Wanted: Help in keeping airport restrictions

Noaki Schwartz

NEWPORT BEACH -- It’s a race the City Council has run alone for most

of the past three decades: trying to keep the skies over the city

friendly to residents.

Now the city will pass the baton to an untested teammate -- the county

Board of Supervisors -- and hope it has the political strength and

endurance to cross the finish line and win an extension on the curfew and

flight restrictions at John Wayne Airport.

“I think we can do this,” said Clem Shutte, the San Francisco attorney

who is counsel to the city on airport issues. “We need to start the

process and work it through.”

The council voted Tuesday night to get the supervisors involved on its

fight to keep the airport’s current restrictions, which expire in 2005,

in effect for another 20 years.

Mayor John Noyes said he’s had discussions with Supervisor Tom Wilson,

who agreed to take the matter to the board.

The political muscle provided by the supervisors is a key step in

keeping the restrictions in place. The process may eventually have to

wind through the Federal Aviation Administration and the courts before

the precedent-setting matter is finally decided.

The original airport agreement was secured in 1985. It provides for a

strict curfew and limits the number of flights and passengers at John

Wayne.

Members of the local Airport Working Group say they will support the

effort but insist that the city should continue to pursue an airport at

the former Marine Corps air station at El Toro.

Noyes, however, insists this is not an El Toro issue.

“Even if there was a full-blown El Toro airport, we would still be

asking for these limits,” he said.

This could prove problematic for South County airport representatives,

who said they will support Newport’s effort only if the city backs off El

Toro.

“They can’t be separated,” said Leonard Kranser, editor of the El Toro

Airport Web site. “The position of folks in South County, as I perceive

it, is the city of Newport is simultaneously trying to overturn Measure

F, which protects people throughout the county, and institute 20 more

years of protection solely for people that live around John Wayne.”