The future of Orange County’s biggest public park could be in jeopardy as city leaders are wrestling with how to pay for the many multi-million dollar amenities they’ve promised to residents over the years.
Last week, city council members got a rare public warning from staff about the park’s finances, with officials noting that without some changes the park would begin losing money over the next few years.
“Without doing balancing measures, by the time we hit 2031-32 we’d be out of money completely,” said Great Park Director Steve Torelli at the Feb. 24 council meeting. “We need to start looking at the Great Park as a crown jewel amenity that maybe deserves a little more attention.”
Torelli had a few recommendations to fix the problems, noting it would likely see an increase in user fees at the park alongside an increasing number of sponsorships, along with possible discussions for a hotel to help generate more tax revenue.
“It’s a very minor fee increase,” Torelli said in an interview after the meeting. “We’re not asking for it to fatten the city’s surplus, we need it to keep the doors open. I don’t think the budget’s been in a situation where we’ve had to make those kinds of asks in the past.”
Right now, the park is funded through special Mello-Roos property taxes on nearby homes, with a ban on using money from the general fund to help build amenities or maintain the property.
[Read: The Great Park Tax: How Irvine Homeowners are Paying for the City’s Big Dreams]
While the park has been in development since 2003, it’s gone through numerous redesigns and shifts, with city staff ultimately giving up on introducing a master plan for development, instead utilizing a framework plan that’s more open to change.
Since then, most of the park’s signature projects like an amphitheater still haven’t broken ground, with city council members regularly discussing ideas for other new projects like a library.
[Read: Irvine City Council Splits on Plans for Future of Great Park]
The park has also been the target of multiple Orange County Grand Jury investigations, highlighting the park’s failure to hit construction deadlines for over a decade and questions around mismanagement.
“The project shifted course several times without a sense of direction,” grand jurors wrote in 2015. “To the public the project seemed stultified and lacked leadership and direction. Unfortunately, what the public got bears little semblance to the pipedreams they were sold.”
Last week, City Manager Sean Crumby announced OC Music and Dance was backing out on their promise to finance and build a new headquarters in the park.
Torelli noted he’d be bringing multiple discussions before the city council over the next six months with ways to boost the park’s revenue, including increasing user fees, and said they were still moving forward on the amphitheater.
“The amphitheater revenue really subsidizes the operations and maintenance for that section of the park,” Torelli said. “We’re very confident in the size of it, we think the location and design of it is pretty stellar.”
Councilwoman Melinda Liu also mentioned at the council’s Feb. 24 meeting that she wants more details on the fees moving forward.
“It just doesn’t look like a sustainable model right now without making changes,” Liu said.
So far, city council members haven’t said much publicly about the income concerns and all but one didn’t return calls for comment on the issue.
In a Monday interview, Councilwoman Kathleen Treseder urged her colleagues to pause their “pet projects” and focus on stabilizing finances before they moved forward with adding more things to the park.
“When you actually go and calculate what our expenses are and our projections, like the most possible money, it’s clear we have out planned our intake,” Treseder said. “The bottom line is we are going to have to show a lot of self discipline as a council to not overload our budget and not make promises that we can’t keep.”
Noah Biesiada is a Voice of OC reporter. Contact him at nbiesiada@voiceofoc.org.