SAN BERNARDINO, Calif. (AP) — Behind a chain-link fence and under heavy security, workers on Monday returned to their offices at the San Bernardino campus where 14 people died last month in a massacre.
Inland Regional Center employees flashed their identification badges to security guards who ushered them into a parking lot surrounded by a mesh-wrapped fence as dozens of news reporters stood outside.
Since the attack, few employees of the center that serves autistic children and mentally disabled adults have gone to the office, other than for brief visits to gather personal belongings.
A photographer, foreground left, takes pictures of unidentified staff members as they hug before returning to work at the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino, Calif., Monday, Jan. 4, 2016, where an attack killed 14 people on the center¿s campus on Dec. 2. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)
Melvin Anderson, who helps transport the center's clients, was trying to figure out where he could turn in paperwork to get paid. The last time he did that — as he does each month — was the day before the Dec. 2 terror attack at a holiday luncheon for county employees. The gathering was held in a building on the gleaming campus.
"It's scary, really scary, but we as Americans just have to face what's going on and try to move on," Anderson said. "We've got to pull ourselves together, and we've got to go on."
Many of the center's roughly 600 employees have continued to work and visited their clients' homes over the past month. But they hadn't been together in the place where everything froze since law enforcement officers whisked them away after the gunfire.
Amid the investigation and cleanup, the campus has been locked behind the temporary fence. Within that perimeter, in one corner, is a second fence. It seals the conference center that San Bernardino County's health department was renting for the holiday luncheon when the two shooters began their assault.
A county restaurant inspector targeting his co-workers was joined by his wife in killing 14 and injuring dozens in the attack. They were motivated by radical Islamist beliefs, according to the FBI.
The conference building did not reopen Monday, and it's unclear when it might.
In the afternoon, more than 3,000 people attended a memorial service for victims of the shooting organized so county employees could mourn together.
Those gathered at the arena in Ontario heard consolation and inspiration from speakers that included former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani and evangelical pastor Rick Warren.
Both pulled from their own experiences dealing with loss — Warren's following the death of his son and Giuliani from his time at the helm of the city during the Sept 11, 2001 terror attacks — and urged the audience to make something good come from this tragedy.
Touting the development of lower Manhattan since the attacks that brought down the World Trade Center, Giuliani said he hopes that San Bernardino will also emerge strong.
"Come to San Bernardino now and spend money and tell the terrorists 'screw you,'" Giuliani told the crowd to boisterous applause. "You can't beat us. We are stronger than you are. Those people didn't die for nothing. They died because of liberty and freedom and decency and human rights."
Warren urged the employees not to bottle up their grief or become bitter and to accept help from others when they need it.
"Grief is a tool that God has given to us. It is the way we get through the transitions of life," Warren said. "It is not grief that paralyzes us — it's fear."
At the center, staff members have missed each other's friendly faces and hallway chit chat, said Lavinia Johnson, the executive director. They yearn to renew a sense of stability at an institution unmoored by violence.
"Most of us are relieved to be back at work. We want to continue with the normalcy, and we miss each other very much," she told reporters. "We want to ensure that our staff feels safe and secure as they work in their offices."
A welcome and food were planned for returning employees. Professional counselors were being made available for workers who wanted them.
"It may take a day or two for most people," said Kevin Urtz, the center's associate director. "There's no blueprint for this kind of thing, and everybody is going to react to it differently."
Both Johnson and Urtz have worked for more than 25 years at the center, which with nearly 31,000 disabled clients in the working-class sprawl east of Los Angeles is the largest of 21 in California. It is a vital community resource in a place where about one-third of households live below the poverty line.
As the workers drove into the parking lot, 41-year-old client Ron Pollakoff held a sign farther down the road showing his support for a place he said has helped him with housing and other services.
He said he knew one of the victims, and was relieved to learn the worker who handles his case was alright.
"I'm still shocked over all of this," he said. "I'm just glad that so many came out of this unscathed."
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Contact Amy Taxin at http://twitter.com/ataxin or Justin Pritchard at http://twitter.com/lalanewsman
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Associated Press writers Justin Pritchard and Christopher Weber in Los Angeles contributed to this report.
Ron Pollakoff stands with a sign of encouragement outside the Inland Regional Center, (IRC) as workers return to work at center in San Bernardino, Calif., on Monday, Jan. 4, 2016, where an attack killed 14 people on Dec. 2. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)
Unidentified staff members hold hands in pray before returning to work at the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino, Calif., on Monday, Jan. 4, 2016, where an attack killed 14 people on the center¿s campus on Dec. 2. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)
Law enforcement officers guard the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino, Calif., on Monday, Jan. 4, 2016, as workers return to the center, where an attack killed 14 people on the center¿s campus on Dec. 2. A chain-link fence was unlocked Monday morning as some of the Inland Regional Center's 600 employees went back to work. Few of them have gone to the office since the killings, other than a brief visit to gather personal belongings. No visitors are allowed. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)
Inland Regional Center executive director, Lavinia Johnson, right, and associate executive director, Kevin Urtz, left, take questions from the media before the reopening of the social service center in the San Bernardino, Calif., on Monday, Jan. 4, 2016. Some 600 workers returned to the San Bernardino social service center for the first time since 14 people were killed on Dec. 2, in a terror attack. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)
A chain-link fence is in place as workers return to work at the Inland Regional Center for the first time since a Dec. 2 attack killed 14 people,in San Bernardino, Calif., on Monday, Jan. 4, 2016. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)
Guards check for IDs as workers return to work at the Inland Regional Center for the first time in San Bernardino, Calif., on Monday, Jan. 4, 2016, where an attack killed 14 people on Dec. 2. Security guards checked employee IDs at the entrance to the center's parking lot. No visitors were planned this week, and a chain-link fence wrapped in green mesh surrounding the property will remain up indefinitely. (AP Photo/Nick Ut)
In this Tuesday, Dec. 29, 2015, photo, the Inland Regional Center's associate executive director, Kevin Urtz, left, listens to the center's executive director Lavinia Johnson during an interview with The Associated Press on the campus of the regional center where the attack on Dec. 2 took place in San Bernardino, Calif. The staff was still gearing up for the holidays on Dec. 2, the day 14 people were massacred on the center¿s gleaming campus. On Monday, Jan. 4, 2016, they'll return to two of the three buildings not damaged in the rampage. (AP Photo/ Nick Ut)
In this Tuesday, Dec. 29, 2015, photo, the conference building where an attack took place on Dec. 2 is seen behind a chain link fence on the campus of the Inland Regional Center in San Bernardino, Calif. At the IRC, Christmas never came. The staff was still gearing up for the holidays on Dec. 2, the day 14 people were massacred on the center¿s gleaming campus. On Monday, Jan. 4, 2016, they'll return to two of the three buildings not damaged in the rampage. (AP Photo/ Nick Ut)
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