents, Mayor Jim Ledford and Councilman Terry Judge, to office and installed a new representative on the panel, Shelley Sorsabal.
Within weeks of the election, the council began taking steps to establish an airpark intended to house the military aircraft built, maintained or tested at Air Force Plant 42.
The park would join other local sites as tourist attractions for fans of aerospace.
The council also resurrected plans to construct a four-room civil courthouse to ease the burden on court facilities in the Antelope Valley. The proposed courthouse is the subject of discussions between the city and Los Angeles County.
Plans for the re-establishment of a full-service emergency care facility in Palmdale are further down the road. But the city, county and the local public hospital district have taken a first step by jointly funding operation of an outpatient general-care clinic at 1529 East Palmdale Blvd.