Bill Nears OK to Give Schools Tustin Acreage

A bill requiring Tustin to turn over 100 acres of land on the former Tustin Marine base for Santa Ana schools is expected to pass today in the state Senate and head to Gov. Gray Davis for his signature.

The bill, by Assemblyman Lou Correa (D-Anaheim), easily passed the Assembly in April. A similar bill by Sen. Joe Dunn (D-Santa Ana) also was approved earlier by the Senate.

Sen. Ross Johnson (R-Irvine) said he will propose an amendment that would rewrite the bill to formalize an offer made two weeks ago by Tustin to give the two Santa Ana districts 37 acres of land, $20 million in cash from property sales and another $18 million in the future. Tustin has valued the deal at $78 million.

“If we as a Legislature are going to involve ourselves in this local dispute, then we should do it in a responsible manner,” Johnson said Wednesday. He said the amendment “would implement a solution that was previously agreed to by all the parties.”

An attorney for the school districts denied that an agreement emerged from a meeting two weeks ago between Tustin officials and the board presidents of Santa Ana Unified and Rancho Santiago Community College districts. There also was no vote by the district boards of trustees.

“Without board approval, there is no deal, so what he’s saying makes no sense,” attorney Martin Burton said.

School officials argued that the land offered to Santa Ana Unified is contaminated and that the city had no alternative sites if the acreage was too tainted for school construction. Tustin offered to buy a $20-million insurance policy to cover unknown toxics that might be discovered later.

“The board was conceptually in agreement with the proposal, provided we got clean land,” board attorney Ruben Smith said.

The districts want the 100 acres for a unique kindergarten-through-college campus. The districts are among the most overcrowded in the state.

The districts were approved for the land in 1994 but a change in state law allowed Tustin to redraft its plan for the base. A new plan submitted in 1996, approved by the Navy earlier this year, set aside the land that had been earmarked for Santa Ana for the South Orange County Community College District.

About 120 acres of the 1,561-acre base is within the Santa Ana schools’ boundaries. Tustin officials have said that they cannot turn over all of the property to Santa Ana because it is needed for commercial development to pay for streets, utilities and other improvements necessary for redevelopment.

Johnson, working on Tustin’s behalf, scuttled a similar bill late last year when time ran out on the legislative session before a Senate vote could be taken.