He can’t take it with him, but Donald Bren says he’s seen to it that The Irvine Company will survive after he’s gone. “The company is set to operate in perpetuity,” Bren said in his recent businessperson of the year interview with OCBJ (see page 1). Bren, who has several potential heirs, did not specify what would happen to his 100% interest in TIC, valued in the billions of dollars. But characterizing himself as just the latest steward of a 142-year-old company, Bren said his “outstanding” employee teams and independent board (10 of the 12 directors are “outsiders”), would continue TIC’s legacy of planning, development and asset management. And Bren has hinted to associates that there will be a “community benefit” to the ongoing operations, which suggests to the Insider a major role for the Donald Bren Foundation or similar entity. But don’t hold your breath,judging from the way he looked and sounded in the interview, the 74-year-old Bren is going to be in charge for a long time …
Interlocking directorships: Our 2006 businessperson of the year runner-up David Pyott of Allergan sits on the Pacific Life board of honorable mention Tom Sutton, who sits on the TIC board of winner Bren …
In our last issue we picked Loretta Sanchez as politician to watch for 2007, but Garden Grove Councilman Mark Leyes suggests we also keep an eye on OC Rescue Mission prez and new Tustin councilman, Rev. Jim Palmer: “He epitomizes compassionate conservatism” and helps to form “a new working majority of fairly conservative, Republican-leaning, pro-business councilmembers” who will now steer redevelopment of the city’s former Marine base …
Another sign of the softening housing market: Dale Dykema of TD Service Co., Santa Ana, reports: “Foreclosures are on the rise” …
KOCE’s Ed Miskevich has turned 50 but looks 30 …
Classy: Although United Parcel Service transferred exec Rosemary Turner from Southern California to Philadelphia, she returned here to fulfill a speaking commitment with the OC Forum. Jo Ellen Allen says Turner’s talk on executive leadership was “phenomenal” …
Little South County Bank isn’t quite so little anymore. The Rancho Santa Margarita-based business bank, run by Thomas Yott, began 2006 with two offices. Now it has four (counting affiliate Inland Valley Bank in San Moreno). Early this year it plans to add two more, including Surf City Bank in Huntington Beach …
The stereotype: A Reuters account of Orange Coast College student leaders banning the Pledge of Allegiance used an L.A. dateline and described the college as being “in conservative Orange County, California, south of Los Angeles” …
Pringle-ized: At a fund-raiser a couple of months back, Anaheim Mayor Curt Pringle announced Tom Tait’s 50th birthday. But it was really Tait’s 48th, which the Insider learned after unwittingly printing the mayor’s spoof. The Insider should have known better than to read a politician’s lips.
