STAFF REPORT
Meeting Date:
November 18, 2025
BUSINESS
18 SUBJECT: ADOPTION OF AN OFFICIAL CITY FLAG
RECOMMENDATION: It is recommended that the City Council:
Select one or more alternatives, along the lines of:
1. Direct staff to return to the City Council with a formal resolution adopting the 2013 Cooper Flag as the Official City Flag; or
2. Ask one or more community input groups – such as the Arts Commission – to review the City of Yorba Linda’s process and re-start it in a different manner or ratify the same process to review one or more versions of an Official City Flag; or
3. Provide other direction as determined by the City Council.
SUMMARY OF THE MATTER
.On September 17, 2013, the City Council had a brief presentation during Public Comment from Chad Cooper, “a 27-year resident, a business owner, and soccer coach” about a possible City flag. The flag below was what Mr. Cooper presented, noting that he had talked to “over 500 people” in town about their ideas for a proper City flag:
According to local reports, no further action was taken, though the Council and members of the audience that night applauded Mr. Cooper’s efforts. Mayor Rounaghi looked into this issue further and raised the issue with the City Manager that this remained unresolved. It’s certainly not the most pressing issue of the day, but as the Centennial approaches, it would be meaningful to have an official City Flag – especially one that notes the incorporation year.
This agenda item attempts to pick up where that left off and seeks the Council’s direction on next steps (or to simply adopt the flag).
ADOPTION OF AN OFFICIAL CITY FLAG
November 18, 2025
DISCUSSION
Per an archived article from the Los Angeles Times:
When Chad Cooper's father wanted a flag to fly in his Maryland backyard, he asked his son to send him a Laguna Beach flag. Cooper, who has lived in Laguna for more than 30 years, scoured the city for an official flag and when his search led him to a City Council meeting, he noticed the dais displayed only two — those of the United States and California. He commented on the need for a city flag at the meeting, and the council told him to pursue a design. ‘They loved the idea,’ he said.
City Clerk Lisette Chel-Walker said that, according to former Councilwoman and City Clerk Verna Rollinger, Laguna Beach did have a flag in the 1980s, the result of a design competition. But it was lost after being loaned to the county. That's all the encouragement Cooper needed. He began the process for a new flag and did not take his task lightly. He felt it was his duty to properly represent the city, so he talked to a range of residents from every corner of Laguna Beach to see what the city meant to them. ‘Everybody had a common thread of two things,’ Cooper said. ‘One was the lifeguard tower…and the other was sunsets.’ So, his flag features the Main Beach lifeguard tower in front of an ocean sunset. The city flower, Pelargonium, adorns the base of the design, and the motto ‘artistic freedom’ and the city's founding date, 1927, are on a banner split by the tower.
The flag design process was far more complicated than he imagined, Cooper said. He spent long hours talking to residents, interviewing the Laguna Beach Historical Society and turning to vexillology — the scientific study of the history and symbolism of flags. Though his inspiration for starting the design came from his father, he turned to Laguna Beach's sister city, Menton, in France, and other European flags for inspiration and discovered ‘the more simple the better.’ Cooper came close to stopping last year, but when his father had a stroke, he felt renewed pressure to finish it. Four years after starting, Cooper gifted the finished project to the city at last month's council meeting to a room filled with applause. Mayor Kelly Boyd was absent and has yet to see the flag, but he said he plans to meet and discuss it with Cooper next week. Chel-Walker said the process for the city to officially adopt the flag can begin once a council member requests that the issue be placed on the agenda for a future meeting.
Cooper has handed out more than 30 flags and said that local businesses like Sourced and Ganahl Lumber are flying one, as are a few residents, including former Laguna Beach Mayor Jane Egly. Laguna Beach Cyclery is also flying the flag, and owner Patrick Fetzer said he ‘is proud that he asked me to be the first store to have it.’ Fetzer said people come into the store every day to ask about the flag, and support has been positive. ‘It's a great story and I think that everybody would love to give him a thumbs-up for his perseverance,’ he said.
ADOPTION OF AN OFFICIAL CITY FLAG
November 18, 2025
Mr. Cooper at Public Comment – September 17, 2013
In the spirit of not reinventing the wheel, we reviewed a staff report and process from the City of Yorba Linda from May 2021 (see Attachment 1). The city was in a similar position – it had something approved but not formally by resolution, with a later tabling of the discussion. Yorba Linda decided to do a flag competition, as well as guidance such as:
• Independent rankings / scorings from an appointed City committee; • Assessing flag designs per the North American Vexillological Association’s “Five Principles of Flag Design”, which are:
• Keep it simple: The design should be so basic that a child could draw it from memory. • Use meaningful symbolism: The flag's images, colors, and patterns should directly relate to what it represents.
• Use 2 or 3 basic colors: Limit the number of colors to a few basic ones that contrast well together.
• No lettering or seals: Avoid using words or complex official seals, which are difficult to read from a distance.
• Be distinctive or be related: A flag should be unique, but similarities can be used to show connections between related entities.
ADOPTION OF AN OFFICIAL CITY FLAG
November 18, 2025
All of that noted, Council may want to either adopt the 2013 Cooper Flag as the City’s Official Flag, or conduct a process akin to what Yorba Linda did (noting that we have not assigned resources or a priority to a community outreach effort like this one), ask the Arts Commission to follow a process, or some other concept we haven’t thought about.
FINANCIAL ANALYSIS
The recommended action will have a minimal fiscal impact. A limited number of 2013 Cooper Flags are already available in City storage. If the City Council adopts the flag as the official City Flag, staff will use existing supplies where possible and incur only minor costs to install or replace flags at City facilities, including City Hall, the Police Department, Marine Safety Headquarters, and Fire Stations. These costs are anticipated to be absorbed within the existing department budgets and will not require additional appropriation.
ENVIRONMENTAL ANALYSIS
The recommended action is not a project under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) pursuant to Section 15378(b)(5) of the CEQA Guidelines, as it involves administrative activities of the City that will not result in direct or indirect physical changes in the environment.
ATTACHMENTS
1. City of Yorba Linda Staff Report - Consideration of a New City Flag Design (Pgs. 5-7) Submitted By: Dave Kiff Approved: .David A Kiff
Dave Kiff, City Manager Dave Kiff, City Manager
Report Prepared By: Coordinated With:
Dave Kiff, City Manager Alex Rounaghi, Mayor