CITYSCAPE ROUNDUP:Santa’s toy bag only half full

The Orange County Toy Collaborative Warehouse for Spark of Love, Toys for Tots, Operation Santa Claus and St. Vincent de Paul is working to complete requests for more than 350,000 toys this holiday season.

Without a huge increase in donations, the warehouse will not be able to fill orders, leaving thousands of needy children in Orange County communities without a toy for the holidays. Toys are urgently needed for distribution on Sunday to the agencies.

As of last week, the agency was 200,000 toys short.

All local fire stations and CVS Stores in Orange County are serving as collection sites for the public to drop off new, unwrapped toys or sports equipment.

In Laguna Beach, toys are also not piling up as they usually do in the bins located at all four fire stations, said Fire Cpt. Patrick Brennan, coordinator of the event.

Toys are also being collected at the Police Department at City Hall, 505 Forest Ave.

For more information, contact Fire Cpt. Patrick Brennan, (949) 497-0709 or [email protected]

Christmas tree recycling, dropoff planned

The City of Laguna Beach and Waste Management of Orange County are sponsoring a drop-off Christmas tree recycling program for residents of Laguna Beach from Dec. 26, through Jan. 7.

Laguna Beach residents may take their trees to the Laguna Beach City Hall employees’ parking lot at the intersection of Laguna Canyon Road and Forest Avenue.

Waste Management customers with curbside service can recycle their Christmas trees by placing the trees at the curb or in their greenwaste carts on their scheduled pick-up day. Trees greater than six feet tall must be cut in half.

Trees will be picked up for recycling during the two weeks following Christmas, beginning Dec. 26. Be sure to remove all decorations, including ornaments, tinsel, lights and the tree stand. Flocked trees cannot be recycled, but will be collected if they are placed at the curb.

During this period, bulky item collection — the scheduled retrieval of items such as furniture or appliances - will be suspended in order to devote resources to Christmas tree collection. Regular bulky item service will resume on Jan. 15.

Trees collected in the curbside program will be mulched for reuse as alternative daily cover, which is the cover material placed on the active face of a landfill at the end of each day to protect against fires, odors, blowing litter and scavenging.

Trash pick-up delayed during holidays

Because Christmas and New Year’s Day both fall on Mondays, Waste Management’s waste and recycling pick-up schedules will be delayed by one day during the weeks of Dec. 25 and Jan. 1.

Customers in Laguna Beach should place their bins out for pick-up one day later than usual during both weeks, beginning on Dec. 26 through Dec. 30, and also Jan. 2 through Jan. 6:

Customers who usually receive service on Monday will instead receive it Tuesday, and so on throughout the remainder of the week, with Friday’s customers receiving service on Saturday.

All Waste Management of Orange County operations will be closed on Dec. 25 and Jan. 1.

Orange County customer service is available at (949) 642-1191 Monday through Friday from 7 a.m. to 5 p.m., and Saturday from 8 a.m. to noon.

For more information, log onto www.wmorangecounty.com.

Boat landing planned at 1000 Steps Thursday

South Coast Water District has rescheduled a test boat landing at Thousand Steps Beach in South Laguna for Thursday at 8 am.

The landing of the 76-foot crew boat is planned during high tide, but is subject to that day’s weather and surf conditions, said district spokeswoman Linda Homscheid.

The boat is part of a major project to repair a sewer tunnel along the coast. The tunnel repair work will begin the week of Jan. 15, not the week of Jan. 8 as previously announced.

The boat will deliver supplies and materials as workers begin the first phase of the repair project: enlarging the tunnel entry and replacing the tunnel door.

For more information, contact (949) 499-4555 or visit www.scwd.org

‘Choices and Change’ at Woman’s Club

Marion Jacobs will discuss her findings about the process of change at the 7:15 p.m. Thursday, Jan. 18 meeting of the Laguna Beach Woman’s Club. She will also share some techniques distilled from her years of academic research and clinical experience.

Part of the Women’s Leadership Series sponsored by the Woman’s Club, this program is titled “Choices and Change,” and is open to the public.

Jacobs’ book, “Take Charge Living: How to Recast Your Life in Six Acts,” was recently published. She is former director of the UCI Counseling Center and of the UCLA Psychology Clinic, where she trained graduate students. Jacobs is a practicing clinical psychologist who lives in Laguna Beach.

She will also answer questions and sign copies of her book.

The Woman’s Club is located at 286 St. Ann’s Drive (corner of Glenneyre Street). This free event is appropriate for women of all ages. For more information, call (949) 497-1200.