Sale of old Killefer school, first in California to desegregate, falls through, latest proposed project is “no more”

Orange Unified School District is back to square one on its plan to sell the site of one of the first schools in California to desegregate.

While the property’s sale sat in limbo, Western States Housing made several adjustments to its proposal for reusing the former Killefer Elementary School on North Lemon Street in its attempt to get the project approved. Which, the Orange City Council did in August, supporting a 24-unit project that would have preserved the historic building and incorporated a new three-story structure. Some neighbors still said the proposed height was too tall and the project would bring more traffic.

Western States Housing was to buy the site for more than $5 million. But that did not happen, and OUSD is now evaluating options, Assistant Superintendent David Rivera said.

Reached by phone, architect Leason Pomeroy of Western State Housing simply said the project is “no more.”

The elementary school was built in 1931, serving the area’s white population. It voluntarily desegregated in 1944, three years before the Mendez, et al. v. Westminster decision mandated California schools integrate.

The school closed in the 1980s, but Santiago Canyon College  used the building for its adult learning center through the 1990s. 

OUSD has tried to sell the site for years. Western State Housing initially proposed a 79-unit, 342-bed apartment targeted at Chapman University students, but substantially scaled down the project to win approval.

Under the plan passed by the council, the developer would have rehabilitated the school building into a six-unit apartment with much of the building’s exterior and interior preserved. The developer would have also built an 18-unit apartment on the site.

The council also required the building to include an education program about the site’s history. It has been added to the National Register of Historic Places.

Council members said when approving the proposal something has to be done about the building.

Otherwise, “It’s not gonna last much longer,” Councilwoman Kim Nichols said.

The Old Towne Preservation Association also pulled back its opposition to the project, echoing Nichols’s point.

“The school is continuing to fall apart,” the association’s president, Sandy Quinn, said. “You can’t just ignore the building.”

But Robert Baca, a former vice president of the Orange Barrio Historical Society, continued to oppose the project, saying it didn’t do enough to preserve the school’s history. He also called it an attempt to gentrify a historically Hispanic neighborhood.

There is no doubt the school site has deteriorated, but the district can do a better job of preserving the historically relevant property, he said. “This is such an important piece of a puzzle for the state because it played such a key role.”