Sometimes you wonder what people may be thinking! Hey, you take the “Greatest
Generation”, every veteran in every war fought and the current crop of American
heroes fighting in Iraq, Afganistan and around the world. You have the Holiday Spirit
of giving and sharing…..and what does the Board of Supervisor’s do? Sell the last Blimp
Hanger on Earth to a Realty Group…………for a electronic gaming center!
We might remind those that don’t remember, that the Board of Supervisor’s had
promised the Veterans of Orange County a Four Service Veteran’s Museum for
about 15 years! Promises were made, rings were exchanged……and now what?
You got it…the Bride leaves town with the 4 Carat Diamond Ring…..and the Groom
gets stuck for all the food that won’t get eaten.
So who voted for what? Our friends Bill Campbell, Chris Norby and Tom Wilson
all voted to give the property to Industrial Realty Group. We will have to watch
the campaign finance reports….to see how stupid any of those involved might be.
So who is Industrial Realty Group? Don’t ask us, just go there yourselves:
www.industrialrealtygroup.com
This is no mom and pop outfit. This is a giant Real Estate Developer Group…..
with over 50 Million Square Feet of Industrial Space….just hanging out there.
But what about the Veteran’s? The County Veteran Service had been helping
our Veteran’s create a County Vets Museum. They had plans….they had a
little group of concerned Vets…….who were attempting to get contributions to
build and create the Museum. How much did the County help in this process?
Not much! So, what great minds came to the conclusion that the Museum was
off the table? Who are those staff people? How did they throw out bids to
have Industrial Realty Group get involved? How much sandbagging is still
going on….in this skewed process?
Ok, so why did this issue have to come to a forced Holiday vote? Maybe because
Tom Wilson will be leaving office and won’t be locked in with his feet to the fire?
Maybe because fraudulently, John Moorlach can say….he didn’t for it! All we can
say is: How many members of the Board of Supervisor’s has served in Armed
Forces of our country? We know, too many rhetorical comments about an issue
that shouldn’t even be up for discussion.
The plain and simple is: The Veterans of Orange County were promised a Veteran’s
Museum at the Blimp Hanger. They have been stabbed in the back………and the
picture is not very pretty! So, let’s all go out and get a Game Boy 3 and forget about it!
The “promise” that was made to veterans about the blimp hangar becoming a military museum is that the building would be made available if the veterans could raise the money. There was never any promise made by the Board of Supervisors that public funds would be available to finance such a project. (I will eat these words if soemone can document such a promise.)
Ron.
This is a very bold post. Look how long it took our nation to honor our WWII veterans in Washington, DC with their Memorial. But at least it is there as are Memorials for the veterans of the Korean and Vietnam conflicts. Sorry. I detest the word conflict. These were undeclared “wars” where we lost thousands of American lives.
An aide to a former Supervisor has been very active in this memorial idea. Hopefully he will weigh in with his thoughts.
I can support Supervisor Moorlach’s remarks and NO vote in that he was only sworn into office two weeks ago. Give him some slack. He is already putting in over 40 hours per week just to get up to speed.
Larry Gilbert
There is more to this story that has yet to be covered. There is a local veterans group who have been working for years on saving this hanger in tact. That effort included raisinng funds to achieve that dream.
However let me pose a different question. Yes, BRAC closed the base and there have been plans to build housing on the site.
But why now? What was the urgency to act at this time? We have four currently serving members of the Board of Supervisors including the honorable John Moorlach who was only sworn in on December 5th.
The story I get is that the Veterans did not expect a vote on this issue before next month. I would have waited until all five members of the Board of Supervisors were on the job to give each one a full opportunity to understand the history of the veterans efforts prior to casting this key vote.
Larry G
I for one could care less about an old blimp hangar. Why should the OC taxpayer spends hundreds of thousands on an old building? Is this the only option to honor our veterans?
lets use it to house Frank Ury’s ego. It might be just big enough.
