By Paul Hughes
Associate Reporter
Saving souls is Jim Palmer’s calling as president of the Orange County Rescue Mission. As a Tustin councilman, saving money is his duty.
Palmer, a reverend, straddles the worlds of politics and religious charity in a way that epitomizes compassionate conservatism, according to observers.
On Tustin’s City Council, Palmer is a fiscal conservative, part of a Republican-leaning, pro-business majority.
Palmer is guided by what he calls his 10 Political Commandments, which include individual freedom, less government and so on.
“A few folks run for office with no ideas to bring to the table,” Tustin Mayor Pro Tem Tony Amante said. “They run because they think it’s chic or important. Jim has a core set of beliefs that he’s very good at articulating.”
Palmer’s day job is running the Orange County Rescue Mission, a Christian nonprofit that helps the homeless get off the streets.
“My heart is to go out and rescue people,” Palmer said. “It’s my calling.”
He’s also President Bush’s appointee as a director of the Corporation for National and Community Service. The Senate confirmed him in June.
Palmer’s name also was submitted for consideration to head Bush’s Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives.
Jim Towey, who used to hold the federal post and now is a college president in Pennsylvania, said Palmer’s name came to his mind not only because of the Rescue Mission’s services but because it delivers them well.
“The model is excellence,” Towey said.
Most who know Palmer like him.
Diane Devore, wife of Assemblyman Chuck Devore, describes him as “the tall guy who’s always smiling.”
Palmer’s led the Rescue Mission for the past 15 years. It has a yearly operating budget of about $15 million.
He’s about to open a new mission headquarters on five acres at the former Tustin Marine base. The campus is dubbed the Village of Hope.
Another venture, Mustard Seed Ranch, is nearing break-even on raising and selling goats to, among others, Muslims.
Palmer sports a bit of a paunch and looks like the father of four that he is.
He said he could go to the gym more often, but it’s not a core goal.
“I could work out two hours a day but then I’d have to ask, ‘What else could I have done with that time?'” he said.
His second-floor window looks across a quad to a former Marine barracks, which is being renovated to house people served by the mission.
It’s a $27 million project, with more than half of the materials and labor donated, plus the land and two large barracks buildings.
Interior designers donated services to make each room unique.
Just a month ago, the grounds still looked much like a construction site: pressboard walkways, builder debris on the ground, framing going up.
Now Astroturf is down and stucco is up.
Donors include Lennar Corp., Oldmans Construction, William Lyon Homes Inc. and John Laing Homes.
Palmer said he expects the first occupants in August.
When finished, the buildings are set to total 40,000 square feet,the kitchen alone is 10% of that,including 128 rooms for 192 people and an 8,000-square-foot chapel that can house 300 people.
At the top end of the square, northeast of Palmer’s office, is the mission’s chapel. At one point, a federal functionary told Palmer he’d have to call it something else, since the government was involved in the base’s redevelopment.
Palmer stood fast and said,nicely, firmly,that calling it a chapel wasn’t actually against any rules.
He won. The dust-up shows how he stands on principle, including Christian ones, if he knows the landscape and his own ground.
“You act from areas of strength,” he said. “You don’t debate unless you have great knowledge in that area and have done your research.”
Jim Righeimer, a Palmer family friend, brings up Palmer’s first meeting at the county’s Housing and Community Development Commission.
“Jim showed up with a three-inch binder of information,” Righeimer recounts. “He knew every issue,hit them running. He was prepared.”
Reminded of this, Palmer chuckles.
“There’s a room here with probably a hundred binders, and there are more we haven’t unpacked yet.”
He points at the bookshelf below his desk. More huge binders.
“I have them on every big item I’m working on,” he said.
In the search for the new headquarters, he brought the mission’s 200-page business plan to Tustin officials.
The mission is one of five nonprofit homeless groups to get space at the former base. It nearly didn’t fly.
