Redondo Beach council names Herondo park after Bill Brand

The new park about to open underneath the giant “Redondo Beach/King Harbor” sign has been named “Bill Brand Gateway Park.”

City councilmembers confirmed the name Tuesday night, in honor of the late mayor who died in 2024.

The land has been under construction since last fall. Its fences are due to come down by the end of July.

“The park is there because of Bill Brand, and his name should be (associated) with it,” said Mayor Jim Light at the July 7 city council meeting.

Councilman Chadwick Castle cited the late Mayor Brand’s work in Redondo Beach, “and also his stance on the environment.”

“Bill Brand Gateway Park,” Castle put forth. “Or just Bill Brand Park.”

The impetus to choose a name came as the city prepares to send out invitations for a ribbon cutting in August.

Workers broke ground last October under the power lines along Herondo Street, west of Pacific Coast Highway.

The right-of-way is owned by Southern California Edison. The new project beautifies the land with native plants and adds a walking path.

Public input on the name at the July 14 council meeting included a detractor, Joan Irvine, a 2025 mayoral candidate, who said the name would be a reminder of a divisive era of Redondo Beach politics spurred by Brand, which hurt the city’s economy.

Brand started as a city councilman in the early 2000s, casting votes against development plans at King Harbor. He campaigned on “revitalizing, not supersizing” the waterfront. Litigation was part of the lingering aftermath. Brand made his final public appearance on the afternoon of New Year’s Eve, 2023, on the site of the new park, to mark the occasion of the final shutdown of the AES plant, another cause he long advocated.

For the namesake park, initially, the larger area of the land extending downhill was explored for use as sports fields, but the idea was denied by Edison.

In more recent years, an effort to build “passive open space” on the upper plateau gained traction, and SCE approved.

“To grow our open space; we haven’t done that in decades,” said City Manager Mike Witzansky last year as part of his recommendation to the council to fully fund the $1 million project.

Councilmember Paige Kaluderovic abstained from the vote, citing concerns about how much the park would be used.

Witzansky noted that the council’s funding of the project would make it clear to SCE that the city would like to use this land in perpetuity, and that once an Edison license has been established, it is routinely renewed.

“We are park poor,” Mayor Light said then. “It’s an anomaly for a wealthy community. It’s an embarrassment. We’re getting 2.5 acres for about $1 million. I think it’s a bargain.” ER