El Toro backers see shift in momentum

Paul Clinton

NEWPORT-MESA -- The proponents of an airport at the closed El Toro

Marine Corps Air Station were flying high Wednesday, a day after an

Orange County Superior Court judge knocked the legs out from under a

South County anti-airport ballot measure.

In the Tuesday decision, Superior Court Judge James Gray invalidated

some 50,000 signatures collected for an initiative that would turn the

4,700-acre base into a Great Park instead of a commercial airport.

The ruling was the second major court victory since December, when a

judge threw out Measure F. That initiative, which passed overwhelmingly

in March 2000, would have required a two-thirds public approval for any

new airport, jail or landfill.

Taken together, the rulings represent a momentum shift from a time in

the late 1990s when South County won a string of court battles, airport

backers said.

“These victories that we have had have been self-imposed by the

opposition” to an airport, said Bruce Nestande, the president and chief

executive of Citizens for Jobs and the Economy who filed the claims

against both initiatives. “It’s how they’ve run their operation, based on

a lot of self-deception. And the courts aren’t buying it.”

Gray’s ruling invalidated the signatures for the Orange County Central

Park initiative because the ballot title and summary were “affirmatively

misleading.”

South County spokeswoman Meg Waters said the fault doesn’t lie with

initiative writers, but rather with County Counsel Laurence Watson, who

wrote the summary.

“The court victories are going to be Pyrrhic victories,” Waters said.

“There’s going to be a backlash of people getting angry at the courts and

at the county. Look who wrote the ballot summary.”

Growing public support for an airport at El Toro has gone hand in hand

with the court victories, even though county residents still seem to

widely support the park plan.

In a poll released July 25, Cal State Fullerton found a 7% increase in

support for an airport between March and June. The poll showed 46.8%

support for an airport. When asked a separate question, 62.4% said they

would vote for the central park initiative.

Newport Beach Councilman Dennis O’Neil cautioned against too much

optimism in the pro-airport camp.

“Right now, all of the efforts show that the pro-airport position is

prevailing,” O’Neil said. “Until something is finalized, it’s in motion.

It’s so fluid.”

Airport backers credited efforts by the Airport Working Group over the

past several months as helping to turn the tide. The group, with a

$3.6-million grant from Newport Beach, has produced a handful of mailers

and television spots deriding the park as an economic drain on the

county.

The ads have used a weasel and a bunny munching on a $100 bill to

attack the park.

The court decisions, along with the ads, have swung the pendulum

toward the pro-airport side, said Barbara Lichman, the group’s executive

director.

It has been a shift from the successful challenges by the El Toro

Reuse Planning Authority to the county’s environmental report and other

aspects of the project, she added.

“They won in a courtroom,” Lichman acknowledged. “But winning some of

the battles doesn’t mean you’ll win the war. Take World War II. Hitler

won a few battles. [Tuesday’s ruling] was their Stalingrad.”

-- Paul Clinton covers the environment and John Wayne Airport. He may

be reached at (949) 764-4330 or by e-mail ato7

paul.clinton@latimes.comf7 .