Proctor takes aim at Irvine’s Great Park plan

Paul Clinton

NEWPORT BEACH -- It wouldn’t be the first time Newport Beach officials

brushed off an alternate El Toro proposal hatched in South County.

Newly elected Newport Beach Councilman Gary Proctor said a plan to

install a park, museum and other recreational features on the 4,738-acre

former El Toro Marine base is “a figment of [Irvine Mayor Larry Agran’s]

imagination.”

In an ongoing effort to block an airport at El Toro, Agran and his

Irvine council colleagues unanimously approved a resolution last week

supporting what is known as the Great Park. Proctor, who served as a

county airport commissioner for 17 years, said the Irvine council’s

action was premature because it has not found answers to basic financing

questions.

“It’s politically correct and totally economically unfeasible,”

Proctor said of the plan. “And they know it.”

Agran and Irvine Councilman Greg Smith disagreed with Proctor’s

assessment.

“I wouldn’t expect anything less from Councilman Proctor,” Smith said.

“Clearly, he’s playing to his constituents.

The Great Park project is an outgrowth of the Millennium Plan, which

surfaced nearly three years ago as an ambitious attempt to stop a

commercial airport at El Toro.

That proposal, which included a substantially smaller park among other

uses, was also brushed off by Newport Beach officials who said it would

never get off the ground.

In its plan, Irvine has splintered from other South County

anti-airport factions -- including the El Toro Reuse Planning Authority

-- which has stuck to the Millennium Plan.

In the latest non-airport alternative, Irvine proposes annexing El

Toro -- that city filed its application with the county in February 1999

-- as a first step toward halting plans to build the airport.

County planners are moving forward with the airport after a Los

Angeles County Superior Court judge on Dec. 1 struck down Measure F,

which would have required a two-thirds countywide voter approval for the

project.

Agran has put a $200-million price tag on the Irvine plan over a 20-

to 30-year period. He has suggested paying for part of the project’s

costs -- which could include land purchasing costs and environmental

remediation -- with state park bond money.

It doesn’t matter how the plan is financed if it doesn’t include an

airport, Newport Beach Mayor Gary Adams said.

“The reason I don’t like it is because it doesn’t support an airport

use,” Adams said. “I don’t need to know the details.”

And although Costa Mesa has taken second chair to Newport Beach

airport activism in the battle over an El Toro airport, city officials

there are still keeping tabs on the countywide debate.

Costa Mesa Councilman Chris Steel, who joined the council this month,

wasn’t as resistant to the park proposal as his counterparts in Newport

Beach. Steel said he supported a plan for El Toro that strikes a better

balance between a park and airport.

Right now, the Irvine proposal calls for a park that could cover up to

3,000 acres of the 4,738, Agran said. The U.S. Department of the Interior

has already set aside 1,000 acres for a wildlife preserve at the site.

Steel said the county must scale down its proposed airport, which

could accommodate more than 28 million passengers annually by 2020.

“I’m not against a park per se,” Steel said. “Looks good, sounds good.

But I’d prefer an airport.”