Developer May Build Homes on Hughes Site in Fullerton

A Toronto developer has reached a tentative agreement to build more than 1,000 homes and a large commercial project on a 270-acre Fullerton site where 13,000 people once worked for Hughes Electronics Corp., city and Hughes officials said Monday.

Brookfield Homes Inc. has agreed to pay Hughes more than $50 million for the property, sources said. Although the new development would generate some jobs, the deal could be disappointing to Fullerton officials, who had hoped to keep the entire parcel as a job-producing industrial site.

But a yearlong effort to find a big industrial user to replace the downsized Hughes weapons businesses proved fruitless, said Marcy Garber, a Hughes spokeswoman.

Garber described the agreement with Brookfield, which has built several other Orange County projects, as “very preliminary.”

Jeffrey Proston, Brookfield’s president for Southern California, couldn’t be reached for comment.

About half of the site, which is near affluent residential neighborhoods, is undeveloped. Brookfield plans to build 1,000 to 1,350 homes on that portion, said Kay Miller, Fullerton’s economic development manager. On the other half are Hughes buildings, mostly vacant now, where engineers once labored on ground and sea radar, communications gear and air-traffic control systems.

Brookfield wants to redevelop that part to include about 1.5 million square feet of commercial and light industrial space; 130,000 square feet of retail space; and 80,000 square feet dedicated to public uses such as a library and a child-care facility.