McCormick Ranch Real Estate & Homes

It sure looks like McCormick Ranch was one of the greatest legacies of George Fretz.

The city’s first planning director who later became the planning guru for Scottsdale’s first master-planned community, McCormick Ranch, has left a legacy as one of the city’s most outstanding and productive visionaries.

George Fretz, who is credited with “having his finger on the pulse of the city” during the 1960s and 1970s, died Friday morning while on a hunting trip with his sons, David and Drew. He was 83.

“I knew George for 35 years,” said McCormick Ranch’s executive director Garth Saager. “He was an outdoorsman and had a cabin at Kenai, Alaska, where we fished for king salmon. We had a lot of fun up there.”

Saager considers the deceased a visionary in league with former Councilman Bill Walton and developer Bill Arthur.

“He was in charge of laying out (McCormick) Ranch when he was city planning director. Later he was hired by Kaiser-Aetna to lay out the subdivisions and the streets,” Saager said.

Arthur was chairman of Scottsdale’s Planning Commission when Fretz arrived in Scottsdale from Chula Vista, Calif., in 1963.

“George was really a great visionary. He had his finger on the pulse of the city,” Arthur said.

Scottsdale’s general plan, sign ordinance, subdivision designs, the Indian Bend Wash Greenbelt, underground utilities and the city’s first master-planned community, McCormick Ranch, were all established during his tenure as planning director, Arthur said.

Bill Schrader, a former Scottsdale mayor, hired Fretz away from the city of Chula Vista.

“He knew nothing about Scottsdale,” Schrader said adding that when Fretz arrived, he liked what he saw and said “I’ll take the job.”

“George laid out the framework for what we have today. He served as our planner until 1970 and then he planned McCormick Ranch which is the most beautiful area in the city,” Schrader said.

“He made us a wonderful city with his vision and his eye to the future as well as the present,” offered historian Patricia Myers. “I live on McCormick Ranch and it’s a beautiful community with small villages within a community.”

Don Prior, an engineering design consultant and former city councilman, first met Fretz in 1971.

“He was a visionary and brought quality development from California and built the first master-planned community in Arizona. (McCormick Ranch) That helped to bring about all the other quality developments that we have today,” Prior said.