I flew choppers in squadrons that were housed in both blimp hangars between 1990-1994. Several years ago I attended a veterans group meeting held at the Sup’s office to plan for a museum. It was plainly embarrasing.
Last July I went to the Great Park’s meeting for a veterans museum and memorial. That went nowhere and is not part of phase I.
If you want to see a memorial in the OC, visit the Joint Vietnam War Memorial in Westminster. It was dedicated in 2003 with over $1 mil. raised mostly from the Vietnamese community. The City of Westminser, specifically Councilman Frank Fry, was instrumental in a private/public effort that took over six years to come to fruition.
Nobody stepped up to raise private money for the Tustin hangar veteran project. The cause was not noble enough.
Typo. Previous post addressed to Anonymous #5
What does Frank Ury have to do with Ron Winships story?
You are an idiot and are in need of some serious counseling. LG
Is no one curious what this EXTREMELY valuable piece of land is being leased or sold for? I’m also surprised that the local libs haven’t come out and demanded that “affordable” housing be built on it.
Like El Toro, why isn’t this land being sold for development? One couldn’t ask for a better location between freeways and the train.
The vets and everyone else need to come to terms with the obvious: 1) the hangars were purpose-built — they’re not very suitable for doing what they were designed to do — house blimps — if that wasn’t the case, new users would’ve been interested long before now, 2) while they’re interesting, they’re not especially attractive and 3) they must be nightmares to maintain, and somebody’s paying for that.
Hey #7,
I don’t think the hangar is big enough for holding your ego. You are a legend in your own mind.
Your name calling that person reveals just how petty you really are.
When are you getting out of Dodge anyway? Give us a break already!
Virtually all the comments above
probably have some validity. There
is little doubt that the veterans
and their various organizations are
not as prepared as they might be to
fund projects worth over $400 million dollars. These are the
proverbiable “volunteer organizations” that offer two things: ineffecientcy and self
agrandizing back slapping. Having
said all that: Where was the
professional help to assist the
veterans in their quest? Did any
come from the OC Veteran Services
Agency?….no. Did any come from
the Board of Supervisor’s?….no.
So, what happens now? According
to the OC Vets Service…they have
committments for $400 million dollars from Investment Group specifically for this project…..
a 4 Service Veterans Museum. Many
of the powers behind the throne
at OC Vet Service office are now
gone. We can only hope that that
enough pressure will be brought to
bear on the County…..to throw
some funding resources back to an agency that has been cut back with
impunity over the last three years.
Once those Blimp Hangers are gone…we can then refer to the
photos of the “Hindenburg”…..and
remember fondly the story, at our OC County Space and Science Museum. Oh, we don’t have one of those either? So, maybe the 5000
house Tustin has planned for the
site instead…is better. We can
tear those down in 60 years without
any historical implications. And
finally where is the Pechanga Tribe
in all this mess? Didn’t they want
an Indian Gaming Center? Hold on…it could be a happening!
Regarding No. 10. Ron and Anna, the Vet “leaders” including the former VSO were very vocal about being able to raise the needed money to fund the development of the museum (including significant retrofit costs to meet fire codes and the like) and projecting high attendance figures claiming that would generate revenue to support the on-going operation. At one point, perhaps still the case, various old military vehicles were being stored on county property (McFadden and Grand) -translation -taxpayer’s proptery was being used for this storage – as a courtesy to the vet advocates of this project. Bottom line is that the vet advocates have had years to pull this together and apparently could not. Time to face reality –maybe the Great Park will include some kind of appropriate tribute to our vets – The Santa Ana-County Civic Center has some monuments now —
By the way, a good time for the Supervisors to deal with troublesome issues, such as raises and long delayed policy decisions (such as this Blimp Hangar issue) is in December before a several week holiday recess. Not too many people watching, several weeks to let things die down, people in more of a forgiving mood, etc. Add in any lame duck Supervisors who are facing their last meeting(s) and the climate is right to make some tough and sometimes unpopular decisions. Fans of politics should therefore heighten their attention in December to Board meeting. The Vets may have been snookered by this seasonal reality ——