PETER BUFFA -- Comments and Curiosities

Finally. It’s about time. I was beginning to have my doubts. Pacific

Savings Plaza, also known as “the really big mission-style building

across the street from Triangle Square” for short, has been sold. Almost.

I say “almost” because we have been down this road many times before.

Just as every city has its quirky stories, Costa Mesa has the Pacific

Savings building.

A lot of people think it’s been there forever, but it’s not even 20

years old. The fact that it has sat empty for the last 10 of those 20 has

added to its air of mystery. And with the mystery comes a bit of history,

some of it well known, some not.

The Pacific Savings building is a four-story monument to the savings

and loan debacle of the late ‘80s -- another experiment in deregulation

that worked even better than the current one. In case you’ve forgotten,

the S&L; crisis was a force-five economic tornado that raged across the

country and wiped out lives, careers, property and a few U.S. senators by

the time it was done.

When Pacific Savings & Loan opened its new headquarters on Newport

Boulevard and 19th Street in 1984, it was nothing but blue skies and

green lights for the S&L; industry, but a decidedly mean-looking funnel

cloud was just over the horizon.

I remember attending the ribbon-cutting as a planning commissioner. If

you think the outside of the building is impressive, you should have seen

the inside, especially the executive offices -- original artwork, rare

hardwoods and brass trim at every turn. I wasn’t the only one whose jaw

dropped. The building won an Urban Land Institute award as one of the top

five new office buildings in the nation that year.

But then, the S&L; twister touched down. It was ugly. Pacific Savings

and its marquee headquarters were wiped out faster than you could say

“withdrawal, please.”

It wasn’t long before Washington stepped in, which, as you know,

always makes things much better. “Don’t worry,” said the Feds, “things

could be worse.”

And before long, they were. They called it the “RTC” -- the Resolution

Trust Corp. -- and the RTC was going to sort the whole mess out. Much too

long a story for our purposes, but think of it this way: The evacuation

of the American Embassy in Saigon looked like a Radio City Rockettes

chorus line compared to the RTC.

Few people know, however, that the corporation not only took

possession of Pacific Savings Plaza, but made it its headquarters for all

of the Western United States and Hawaii. So while most of us were

mesmerized by the unfolding S&L; catastrophe on the nightly news, a lot of

the real business of the RTC was being conducted from the corner of 19th

Street and Newport Boulevard.

A funny old world, is it not? And that brings us to the story of “The

Mayor, the City Manager and the RTC.”

I couldn’t help but smile one of those wry, dry smiles over the recent

speculation about moving Costa Mesa City Hall to the Pacific Savings

building. One of the nice things about being around since the Pleistocene

era is that, sooner or later, everything old is new again.

In my first term as mayor, just after World War II, Costa Mesa City

Manager Allan Roeder and I started to kick around the idea of moving City

Hall to you-know-where.

Actually, it was a quiet overture from the RTC that started the whole

process. “Why not?” I thought, formulating an idea every bit as good as

my suggestion for a city skateboard bowl. As Allan and I drove down

Newport Boulevard, my vision for a new City Hall began to emerge, most of

it revolving around a huge mayor’s office on the top floor, with a

floor-to-ceiling video wall and lots of French windows with a view of the

ocean to the south.

We were greeted at the door, exchanged pleasantries, stepped inside,

gasped and stopped dead in our tracks. What had been a glistening,

corporate flagship a few years earlier was now a rusting, abandoned

shipwreck.

There were mountains and mountains of file boxes, some closed, some

open, with papers and documents spilling everywhere. Deep troughs had

been gouged right through the carpets by the wheels of hand trucks

hauling tons of files day in and day out. There were gaping holes punched

in walls and doors -- solid hardwood I might add -- hanging from one

hinge. We thanked our hosts from the Potomac and headed for the parking

lot with all deliberate speed.

The RTC left town soon after that, as quietly as they had arrived.

Apparently, Washington had helped us enough. Fortunately, the building

returned to private hands and was made presentable once again.

But there it sat for 10 long years -- an imposing sentinel that

watched in silence as Triangle Square and Niketown and Borders Books and

a reborn Newport Boulevard grew up around it.

I was always surprised that the building didn’t become the inspiration

for some local mythology. If ever there were a candidate for a haunted

house or some fantastic tale about why the place had been empty for so

long, this was it. Didn’t happen.

Year after year, we’ve all waited for the light at 19th Street to

change, unable to resist a glance at the big Spanish building gazing down

on us -- our own version of the Mona Lisa, only bigger. I hope this time

is the charm. I really like the place. We’ll see what happens.

I gotta go.

* PETER BUFFA is a former Costa Mesa mayor. His column runs Sundays.

He may be reached via e-mail at [email protected].