Mayor Praises City’s Public Service Record

In her annual State of the City address Friday, Mayor Joanne Coontz emphasized strides the city has made in improving services to the public and luring in new businesses.

“Teamwork, communication and partnership were the reasons why 1996 was a strong year for the city of Orange,” she said.

In keeping with those themes, she announced that the city will consider plans for a new community center in the year ahead. The mayor also described a new police program that would offer classes to business owners to help them fight white-collar crime.

The “business academy” would include instruction in doing background checks on new employees, handling fraud, bad checks, robberies and embezzlement. The classes would be taught by police and fire personnel.

“We think this program has absolutely tremendous potential,” Police Chief John R. Robertson said.

The department needs to find grant money for a coordinator before the program can begin, he said. If the search for funds goes well, the classes could begin within a few months.

Coontz, accenting the positive, described the city’s leap into the technology age over the past months.

Officials have installed a new computer system that will help residents and businesses get information faster, she said.

The library is also installing new technology, she said.

Among other highlights of the past year, economic development officials signed an agreement with Mills Corp. of Washington to build a new mall on the site of the abandoned The City Shopping Center and have lined up the Sports Authority and Off Fifth, a Saks Fifth Avenue outlet, to open stores, Coontz said.