TUSTIN : District Seeks to Sell 2 Closed School Sites

After failing to get a buyer for the Red Hill school site through competitive bidding, the Tustin Unified School District now plans to seek developers who may be interested in buying or leasing the property.

School officials decided to auction the 10-acre property in June, with a minimum bid of $2.9 million. But on Monday, when the bids were supposed to be unsealed, none had been received, officials said.

Supt. David L. Andrews said that the district needed the money to renovate the former site of the Columbus Tustin Middle School, which closed in 1991. The school was moved to another location. With about $1.5 million to $2 million, enough improvements could be made to reopen the old site by the 1994-95 school year, he said.

“We have to keep moving,” Andrews said during Monday’s school board meeting. “If we wait and ask for new bids, we won’t open on time.”

He said some church groups have expressed interest in buying or leasing the Red Hill school site. The elementary school was closed 11 years ago.

The former site of Guin Foss Elementary, which was closed in 1978, also has been declared surplus property. Rick Bradford, pastor of the Tustin Community Church, said a group of business people are interested in that site.

Joseph Herzig, a parent, asked the board to hire a demographer to study enrollment patterns before selling the school sites.

But Andrews argued that there are only 142 school-age children in Red Hill’s attendance area now, compared to 232 when the school was closed.

“We should have sold this school site in the 1980s, and we (wouldn’t) be having these problems now,” Andrews said.