Laguna Beach buys hiring site used by day laborers

After years of controversy, the sliver of Laguna Canyon where dozens of men gather most mornings in search of work will become Laguna Beach property in a deal finalized Wednesday.

Laguna Beach’s day laborer hiring site on Laguna Canyon Road has been partially funded by the city for nearly a decade, drawing illegal-immigration protesters and sparking lawsuits.

But until this week, the rugged property, now outfitted with portable toilets and a paid monitor, belonged to the California Department of Transportation.

The California Transportation Commission approved the $18,000 sale of the parcel, which has been a flash point in the region’s illegal immigration debate.

The deal closes a chapter for the center, where Wednesday morning, a couple of dozen men lounged on benches, read religious texts, threw dice and ate rice from a food truck as commuters whizzed by.

“Everyone needs to work,” said Jesus Luna, 58, of San Juan Capistrano, who was seeking a carpentry job with his son, Juan, 27. Dayworkers can make $120 on a good day, but many say business has slowed lately.

“There’s a lot of desperation among us,” said Eduardo Gonzalez, 38, of Santa Ana, who has been coming to the site for eight years.

Caltrans originally appraised the parcel last year for commercial use at $1.2 million, said Pam Gorniak, a spokeswoman for Caltrans District 12, which covers Orange County.

With no prospective buyers and the city rejecting potential commercial uses, Caltrans dropped its asking price to $18,000, said Ricky Rodriguez, a Caltrans official. The city made the only bid for the property, designating it for open space, Rodriguez said.

Laguna Beach residents Eileen Garcia and her husband, George Rivere, ardently oppose the center and are suing the city. They contend that Laguna Beach is spending taxpayer money for illegal purposes, said Paul Orfanedes, director of litigation for Judicial Watch, a conservative legal organization that represents Garcia. The suit, which is slated to be argued before a state appeals court this year, alleges that the use of city funds for the dayworker site violates federal law.

“What the city is doing is facilitating illegal employment, and on both sides,” Orfanedes said. “A lot of municipalities say, ‘We’re just trying to deal with a bad situation.’ Through their choice of policies, they’re actually adding to the problem.”

Since Caltrans discovered two years ago that the city was using state land without a permit, Laguna Beach has leased the narrow parcel for $420 a month.

Operating costs at the site, including paid monitors who organize the men and keep work records, run about $50,000 a year, said David Peck, chairman of the South County Cross Cultural Council, a nonprofit group that runs the center. The city usually covers about half that amount.

“The city’s been behind us pretty consistently -- we assume that’s going to continue,” Peck said. “We hope that people will accept the fact this is a local institution that works for the betterment of the community.”

Garcia said the city could make money from the land by opening a small business, such as a coffee stand. City Manager Ken Frank said the land had “no commercial value, no residential value.”

Workers at the site, which is open six days a week, have photo ID cards that register them as day laborers, and they pay a $2 fee each day to wait for jobs, Peck said, although that amount could change.

The job seekers are not asked about their immigration status. There are at least 120,000 such dayworkers across the country, according to a 2006 academic study.

Before the center was established, workers would congregate on street corners along North Coast Highway.

But the city banned solicitation, except for the designated work center, after complaints of public urination and other inappropriate behavior, Frank said.

“It’s under control, and 99% of our residents like it,” Frank said.

Nearby Lake Forest is fending off an American Civil Liberties Union lawsuit that accuses the city of violating day laborers’ 1st Amendment rights by discouraging them from soliciting work.

The city of Orange tightened requirements for job seekers at its resource center last year, requiring two forms of identification and other documentation.

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susannah.rosenblatt@latimes.com