Proposed Satellite Campus at Van de Kamp’s Site Praised

A proposed satellite campus for Los Angeles City College has earned the district points with historic preservationists and could be the first major project using funds from a $1.25-billion bond recently approved by voters.

A $30-million education center on the site of the landmark Van de Kamp’s bakery in Glassell Park would make room for about 3,000 more students in an area considered underserved by the Los Angeles Community College District, said college President Mary Spangler.

The Los Angeles Community College Board of Trustees on Wednesday considered buying the seven-acre site for $6.25 million, about half of which would come from a federal grant to preserve the historic site, Spangler said.

The remaining money for the 90,000-square-foot complex could come from City College’s $147-million portion of the bond approved in April.

The acquisition also would be the first major land buy for the district since a 1990 boondoggle purchase of an office building in mid-Wilshire. The district did not occupy the building and sold it for $5.9 million in 1998 at a loss of more than $20 million.

“Some people have that in their memory,” Spangler said. “So we certainly want this to be positive proactive community-supported and, to some extent, a community-directed project.”

The Coalition to Save Van de Kamp’s had battled with developer Lucia Properties, which wanted to tear down the 16th-century style Dutch townhouse facade at the former bakery to build a big-box home-improvement store.

Coalition spokesman Andrew Garsten said the group, which represents 250,000 residents in 20 neighborhood organizations, decided that having a college campus instead of a commercial development at the site “offers enough benefits to the community to justify giving up the factory.”