“We didn’t have to do this,” said Chris Shingleton, Tustin assistant city manager. “But we saw a need and wanted to make a contribution.”
When the city started the screening process nearly 15 years ago, Shingleton said there was “a bit of skepticism” about dotting homeless charities.
At one point, a group of several dozen charities banded together and launched legal efforts to make it happen.
All the organizations coveting land joined in,except one. Guess who.
“That coalition wanted more land than the base had,” Palmer said.
When Tustin asked questions about charities’ financial strength,how they operate, are they running a deficit, can they handle a long-term construction deal,Palmer’s group documented everything.
“It was one of the most complete applications we received,” Shingleton said.
Police and city officials visited mission facilities in the county and liked what they saw.
Palmer was elected to the City Council in November.
He came with strong beliefs but without being “brash or rash.” Mayor Pro Tem Amante said.
Palmer fairly evaluates what others say without compromising his principles, according to Amante.
Within Palmer’s first few months, he helped craft a realignment of city committees and commissions into three central citizen bodies, saving time and money, Amante said.
What you hear about Palmer in politics: he gets things done, and people end up liking it.
“He wants to make customer satisfaction a priority in Tustin,” said Matt Cunningham, editor of RedCounty.com, a political blog.
Palmer has a knack for consensus,even when everyone knows where he comes at the idea from: the right.
“His network is so effective and his leadership style so appreciated, that he can get all the players into the room,” said Supervisor John Moorlach, who endorsed Palmer for City Council. “He’s worked himself into a senior statesman position.”
Blogger Cunningham agrees: “Overall, he’s pretty high profile in Orange County, with a sterling reputation,personally, morally and civically.”
The Village of Hope lists 217 corporate and personal “partners”,from Beckman Coulter Inc., Capital Group Cos. and Fluor Corp. to Clarence and Ellen Conzelman, Irvine Valley Boy Scout Troop 36 and the Bible class of St. Olaf Lutheran Church.
The mission has a dozen efforts countywide, including low-cost housing in Buena Park, drug addiction and recovery efforts and mobile medical services to the homeless.
One of its biggest success stories, the Mustard Seed Ranch, is in Warner Springs in eastern San Diego County.
On top of it all, Palmer’s got four kids,including three foster children. At one time or another, a half-dozen foster kids have lived in the Palmer home.
How does he do it?
“Everyone has the same 24 hours,” Tustin’s Amante said.
Palmer is super-focused and an awesome delegator, he said.
The mission’s board helps keep the focus, according to Palmer.
Members include Bart Hansen of Nieupointe Enterprises, a Tustin developer; Dr. Malcolm Lewis, engineer and president of CTG Forensics in Irvine; and Jewel Loff-Polk, a Washington Mutual Inc. vice president.
Orange County Sheriff Michael Carona is a board member as well.
According to the mission, 20,000 people in OC don’t have homes. They’re in various stages of homelessness, from temporary hard luck to chronically dispossessed to the mentally ill.
Like an entrepreneur targeting a niche, the Village of Hope hones in on three groups: single men with children, married couples and seniors.
“The homeless situation is so big, and those groups are underserved,” Palmer said.
As for delegation, Ray Johnson, who runs the Mustard Seed Ranch, tells of when he first began working for Palmer.
In Johnson’s early months, he said he was loath to try too many things for fear of making a mistake.
“Jim told me to go ahead and make them,” Johnson recalled. “He said, ‘If you think about it, of any 10 decisions you can probably change nine of them,so don’t worry.'”
These days, the ranch runs smoothly. It’s a working ranch: raising goats to sell for meat and show horses that win awards.
Ten to 12 men from Rescue Mission programs regularly live at the ranch,getting job training (many will go to work for other ranches nearby) and intensive life-coaching.
“Most people actually don’t know what they’re doing,” Palmer said. “Go anywhere in politics or leadership and you find that. I make sure I know what I’m doing.”
