Did Measure F serve its purpose?

Alex Coolman

NEWPORT BEACH -- A Superior Court judge may have axed Measure F, but

the initiative already has generated enough momentum to sink any plans

for an airport at El Toro, a county supervisor said Monday.

“Measure F accomplished what it was designed to do,” said 3rd District

Supervisor Todd Spitzer, “which was to slow down the [airport planning]

process and to prove in a real-life vote that public sentiment is not for

an airport.”

The initiative, which voters overwhelmingly approved in March, would

have required a two-thirds vote on county projects to develop airports,

landfills or prisons near homes. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge

James Otero ruled Friday that the initiative was “fundamentally flawed”

by ambiguous language and an excessively broad scope.

For advocates of developing an airport at the closed El Toro Marine

Corps Air Station, Otero’s ruling was the cause for celebration and new

strategizing.

“I see [the decision] as providing the county with an opportunity to

reexamine the whole process and see how we can all get together and have

an open dialogue,” said 4th District Supervisor Cynthia Coad.

Coad added that county residents, when not distracted by issues such

as jail and landfill development that were included in Measure F, likely

would find the idea of El Toro more palatable.

“We can have a smaller airport,” she said. “I just feel that we should

be able to come to some agreement that’s going to be to the benefit of

Orange County.”

El Toro opponents, though, view Otero’s opinion differently. The judge

wrote that Measure A -- a 1994 initiative specifying that El Toro be used

for an airport -- should be the proper object of their efforts.

And airport foes say they plan to follow his instructions to the

letter.

“He’s showing the road map for what we have to do,” said Bill

Kogerman, chairman of the group Citizens for Safe and Healthy

Communities, which backed Measure F.

Attacking Measure A, Kogerman said, has been part of the strategy for

a long time. But Otero’s ruling has brought the issue to the forefront.

“It’s no big revelation,” said Kim Koeppen, executive assistant to 5th

District Supervisor Tom Wilson. “That’s something folks have talked

about.”

Koeppen, like Spitzer, said she was far from dismayed about the loss

of Measure F.

“If nothing else, it was a bold and clear statement from the public

about what not to do with that property over at El Toro,” she said.

“Regardless of what one judge does, it’s not going to change the way 67%

of the voters feel.”