The CLEF Board of governors held its last meeting on February 27, 1959. The Articles of Incorporation were adopted and the same meeting reconvened the same day as the board of regents of California Lutheran College. The college regents had been elected by a convocation with representatives proportionately assigned to the five participating bodies. The first action of the regents was determining the college's start date to be September 1961. A secret ballot took place in order to select the first college president. The ballots were opened by the board's executive committee on June 5, 1959, with 21 members voting to elect Dahl. California Lutheran College was formally incorporated on August 4, 1959, and soon the site was bursting with activity such as bulldozers and ongoing construction. Carpenter John Beyer was given the task of remodeling the brooder houses into classrooms. At the time, Thousand Oaks was an unincorporated community with a population of around 3,000. Much of Thousand Oaks’ development was undertaken by the Janss Corporation, which later paid for engineering site analysis of the Pederson Ranch and later gave donations to various CLC projects. Dahl was convinced that without a strong church connection, the school would never become reality. He quickly established an outdoor place of worship and also constructed a swimming pool to entice congregations to come out to the future campus.