Public Safety Building Plan Moves Ahead Remake for Civic Center envisioned

By Jim Tortolano Orange County Tribune

The proposed new Public Safety building took a step forward on Tuesday night as the Garden Grove City Council heard a report on the status of the project and approved $1.2 million to planners and consultants for the facility. “I’m really excited about this,” said Mayor Pro Tem George Brietigam (District 1). “It is long overdue.”

Proposed is not just construction of a new police department facility, but also a parking structure and a new public park as the entire Civic Center –bordered by Euclid Street, Acacia Parkway, Stanford Avenue and 8th Street –would undergo a remake.

The entire project is estimated to cost $108 million, and will replace most of an aging Public Safety building that opened in the early 1970s and which is considered too cramped, without sprinklers or proper Americans with Disability access.

While no final decision

Flowers bloom on Main; Tet parade draws crowd

Two events celebrating “The Year of the Cat” were mostly purr-fect in Garden Grove and Westminster this weekend.

A new celebration for the lunar new year is “Flower Street on Historic Main Street” in downtown Garden Grove on Saturday and Sunday. Based on the “flower streets” that are popular in many Asian cities, it featured displays of flowers, giant petaldecorated figures including two dragons and a towering cat, and a variety of entertainment.

The event was held on one block of Main Street, the heart of the city’s original central business district.

On Bolsa Avenue in Westminster on Sunday the annual Tet Festival

ON MONDAY NIGHT, hundreds filled the Garden Grove Community Meeting Center to celebrate the official swearing in of Garden Grove’s 14th police chief Amir El-Farra. Chief El-Farra took his official oath and was pinned his badge before members of the Garden Grove City Council, other elected officials, family, friends, professional colleagues, and many others (City of GG photo).

Madcap bliss with 2 wives

An 180-day time extension was approved Tuesday night by the Stanton City Council on an agreement with a group seeking to build a 161-unit multifamily project.

The council voted 5-0 to extend an exclusive negotiating agreement with Brandywine Acquisitions Group, C&C Development Company and National Community Renaissance of California which are partnering to build apartment homes in the area of Magnolia Avenue and Pacific Avenue.

The City of Stanton has been purchasing properties in the area which would be demolished and replaced with newer housing.

The 180-day extension is intended to give the the partners time to negotiate a disposition and development agreement which would help clear the way for the project to proceed.

FORMER WESTMINSTER Mayor Tri Ta, now a state legislator, in traditonal Vietnamese dress at Tet Parade (Photo by Terry Rains).