School Land Fight: Bills Aid Santa Ana

Bills by two Orange County legislators that would require land at the closed Tustin Marine base to be set aside for Santa Ana schools were approved in their respective houses Thursday.

Easy passage of the bills by Assemblyman Lou Correa (D-Anaheim) and state Sen. Joe Dunn (D-Santa Ana) signaled that each has a solid chance of passing in the opposite house and being sent to the governor for his signature.

The votes fell along party lines--Democrats voting yes and Republicans opposed. The votes were 49 to 27 in the Assembly and 24 to 11 in the Senate.

“Taxpayers own the land, and it makes sense to put that land to its highest use: education,” Dunn said in a joint statement. “It’s a great day,” Correa said.

Correa’s bill, AB 212, requires Tustin to set aside 100 acres on the base for the Santa Ana Unified and Rancho Santiago Community College districts. Dunn’s bill, SB 874, gives priority to building schools over redevelopment.

Tustin Mayor Tracy Wills Worley said the city expected approval of the bills, one of which nearly passed at the end of the last legislative session. She said the city will urge Gov. Gray Davis to veto them.

“We’re hoping the governor would see the merits of the laws we followed,” Worley said. “If we’re not successful there, we’ll hope that in a court of law, federal law supersedes state law.”

But Ruben Smith, an attorney representing the schools, said state redevelopment law plays an important role in base-reuse planning.

“These bills were intended to bring Tustin to the negotiating table,” Smith said. “If there is a settlement, the bills in essence have no effect.”

Tustin has argued that the federal Base Realignment and Closure Act allows the city to determine the ultimate use of property on the closed base. The city wants homes, commercial development and a golf course, as well as schools for Irvine and Tustin, on the 1,561-acre base.

Giving land to Santa Ana would topple the base redevelopment plan, city officials said. The land the schools want--near the intersection of Barranca Parkway and Red Hill Avenue--is to be sold to commercial developers to help pay for streets, utilities and other improvements at the base.

Santa Ana has battled tenaciously for the land in the last year. The districts, which overlap base boundaries, want 100 acres for a kindergarten-through-college campus.

Tustin initially granted the districts’ request for land, but changed its mind, submitting a new plan in 1996 that gave 100 acres to South Orange County Community College District.

In recent weeks, the city offered the Santa Ana districts 37 acres for a community college and elementary school, and more than $20 million. That offer was rejected because officials with the districts said the money wasn’t enough to buy land for a new high school for the severely overcrowded district.

Earlier this month, the districts sued Tustin for its refusal to turn over the land, alleging violation of federal protections against racial discrimination. Officials with both districts--where nine in 10 students are Latino--also complained last week that the 37 acres offered to them were among the most polluted on the base.

Tustin officials have strongly denied allegations of racism, saying their decisions are based solely on economics. They said the federal government is obligated to clean up the base.

Dunn and Correa have argued that forcing the districts to buy land elsewhere means that the state ultimately would be subsidizing redevelopment activities at the base. School officials say there is little land available elsewhere in Santa Ana to build schools; currently, about 25,000 students use portable classrooms.