YORBA LINDA : Mayor Defends Push for New High School

Responding to a recall notice filed earlier this month by former councilman Irwin M. Fried, Mayor John M. Gullixson has defended his drive to establish a high school in the district, saying he is fulfilling his campaign promises.

“What causes Mr. Fried to attack myself and my family simply because I pursue campaign promises?” Gullixson wrote in his response this week. “As mayor of Yorba Linda, I have acted to designate undeveloped land for possible future school sites. It’s important that good planning occur now because once those sites are gone we can’t get them back.”

In his notice of intent to recall, Fried accused Gullixson of usurping the authority of the Placentia-Yorba Linda Unified School District Board of Education. Fried said Gullixson’s personal campaign for the high school had caused friction between the school board and the council.

Gullixson has mounted increasing pressure on school officials to pick a site for a future high school in the city, including drafting an ordinance alleging that the school district planned to bus local students out of the city when existing schools are full.

Since his election in 1990, the mayor has frequently said a city the size of Yorba Linda should have its own high school. He has also said that growth in Yorba Linda and Placentia will cause overcrowding at existing high schools.

Fried has 10 days to return to the city clerk copies of the petition he plans to circulate. Once the clerk approves the petitions, the former councilman has 120 days to gather the 6,200 signatures needed to force a recall election.