Fight Over School Site Escalates : Santa Ana May Condemn Land Set for Industrial Use

Santa Ana officials sent a written ultimatum to the local school board Thursday, threatening to condemn a 110-acre tract planned for a multimillion-dollar high-technology center rather than let the board use part of the site for a new high school, The Times has learned.

The letter was sent to the Santa Ana Unified School District board, which voted Tuesday to locate the school on South Grand Avenue next to the site of a McDonnell Douglas project. An official of Santa Fe Land Improvement Co., which owns most of the land involved, said construction of the school would make building the McDonnell complex impossible.

Won’t Let Board Have Site

The City Council and top staff members, following a two-hour strategy-planning session aimed at forcing the Board of Education to find another site for the school, said they simply will not allow the board to claim the 40-acre site.

City officials said the letter would be delivered to board President Joan Wilkinson Thursday evening, giving the board until 1 p.m. Monday to change its mind.

City officials said they would not disclose their planned strategy unless the board fails to meet the deadline. But it was learned that the city is considering buying the entire site from Santa Fe and then selling McDonnell Douglas the land it wants to develop the high-tech center.

Another option considered would be for the city to condemn the entire 110-acre Santa Fe site and proceed with developing a high-tech industrial park that would include the McDonnell Douglas project.

Legal Deficiencies Cited

Two city officials who declined to be identified said the city attorney has uncovered deficiencies in the legal steps the board had taken in choosing the school site, including failure to conform with provisions of the California Environmental Quality Act and government code violations.

Another option discussed by city officials is rezoning the site to ban public buildings.

“The site is not available for a school,” Mayor Daniel E. Griset said in a terse statement after the council’s closed-door meeting. The council criticized the site on grounds of safety because many of the students would be forced to cross busy Grand Avenue to get to and from school, Griset said.

Wilkinson dismissed that concern, saying, “Where is the council when our children have to cross Bristol Street and 17th Street?”

Griset also said the council is concerned with the potential high cost of busing, which he said would be necessary if the school is built on the Grand Avenue site. Wilkinson, however, said flatly that there would be no busing. Students and their parents would be responsible for getting to and from school, she said.

Bob Young, executive vice president of MDC Realty, the real estate arm of McDonnell Douglas, said the aerospace firm’s time constraints require a signed and sealed deal with Santa Fe and the city within 30 days: “It is essential . . . an absolute requirement,” he said.

Additionally, construction “must start” in six months, he said.

City officials say the McDonnell Douglas project would constitute the largest high-tech industrial park in Orange County and would cost $100 million.

Young said that figure “might be a little high” but noted that the land purchase alone would cost $25 million.