Year after year, crime statistics consistently rank Laguna Woods among the five safest cities in California.
And Laguna Woods Village, a gated community that’s home to about 18,000 people aged 55 and over, is even safer.
Suspected transgressions in the community are usually solved before police even arrive.
“We get calls from individuals who say they are missing a purse or another item,” said Orange County Sheriff’s Department Lt. Ken Burmood, chief of police services for Laguna Woods. “Security employees help them retrace their steps and almost always locate the items.”
Yet officials plan to spend millions of dollars on a high-tech security system – citing a study that labeled the village vulnerable.
“It will bring us into the 21st Century,” said John Luebbe, director of the Golden Rain Foundation, the community’s powerful homeowners association.
Three weeks ago, the Golden Rain Foundation embarked on a $1.5 million pilot program – the complete overhaul of two major entry points. New bells and whistles at Gates 5 and 6 will includebarrier arms, radio frequency identification readers, license plate recognition and high-definition cameras.
Supporters claim it will preempt misdeeds more serious than petty thefts – and, as a bonus, reduce parking issues created by visitors overstaying their welcome.
But some residents deem the whole thing overkill.
“What are we trying to be – the safest city in the world?” Al Steinberg, 84, noted. “It’s completely unnecessary, and far too expensive for what we’re going to get.”
A fix looking for a problem?
More than 20,000 vehicles a day go in and out of the community, cut into quadrants at the intersection of El Toro Road and Moulton Parkway. Each of the 13 main gates is staffed by two “ambassadors” – gregarious denizens who take the minimum-wage job largely for its social component.
Ambassadors are well suited for cheerfully greeting guests and verifying their status – be they friends dropping by or pizza deliverers. But gate guards also are charged with checking that cars a lane or two over bear residential windshield stickers – no easy task when closer vehicles block the view.
“We have gate runners who just drive right past us in the residents’ lane,” said David Houldsworth, 74, a retired Nottingham, England, police officer and self-dubbed “humble gate ambassador.”
Luebbe pointed to a survey, conducted last week at Gate 3, indicating that about one-third of drivers attempting to enter via the residential lane lacked proper credentials.
“It’s not the ambassadors’ fault they miss cars,” he said. “They can’t possibly check every car.”
In 2014, GRF paid $40,000 for an evaluation conducted by Irvine-based environmental impact consultant Urban Crossroads and Anaheim-based installer California Gate & Entry Systems. After concluding that Laguna Woods Village is “porous from a security standpoint,” the report offered a host of recommendations – most of which will be tried out in the pilot program now underway.
Those suggestions have failed to impress dissenters, who claim they received little information about specifics until after the pilot program was a done deal.
“What problem are we trying to solve?” said resident Bevan Strom, 78. “That has not been answered to my satisfaction.”
“It was an arbitrary decision,” said Bill Margolis, 74. “We weren’t included in the process.”
His wife Sue Margolis, 73, observed, “The few crimes that do occur are usually committed by people invited here – family members, caregivers, contractors.”
Burmood confirmed that “most thefts inside the gates involve people who have knowledge of and access to the property.”
Developed in the early 1960s, the secluded retirement community accounts for 90 percent of its city’s four square miles.
Laguna Woods as a whole counted 117 thefts and two robberies in 2015. But the vast majority of those crimes happened outside the gates near public shopping areas, according to Burmood.
Friendly gate ambassadors
Regardless, when it comes to fortifying their environs, many residents are all in – including ambassador Houldsworth and his Gate 1 coworker Judy Schreiber.
“I know we don’t have a high crime rate like London’s, but a better security system will prevent a lot of little problems,” Houldsworth said.
He particularly likes the introduction of mechanical arms.
“They provide a physical and psychological barrier for criminals,” Houldsworth said.
The colleagues – by coincidence, both British – chuckle about occasional encounters with rudeness.
“People honk their horns because they want us to hurry up,” Schreiber said. “If someone curses, I say, ‘We don’t use that kind of language – we’re grownups, aren’t we?’”
But such incidents are not the norm, she said.
“Most folks like us,” Schreiber said. “You should see this place at Christmas. They bring us all kinds of food and goodies.”
Ambassadors will not be replaced by computers, Luebbe said. They are still needed to process visitors.
The first stage of the security project, which also features new gate houses and landscaping, should be completed by August, Luebbe said.
If everything goes well, the rest of the program could be rolled out at the end of the year, he said.
An expansion encompassing the remaining 11 entrances, Luebbe said, would run between $50,000 and $100,000 per gate – a relative deal compared to the debut’s tab, which included the software system.
Additionally, some of the gate houses will need replacement due to termite damage, Luebbe said. The structures slated for Gates 5 and 6 tallied $764,000.
Most of the costs will be covered from GRF’s $30 million in reserves, Luebbe said. Residents pay about $600 per month in homeowners fees for street maintenance, some utilities and amenities such as the clubhouses and swimming pools.
“The improved gate system will drive up home values,” said Chuck Holland, information technology director for Laguna Woods. “Money spent is money reinvested into the community.”
Norma Benner, 84, said she appreciates not only the beefed up security but also the enhanced regulation of nonresidents who take up parking spaces and use laundry rooms, craft workshops , fitness centers and other amenities.
Benner and other citizens blame parking problems on the Saddleback College Emeritus Institute, which holds classes available to the public at Clubhouse 4.
“We open up to the outside world,” Benner said. “People come for classes and stay all day.”
Marilyn Coleman, 83, who enjoys taking Saddleback art classes, rolls her eyes about oft-stated annoyance over the college’s presence.
“That’s the real issue with some people who want this fancy security system,” she said. “But it’s an awfully expensive way to just manage parking.”
Despite the grumblings, ambassador Schreiber predicts that residents will quickly adapt to the new system and even come to prefer it. Regardless, she expects bumps along the road to Gate 1.
“It’s visitors who will be the problem,” she said. “They’ll choose the residents’ lane, get stuck at the arm and back up traffic. We’ll have to manually lift the arm and tell them to pull over so we can screen them. People don’t read signs.”
As for the naysayers, Schreiber concluded, “Old people are very stubborn and don’t like change. I can say that, because I am one. But we’ll all get into the groove.”