Builder Aims a Long Shot to to Land the Nixon Library

Developers of an educational park along a picturesque lagoon in Carlsbad have stepped in line for a shot at getting the Richard M. Nixon presidential library if a proposal for the facility in San Clemente falls through.

Sammis Properties, the San Diego-based developer of the $250-million Batiquitos Lagoon Educational Park, has offered to donate a six-acre parcel to the foundation planning the presidential library and archives.

“I think it would be a real jewel for North County,” said Robert Breunig, executive vice president of the Foundation for the 21st Century, a public policy think tank slated for the educational park. “It would bring quite a lot to the area in an educational sense.”

Officials with Sammis Properties have corresponded with the private foundation planning the 80,000-square-foot library and received “polite responses” requesting information on the educational park, he said.

Possible Alternative

Breunig stressed that the Carlsbad facility is not competing with San Clemente to be the site for the library. If the project proves infeasible in the Orange County city, however, Sammis officials hope the Batiquitos park will be considered, he said.

“All we’re doing is offering this site as a possible alternative if their plans in San Clemente don’t come to fruition,” Breunig said. “We wish them luck because they’ve been working hard at it for quite a while. They deserve success. But we’re here to assist the library if the time comes.”

San Clemente was selected as the site for the library four years ago, but development of the facility has stalled. San Clemente officials have objected to plans by the Lusk Co., a Newport Beach builder, for a 253-acre complex that would include the library along with three hotels, 1,500 homes and a commercial center.

Officials in San Clemente say the development would violate the city’s planning guidelines by failing to preserve the scenic bluffs and interior canyons on the property, which is one of the largest remaining parcels of undeveloped oceanfront in Southern California.

Although the city and developer have failed to reach any final agreement on the project after 18 months of negotiations, the Lusk Co. several weeks ago requested a hearing on a specific plan for the site. The San Clemente Planning Commission is scheduled to hear the issue June 2.

Growing Impatient

In the meantime, officials with the Richard Nixon Presidential Archives Foundation have grown impatient with the delays. The foundation has raised $24 million of the $25 million needed for construction of the library and is eager to break ground on the 16.7-acre parcel in San Clemente, according to officials with the group.

“I have every reason to believe that the council and Lusk will work out their differences,” said Anthony R. DiGiovanni, a San Clemente banker and chairman of the local Nixon library committee. “I believe reasonable people can work this sort of thing out.”

But if the San Clemente proposal falls through, the 168-acre Batiquitos Lagoon Educational Park could prove to be an enticing entrant in any renewed competition for the library.

Breunig said the six-acre site that has been earmarked for the library is part of the first phase of the educational park, which has received approvals from both the city and the California Coastal Commission.

Although Carlsbad officials say addition of the library would not require any extra hearings, the matter would likely have to go again before the Coastal Commission, Breunig said. That rehearing, however, would probably pose no problem, he said.

On Wednesday, Sammis officials and a consultant with the Nixon library foundation met with Carlsbad Mayor Claude (Buddy) Lewis and Councilwoman Ann Kulchin to discuss the proposal.

“If it does fall through in San Clemente, it sounds like it would have real good potential for Sammis Properties,” Lewis said. “I think it would certainly be a nice addition to the city.”

Plans for the Batiquitos Lagoon Educational Park call for several colleges, restaurants, convenience and retail stores, a convention center and 423-room hotel, office buildings and 600 homes around the rim of the site.

Among the schools that have agreed to set up shop at the facility are a music conservatory, an architecture school, the public policy think tank and branches of Chapman College and Claremont-McKenna College.

The site, nestled atop the bluffs north of Batiquitos Lagoon, has been graded and the sewers, major water lines, curbs and sidewalks have been installed for the first phase. Construction is to begin soon on 76 single-family homes, according to Breunig. The 60,000-square-foot main educational building will then be built, he said.