Rift Between City, Valley-Wide Starts to Get Nasty

Dean Wetter, general manager of Valley-Wide, addresses the Menifee Parks, Recreation and Trails Commission Thursday night. Menifee 24/7 photos: Doug Spoon

On Nov. 10, members of the Riverside Local Agency Formation Commission will determine whether Valley-Wide Recreation and Park District will lose its presence as a maintenance organization in Menifee, giving full control to the City.

Referring to the City's preparations to argue its case for such a detachment from Valley-Wide, Menifee mayor Scott Mann asked Community Services Director Robert Lennox at Wednesday's City Council meeting whether he believed the department had satisfied LAFCO's directive to "demonstrate an ability to run our own parks department."

Lennox's response: "Emphatically, yes."

There are those who would beg to differ -- led, understandably, by representatives of Valley-Wide, which has served Menifee residents on the east side of Interstate 215 for 27 years. How emphatic are they in their objection to the way the Community Services Department has conducted business since its creation in 2014? Well, consider the comments made by one Valley-Wide official during Thursday night's meeting of the Menifee Parks, Recreation and Trails Commission.

"Over the past year and a half, I've observed a troubling trend, in my opinion," said Matt Duarte, a Menifee resident and president of the Valley-Wide board of directors, during the public comments portion of the meeting. "During that time, your director, Mr. Lennox, has demonstrated himself capable of accomplishing one singular task -- blaming other people. First he blamed the county, then it was Valley-Wide, then contractors, and now we're back to Valley-Wide.

"The City has a problem with its general fund and wants to raise taxes. How about instead, dissolve Mr. Lennox's department ... we would be better served spending that money on police rather than a department that creates this type of red tape for our community."

The latest source of contention between the City and Valley-Wide was a subject of Thursday night's meeting -- a discussion item regarding the City's decision in early July to issue a notice of violation and Stop Work Order on Valley-Wide's project to retrofit water lines on parkways along Newport Road with recyclable water lines and replace turf with drought tolerant landscaping. That story was reported in Menifee 24/7 on Aug. 9. These parkways, which motorists passing by can't miss because of the dead grass, are one of several areas in which the issue of authority between the City and Valley-Wide is under question.

Valley-Wide Recreation and Park District is an independent special district established by the state legislature, but Valley-Wide general manager Dean Wetter said it is not a branch of state government. The sometimes confusing connection between this special district and a recently incorporated city appears to be clouding the issue. What's even more confusing is trying to figure out whose fault the latest area of contention really is.

Wetter was invited to Thursday night's meeting to present a response to the City's latest requests for modifications to the retrofit project. In his remarks prior to Wetter's comments, Lennox stated that Valley-Wide receives $3.7 million in taxes from local residents in the areas in question and that although Menifee represents only about 1.7 percent of the district's total geographic area in Riverside County, it collects about 40 percent of its total revenue in Menifee.

Getting into specifics of the retrofit project, Lennox said Valley-Wide was slow in responding to the City's second plan check, forcing the City to order the project stopped because of various unapproved work -- all this as grass, trees and plants continue to die, raising the ire of homeowners in the affected Menifee Lakes community.

Lennox cited a disagreement regarding who has authority over what he said is 44,000 square feet of land along those parkways that are Menifee Lakes Master Association property and not Valley-Wide jurisdiction. He said the City's interpretation over which areas of the parkways are actually the HOA's responsibility would shift additional cost to the residents -- an argument Valley-Wide officials believe is simply a tactic to delay the project and make Valley-Wide look bad heading into the LAFCO hearing.

"Some of Mr. Lennox's factuals were a little selective," Wetter told commission members. "About the 40 percent revenue within a district that's representing only a certain small percentage of the total district ... factually, this is correct. Our revenues come from community investment and financing, so where the improvements are is where we spend our time and efforts."

Regarding efforts to resolve the differences regarding the landscape plans, Wetter said, "We've had Valley-Wide's legal counsel reach out directly to the City's legal counsel and to my knowledge, phone calls have not been returned." He mentioned other City requests and actions he considered unnecessary.

"I can't help but deduce that this is a stall tactic to make Valley-Wide look bad during the detachment process," Wetter said.

Commissioner Rick Croy (right) told Wetter he believed "communication on your end to the city has been extremely poor. I know it's a 'he said, she said', but I don't know why we are looking at hundreds of dying trees out there. A responsible organization wouldn't let that happen."

In response to questioning by commissioner Tom Giedroyce about specific areas of contention within the landscape project, Wetter mentioned two plan changes that Valley-Wide has agreed to, leading Giedroyce to say "it sounds like you are making progress in the right direction and that the project should soon be able to move forward."

Wetter said Valley-Wide has been invited to a meeting with the City and Menifee Lakes HOA regarding the financial implications. Lennox said a date for such a meeting has not been set.

In his comments, Duarte suggested as a possible solution that the HOA agree to indemnify the City from any claims resulting from use of the land, creating no additional expense to homeowners. Ultimately, however, commission members chose not to make a recommendation to the City Council regarding the Stop Work Order, instead voting to simply take the information as a "receive and file" item.

That was just another example of the way City officials have mismanaged the situation, Duarte told Menifee 24/7 after the meeting.

"It's so frustrating," Duarte said. "We're begging for solutions. For them to just receive and file the item with no recommendation ... that's a 'do nothing' approach."

Duarte said he felt the City's decision to create a Community Services Department in 2014, hire Lennox and build a department that now includes approximately 11 full-time employees with a department budget of about $790,000, according to city documents -- all before the detachment from Valley-Wide was to be considered by LAFCO -- was an inappropriate and costly way to force LAFCO's hand and eventually rule in the City's favor.

"I thought a year and a half ago, when Robert was hired, it was putting the cart before the horse," Duarte said. "They hadn't even decided what they were going to do with that side of the freeway. Then when the council decided to contract with Valley-Wide (on the west side of the freeway; action that was later reversed) ... I don't even know what Robert was doing during that time. This is a path they started down a long time ago, but that doesn't mean you just keep going down that path."

In response to Duarte's comments, Lennox today told Menifee 24/7 "it is the City’s preference to not respond to any personal character attacks as it does not assist with the swift and fair resolution for our residents." He also made reference to a comment made by Commissioner Bill Zimmerman during Thursday's meeting that some of Duarte's personal remarks about Lennox were counterproductive and unprofessional.

"The progress and accomplishments of the Community Services Department speak for themselves," Lennox wrote in an email to Menifee 24/7. "As evidenced in the Department’s recently published Annual Report, Menifee tax dollars are being invested wisely and working to enhance the quality of life for all who live here. The Department’s programs served over 93,000 participants and 1,100 volunteers in fiscal year 2015-16."

Lennox referred to a report made by city manager Rob Johnson during a June public budget workshop, stating that the general fund "only minimally supports the Community Services operations, with the majority of the operations funding coming from restricted special tax district funds."

Lennox also cited various accomplishments by the department over the last year and a half, including the Ruth Vreeland Award for Engaging Youth in City Government and Helen Putnam Award, recognizing the City's new Youth Advisory Committee; the City's designation as a "Playful City USA"; and a Valley Health Systems Grant for "Living Healthy, Building Community Program."

Further, Lennox said the formation and expansion of the Community Services Department was in response to a LAFCO directive in 2014 to "establish itself as a reliable service provider of park and recreation programs and facilities within its own territory." Lennox said he is satisfied the City has done that.

"Simply put, the efforts of the City and Community Services Department are not a 'ploy', but rather a set of performance measures we have fulfilled as directed by LAFCO," Lennox said.