Irvine will not be moving forward with a veterans cemetery at the Great Park after city council members again voted against the idea, with a slim majority saying it was a project better left in the past. 

It’s a proposal that’s resurfaced in Irvine repeatedly – even after Orange County veterans have kicked off efforts to build a state veterans cemetery elsewhere. 

During Tuesday night’s city council meeting, Bobby McDonald, one of the leaders of the Veterans Alliance of Orange County, called on Agran to not “reopen old wounds” on the cemetery fight. 

“Please approach this issue with care and thoughtfulness,” McDonald said during public comment. “The decisions made here matter, not just to us, but to generations of veterans and their families.” 

While Irvine was set to be the home of Orange County’s first veterans cemetery for over a decade, every city in the county – including Irvine – supported turning a piece of county owned land in Gypsum Canyon after a coalition of veterans called out the city for turning the project into a political quagmire. 

[Read: How Did Irvine Fail to Build a Veterans Cemetery After Nearly a Decade of Debate?]

Despite the shift in 2021, Irvine Mayor Larry Agran has continued to advocate for a veterans memorial park and cemetery in the city through multiple campaigns and saying the city has to follow through on its past promises. 

“It’s nuts that we can’t get our act together and see to it we have a proper cemetery for veterans,” Agran said at Tuesday night’s meeting. “It’s not a competition in my mind between the two sites.”  

Orange County Supervisors Katrina Foley and Don Wagner, who is himself a former Irvine mayor, came out and told Agran that the project would not be recognized as an official veterans cemetery, which means veterans wouldn’t be able to receive official burial services there. 

“If the city would like to have a municipal cemetery, knock yourselves out,” Wagner said during public comment at Tuesday night’s council meeting. “But be under no illusion it will not be a veterans cemetery. That ship sailed for Irvine.” 

“We are building it now,” Foley followed up, referring to Gypsum Canyon. “We must stop all the bureaucratic obstacles and delays.” 

Roughly 130 people spoke during public comment at Tuesday’s meeting, with a majority voicing their opposition to the cemetery – raising issues including the impact of rifle volleys on the nearby Cadence Park school and the possibility of hamstringing other proposed projects at the park. 

Right now, there is over $50 million set aside by county supervisors and the state government for the project at Gypsum Canyon, and it is currently on the list for future funding from the federal Department of Veterans Affairs. 

Agran’s proposed cemetery would have been funded by the special property taxes paid by surrounding Great Park homeowners to develop the area – a fact that many Great Park homeowners who spoke at the meeting opposed. 

[Read: The Great Park Tax: How Irvine Homeowners are Paying for the City’s Big Dreams]

City council members narrowly rejected Agran’s proposal on a 3-4 vote just after midnight. Agran and Councilmembers Betty Martinez Franco and Mike Carroll voted for the proposal.

Councilman William Go, who represents the city’s second district and lives near the Great Park, criticized the idea of homeowners financing the cemetery. 

“You will use our tax dollars against our will,” Go said. “We will not forget. We will remember.” 

Councilmembers James Mai, Melinda Liu and Kathleen Treseder joined Go in voting against Agran’s proposal. 

“I appreciate the history, the promises that were made, and it’s unfortunate it took us 20 years to get to this point,” Mai said. “I feel bad for the promises that were made to people, but this was 20 years ago … I’m going to be against this.”  

Liu highlighted how there can be only one veterans cemetery in the county and the funding is already committed to Gypsum. 

“I don’t really see how it’s possible for us to pursue that,” Liu said.

Noah Biesiada is a Voice of OC reporter and corps member with Report for America, a GroundTruth initiative. Contact him at nbiesiada@voiceofoc.org.