Homeless Shelter Takes Root at Base

The closed Tustin Marine base was reincarnated Saturday when ground was broken for a homeless shelter, the first redevelopment project at the former military facility.

“This has been a long, long road,” Tustin Mayor Jeffery M. Thomas told about 200 people gathered for the ceremony. “It has taken a lot of time and a lot of patience.”

The occasion was a milestone in the saga of Orange County’s two closed military bases whose reuse plans have sparked controversy.

Plans for a commercial airport at the former El Toro base appear to be dead, though the dispute still lingers as proponents of the airport take their fight to the courts.

The 1,600-acre base in Tustin also faced an uncertain future until Thursday when the city of Tustin, which is in charge of redeveloping the base, and the Santa Ana Unified School District announced they had reached a settlement in their eight-year battle over a chunk of the base.

Both bases were slated for closure in the early 1990s, but officially closed their doors in 1999.

The quarrel over the Tustin base threatened its redevelopment because a state law passed last year prohibited Tustin from approving projects until the matter with the school district was resolved.

The law exempted the homeless shelter, but stood in the way of Tustin’s plan to allow construction of homes, businesses and a golf course at the site.

The Department of Navy is to turn over deeds to the land Tuesday.

“It doesn’t get any better than this,” an ebullient Thomas said. “Now, it is kind of a fun climate moving on to Tuesday.”

The mood was decidedly cheerful for backers of the homeless shelter too. The five-acre complex will house 192 men, women and children and include medical and educational facilities. Two barracks will be remodeled and a new facility constructed.

Tustin will lease the land at no cost to Orange County Rescue Mission, a faith-based agency which will run the shelter.

The work is expected to take about two years and when completed, the shelter will be one of the largest facilities of its kind in the country.

“Today, we are actually going to make this thing happen,” said Rescue Mission President Jim Palmer, before hopping on a skip loader and tearing out a slab of asphalt in the parking lot to make way for the shelter’s job-training and medical facilities.

For the Rescue Mission, it was a homecoming of sorts. The founder of the nonprofit, Lewis Whitehead, was a Marine sergeant at the Tustin base who began feeding the area’s homeless 38 years ago with leftover food from the mess halls.

“It is incredible,” Palmer said. “He used to walk across this very site. This brings us full circle.”

Retired Col. William L. Hammerle also completed a circle Saturday. He was base commander from 1993 until 1996, when he retired and settled in Tustin.

Saturday, while watching his former home take on a new life, Hammerle pointed to the base’s old chapel, just beyond the spot where the homeless shelter will sit.

“We had a lot of young Marines get married there, also memorial services,” he said. “That place captured the smiles and tears of this place.”