Oklahoma City billionaire David Green and his Hobby Lobby Stores chain made news here last week with a gift of land to Pastor Rick Warren’s Saddleback Church. Green is eyeing a deal that would make bigger news—Crystal Cathedral. Green is a professed Christian whose family, among other interventions, financially rescued Oral Roberts University three years ago. Last year he facilitated the transfer of a 170-acre ranch in San Juan Capistrano from the ailing Crystal Cathedral Ministries to Warren’s booming Lake Forest-based mega-church. Hobby Lobby bought the property—given to Crystal Cathedral and founder the Rev. Robert H. Schuller as a gift in 1981 by OC philanthropist and RV king John Crean—and leased it for a nominal amount to Saddleback, which is using it as a retreat center. Last week Hobby Lobby deeded the property to Warren’s church. Call it calculation, coincidence or divine providence, but the gift comes at a key time in Crystal Cathedral’s bankruptcy, too. The creditors committee is expected to soon submit its reorganization plan to Judge Robert Kwan, including its choice of buyer for the iconic glass tower and the rest of the Garden Grove campus. The leading bidders are presumed to be Chapman U and the Catholic Diocese of Orange, both offering $50 million in cash (Chapman upped its initial offer from $46 million to match the diocese’s.) But Hobby Lobby could also be in the running. Its bid is only $47.5 million cash, but Green’s son Mart said that is adequate to cover all creditors. Hobby Lobby also has the recent history with Crystal Cathedral and a seemingly compatible brand of Christianity. Mart Green said, “Before we submitted a formal proposal, we sought and received the blessings of the Schuller family.” Mart said Hobby Lobby would lease the property to King’s University, a Los Angeles-based bible college. Speculation is the Crystal Cathedral ministry would be allowed continued use of the cathedral building, as it would in Chapman’s offer but not in the diocese’s …
It was going to be a happy day for South Coast Rep Prez Tom Phelps, presiding over the theater group’s annual board dinner. Instead, Phelps traveled to Audubon, Iowa, to eulogize his longtime pal and business partner, Democratic Party heavyweight Chuck Manatt. In 1965 in L.A. they founded the bicoastal law firm bearing their names …
If Jefferson County, Ala. files for bankruptcy over $3 billion-plus in derivative-fueled debt, commentators are saying it will set a new standard for municipal failures, eclipsing the $1.7 billion investment loss that triggered OC’s 1994 bankruptcy. Not necessarily so, says Supe John Moorlach, the Cassandra of the OC default. He says Jefferson County’s struggle to make bond payments is apples to the oranges of OC’s spectacular meltdown, which was akin to a run on the bank. And, Moorlach says he’s sure OC’s bankruptcy petition listed more assets. “I want to keep the record!” he says with a chuckle.
