School Districts, Tustin at Impasse Over Use of Land at Closed Base

Hopes for resolving a stubborn dispute between Tustin and two Santa Ana school districts over land at the closed Tustin Marine base evaporated this week after Tustin presented its final offer and the districts rebuffed it.

“We’re at a standstill,” attorney Ruben A. Smith, representing the Santa Ana Unified School District, said Tuesday. “You can’t negotiate with yourself.”

Tustin made significant concessions in recent weeks but isn’t willing to go further, City Manager William A. Huston said.

“We think we’ve offered everything we reasonably can offer,” he said. “What would be shocking is that we’re so close to a deal that it would be blown up over a relatively marginal difference between the parties.”

Santa Ana Unified and the Rancho Santiago Community College District want a 100-acre piece of the base for a unique kindergarten-through-college campus. The request initially was granted in 1994 by the city and the federal Department of Education. But the city changed its reuse plan and instead offered the land--located within the districts’ boundaries--to the South Orange County Community College District.

Two weeks ago, the city offered 22 acres on the base to Santa Ana Unified, 15 acres to Rancho Santiago and “$20 million-plus” to the districts, Huston said. An attempt by Smith to amend the proposal was rejected. He said the 22 acres would have been enough for an elementary and intermediate school but not enough for a high school. The cash would have covered only half the cost of purchasing a high school site somewhere else.

Smith said Santa Ana Unified asked Tustin to provide land somewhere else for a high school.

School officials said they hope to get the negotiations moving again but have scheduled a news conference Thursday on the matter. Thursday is when Santa Ana officials have said they’ll decide whether to follow through with a threat to sue Tustin for federal civil-rights violations.

“It looks like that’s where we’re headed,” Smith said. The Santa Ana Unified board was briefed on the negotiations Tuesday night.

The districts have accused the city of discriminating against Santa Ana’s mostly Latino students by denying them adequate space on the base while giving additional land to the Irvine and Tustin school districts. If the Santa Ana districts decide to file suit, they must do so by April 16.

Huston said the city has hired a civil-rights attorney and is prepared to go to court if a lawsuit is filed.

He and city officials have strongly denied any racial motivation for the city’s actions. The city cannot give more land to Santa Ana schools, Huston said, because the land is needed for commercial development that will pay for the roads, utilities and other upgrades needed for base redevelopment.

According to the Navy, if the city and districts can’t reach agreement, the decision will rest with the Department of Education. The department has received requests for the land from all three districts.

Meanwhile, with the breakdown in negotiations this week, Assemblyman Lou Correa (D-Santa Ana) and state Sen. Joe Dunn (D-Garden Grove) are poised to introduce legislation in Sacramento to force the city to give up the land.

Correa’s bill, which nearly passed after being introduced last September, would compel the city to give up the land or negotiate a settlement with the school districts. Dunn’s bill would withhold redevelopment funds for the base unless the city turned over the land.

Dunn’s bill would cause the city’s plan for the base to collapse because it would take money from the redevelopment area, Huston said. Correa’s bill contains no such provision.