BY NICK DIAMANTIDES
Staff Writer
Signal Hill Vice Mayor Ellen Ward is seeking her third four-year term on the city council. Ward had worked for municipal governments for 31 years before being elected to the council in 1991. “I retired from the City of Santa Ana in 1990, where I was superintendent of recreation,” she said. “I was there for 10 years. Prior to that I worked in various administrative positions for Paramount, Hawaiian Gardens, and Artesia, and the County of Los Angeles.”
Ward has a bachelors of science degree in recreation education from Cal State at Los Angeles.
Ward said she was very proud of the council’s accomplishments during the past eight years. “We increased the police department by six officers, which enhanced public safety in our city,” she said. “The development of five new parks and hiking trails and the development of Las Brisas Phase I and Phase II apartments were also things that gave me a lot of satisfaction. It was very important to provide more open space and quality housing affordable to low-income people.”
The councilwoman explained that she is running for reelection because she wants to finish some things she helped start. “I want to see the new police department completed,” she said. After that, we need either build a new library or expand the one we now have.”
Ward added that she also wants to be part of the leadership that will bring a new low-income housing project in the vicinity of Signal Hill Elementary School.
“My fourth priority is the North Slope. I would like to keep it natural,” she said. “We had Cal Poly Pomona do a study on it, and they came up with some great ideas.” She explained that converting the vacant parcel now owned by Signal Hill Petroleum into a nature park would benefit everyone in the region. “It needs to be something beautiful and natural,” she added. “We need to do that for the people who live in this area and for the wildlife that we still have.”
Ward noted that serving on the council is one of her greatest pleasures. “I enjoy using my experience to get things done for Signal Hill,” she said. “ I go to Sacramento and I run into people that I knew when I was in city government,” she said, explaining that in her 31 years in municipal government, she built quite a few relationships with people who are now state legislators or members of various state agencies. “And now that I am retired, I have the time to give a lot of my time to serving on the council,” she added.
Ward owned a small business (a Long Beach bar) for 23 years. “My background as a business owner, a municipal government administrator and an elected official have combined to give me a unique perspective on what needs to be done in terms of making a city a better place to work and do business,” she said.
Turning to the present state and national economic crisis, Ward said Signal Hill has already implemented cost-saving measures in anticipation of decreasing revenues. “The council is now only sending one representative to the various functions and conferences that we go to instead of two or three of us going,” she said. “The City of Signal Hill also has a hiring freeze on right now.”
She added that for the past eight years, the city’s budgets have been conservative. “Usually we had about a million dollars more revenues than expenditures,” she said. “Now we are looking at less revenues than expenditures because of the decrease in sales tax revenues, but we are prepared to meet that challenge.”
She explained that the council has always voted to put excess revenue in reserve funds. “We have about six months operating capital in reserves,” she said. “We try not to use that, but if we have to, we will.”
Ward said she does not envision a utility tax being imposed in the city. “Cities that are in trouble have to do something to raise revenue, and a utility users tax is one way to do that,” she said. “Signal Hill is not in trouble, but we are always looking for additional revenue. The transfer station that will open here soon will bring us additional revenue. Eventually that could be as much as $1 million per year, and that will just be one more thing that helps us weather economic storms in the future.”
Ward added that she believes the voters understand the importance of keeping experienced people on the council. “Over the years, we have learned how to get good things done,” she said. “We have been a successful city, and I would like to finish the jobs that I started.”
