Two Towns That Won’t Be Celebrating Today : San Clemente: The library was almost built here overlooking the Pacific, but a deadline was missed by two weeks.

Just for a minute, forget Yorba Linda. Picture instead the Nixon presidential library perched on the Marblehead Bluffs in San Clemente with a perfect view of the Pacific Ocean mere yards away.

That picture, however, never left the blueprints. Amid a controversy that divided this beach community three years ago, Nixon and his advisers decided to locate the library next to the Yorba Linda house where he was born, rather than adjacent to the site of his seaside Western White House.

Just as critics are divided about the former President’s place in history, so too are residents and community leaders about whether the library should have been located in their city.

“There’s still no clear-cut opinion about whether the library should have been here,” said San Clemente City Manager Michael W. Parness, referring to the community. “Some people are still upset that it is not here. But others don’t care much about the density and traffic it might have brought.”

For a few years, however, community leaders flirted with the idea of having the library in their city. The creation of the Western White House had placed the small town on the political map, and civic leaders thought that the Nixon library would spur tourism and commercial activity.

Nixon had chosen the Marblehead Bluffs as the site for the library in 1983 after his friend, Irvine developer John Lusk, donated 17 acres of land for the project. There was only one catch: The library project was attached to a controversial 253-acre residential and commercial development proposed by the Lusk Co. of Irvine.

City officials delayed their approval of the development. In 1987, Nixon issued an ultimatum to San Clemente officials: approve the entire project within a month or lose it.

The city’s approval came two weeks after Nixon’s ultimatum expired, but by then the former President had already decided to locate the library next to his birthplace.

The move triggered talk of a recall campaign that never materialized.

Many San Clemente residents believed, however, that the delay in the approval of the project had nothing to do with Nixon’s decision to place the library in Yorba Linda.

Even with the city’s approval, the project still faced a six-month-to-one-year approval process with the California Coastal Commission.

“When Yorba Linda got the library, I was very upset. I felt like going up there and telling them off,” said Councilman Thomas Lorch, who was a major advocate for the project. “Then I realized that Nixon’s heart was there, and it was really his preference of the two.”

Some San Clemente residents thought the proposed site for the library would have been ideal. Many say that having the library on the 75-foot-high Marblehead Bluffs--a scenic, milelong stretch of sandstone cliffs with a 180-degree view of the ocean--would have combined a perfect vacation with an educational experience.

Frank Smith, general manager of the San Clemente Inn, said there were no doubts about the library being a success. The hotel’s display of Nixon memorabilia in its “Bit of History” museum drew crowds of enthusiastic Nixon fans, Smith said.

Other residents, however, feel no loss that the museum ended up in Yorba Linda.

Realtor Bob Farnell, who would have been Nixon’s next-door neighbor had the library been located in San Clemente, is thankful that it wasn’t built here.

“The guy’s a crook,” Farnell said. “And think about the problems we’ve been spared. When he was President and came on weekends, the Secret Service and the Coast Guard took over the beach. Do you know what it’s like seeing six-foot tubular waves and you have to stay out of it because one man is in town.”

The saga involving the Marblehead Bluffs has, however, not ended. Last month, Lusk Co. officials unveiled a plan to build a resort hotel complex, 500 homes and an 18-hole golf course on the site. City officials say the new proposal is likely to meet with the council’s approval.

San Clemente Mayor Candace Haggard said that if she had her way, the Nixon library would have been on Marblehead. Haggard is an Orange County librarian, and she recalls shaking Nixon’s hand at a gathering several years ago.

“The library would have been good for the city,” Haggard said.