Gates Details Plan for Drug Training Center : Law enforcement: County officer’s report recommends selling South County ranch, but sheriff wants to turn it into a training facility for lawmen.

A narcotics training center that Orange County Sheriff Brad Gates wants to build at a remote South County ranch would cost about $4.3 million to develop fully, according to a Sheriff’s Department report.

The report, shown to county supervisors’ aides last week, is Gates’ most detailed presentation of his plans to turn the 213-acre Rancho del Rio--confiscated in a 1985 drug bust--into a regional training center for lawmen.

But a separate report from the county administrative officer recommends selling the ranch to supplement the Sheriff’s Department budget, which this year is running a deficit of $4 million to $5 million. The Board of Supervisors is expected to consider the recommendation to sell next week. Supervisors’ Chairman Don R. Roth has said he favors selling.

Gates, meanwhile, has been lobbying to convince supervisors that a regional narcotics training center is needed.

Late Monday afternoon, Gates met with County Administrative Officer Ernie Schneider to dispute cost estimates contained in a draft of the report that recommends selling the ranch.

According to Gates’ report, the first-year development phase would cost about $388,000, including construction (using inmate labor), salaries and operating costs. Narcotics-related training would be given to about 20 students a day for 90 days during the first year, said Assistant Sheriff Walt Fath.

Three subsequent development phases, which include plans for additional classrooms and a dog kennel for canine training, student and instructor housing, a dining facility, a swimming pool and two tennis courts, would follow only if there is enough demand for the training, Fath said.

Initial costs would be covered by tuition, fees, regional narcotics suppression program funds and a donation from the Sheriff’s Advisory Council, a residents group, the report says.

It does not detail where some of the money needed for future development would be found, but Fath said the Sheriff’s Advisory Council would probably help out again.

The sheriff’s report also projects that the training center will more than pay for its own operation over several years. But the county staff report says that projection is based on a revenue stream that is “subject to fluctuations.” That, it said, could result in the county having to spend more money.