$300,000 Rescues SOS; Charity Plans to Relocate

COSTA MESA — Only days before they were to be kicked out of city-leased quarters, directors of the embattled charity Share Our Selves announced Thursday that they have received $300,000 in contributions over the last three days and are on the verge of purchasing a permanent home.

“We are so excited,” said SOS founder and executive director Jean Forbath. “We never anticipated we’d ever have enough money to buy a building . . . but there has been an outpouring of support.”

Supporters of SOS also reacted with joy at the announcement.

“I think it’s wonderful,” said City Councilwoman Mary Hornbuckle, a longtime backer of the group. “If this comes about it is real good news for everyone. And it says something about the philanthropic community of Orange County that they were able to come through.”

Merritt L. Johnson, president of United Way of Orange County, said the news belies the county’s reputation as being stingy with its charitable dollar.

Johnson said studies of charity giving do not necessarily show the impact of a sudden disaster like the recent earthquake in Northern California. “In Costa Mesa there has been an earthquake around SOS in a sense,” Johnson said.

Forbath said the agency has made an offer to purchase an 8,000-square-foot warehouse in a Costa Mesa industrial area. She declined to give the exact location.

Although negotiations continue, Forbath said the building is priced at between $800,000 and $1.2 million, not including the cost of renovations.

The group is also looking at another industrial building--in slightly worse condition--as an alternative if current negotiations fall through.

The dramatic turnaround appears to mean new life for one of Orange County’s largest private charities, an agency that at the beginning of the week seemed resigned to closing its doors.

The developments may also signal an end to the contentious relationship between SOS and Costa Mesa’s City Council, which in July had ordered the charity to vacate the Rea Community Center, its home for nine years.

Earlier this month the council rejected as too costly an estimated $100,000 plan to help the agency move into new space in the city.

The agency is scheduled to be evicted from the community center Monday, but SOS officials said they will ask the council for an extention to let them complete the purchase and make renovations. The council has previously voted against granting any extension, but now may find the request more acceptable.

“I am not opposed to giving them a little more time,” said Councilman Edward Glasgow, who in the past has voted against the charity.

“I have said all along that if they have a concrete proposal and time line and demonstrate good faith . . . it would be reasonable to consider an extension,” added Councilwoman Sandra L. Genis, who also had voted to deny an extension.”

Councilman Orville Amburgey, a consistent foe of SOS, said, however, that the new developments do not change his mind.

“We have a commitment to the citizens of Costa Mesa to have them vacate . . . and I would hope they would do that,” he said. “It is not going to have that much impact if they close and open up a month or so later.”

SOS must still obtain a conditional use permit wherever it relocates, and directors intend to ask the council to “support our acceptance by the community,” Forbath said.

That acceptance may be hard-won, Forbath concedes, if the agency remains on the west side of town, which many residents complain already shoulders an inordinate number of social service agencies.

Thursday’s announcement follows a week of ups and downs for the beleaguered charity, a private, nonprofit volunteer group that has been fixture in the community for nearly 20 years, providing food, clothing, financial and medical assistance to the needy.

On Monday, several community and religious leaders, including the Roman Catholic Diocese of Orange’s Vicar for Charities, held a news conference and urged the council to rescind its decision to evict SOS, arguing that its closure would seriously hinder assistance to the poor.

SOS officials also said at the news conference that they would hold a rally and 50-hour fast beginning Saturday to protest their eviction.

Forbath said Thursday that the rally and fast will still be held “as a peaceful means to bring about moral change.”

On Tuesday, several west side neighbors who have opposed SOS held their own news conference to object to comments made by the religious leaders, who they claimed mischaracterized them as “heartless and racist.”

They said they would picket SOS’s rally to protest the protest. That, also, is still set, according to an organizer.

On Wednesday, Mayor Peter F. Buffa announced that he, too, would hold a news conference today to address the SOS controversy.

Buffa, who could not be reached for comment, reportedly was to propose a compromise in which SOS would temporarily move into a building on West McArthur Boulevard that houses the Community Development Council, another privately run poverty agency.

SOS’ attempts to buy its own building would appear to make the CDC move unnecessary, but Forbath said her group will consider the compromise as a last resort. The CDC move also appears to have the backing of a majority of the council if all else fails.

Even SOS’ die-hard opponents reacted favorably to the latest developments. Many residents near the Rea center had spent years working to close--or at least relocate--the agency.

They had long complained that SOS patrons disrupted their neighborhood by spreading trash and graffiti and making obscene remarks.

“I am delighted for them,” said Janice Davidson, a longtime SOS foe.

How would she react to an extention of SOS’ stay at the Rea center?: “Most neighbors feel they (SOS) have not shown good faith and should close but I would not oppose it if their plans are really firm.”

Davidson said she harbors no ill will toward the group. “I really wish them the best,” she said.

NEXT STEP

On Saturday, directors of Share Our Selves will protest the charity’s ouster from the Rea Community Center by conducting a 50-hour fast leading up to Monday night’s Costa Mesa City Council meeting. Then they will ask the council to delay the eviction--which could begin Tuesday--until the charity can buy and remodel new quarters. If that request fails, the council might consider alternatives.