County Office Building Is Praised on 50th Birthday

About 200 San Diego residents and politicians, past and present, gathered in front of the San Diego County Administration Center on Pacific Highway to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the first structure built in the county to exclusively house government offices.

“They didn’t take it seriously back then,” recalled Samuel Hamill, the lead architect who designed the building. “They all thought it was a typical example of people wasting money.”

No such thoughts, however, were in the minds of those attending Wednesday’s celebrations as Hamill received a standing ovation and a medallion as a symbol of the “blood, sweat, and tears that went into this great accomplishment,” as Supervisor Brian Bilbray put it.

It was also announced that the building, sometimes referred to as the gateway to the city, has been nominated to be included in the National Register of Historic Places.

The 10-story building was built in 1936 during the Great Depression with a $1-million allocation from the Works Progress Administration, a federal agency that provided work to relieve the mass unemployment throughout the nation. Citizens raised an additional $750,000 to finishing the interior and landscape the 18-acre site.

The building, originally known as the Civic Center, was owned jointly by the city and county of San Diego. The city offices moved to a new city hall downtown in 1964, and the county bought out the city’s share for $3.3 million.

Along the more than 200,000 square feet of steel and reinforced concrete, visitors can marvel at the mission tile roof and the modified Spanish Colonial style design adorned with gold and azure tiles. There’s also a 150-foot tower that had to be cut by a third of its proposed size to accommodate passing aircraft.

There are two mottoes inscribed on the building--”The Noblest Motive Is the Public Good” over the west entrance and “Good Government Demands the Intelligent Interest of Every Citizen” in the mosaic in the floor of the foyer, and carved over the east entrance.

Paying tribute to the beauty of the building, Supervisor Leon Williams said: “She exudes an ambiance that promotes the spirit of its residents.”

Robert C. Cozens, former Board of Supervisors chairman, said: “Elected officials come and go, but this building stands as the golden link between the government and the people.”

“She’s not an old past,” Bilbray said, “she’s the shining, glowing future.”

Hamill, the chief designer of the team of four architects who designed the building, said he had not expected such acclaim for the building but “we did our best to guarantee it would someday be a historical monument.”