Supervisor raises concerns about FAA report

Paul Clinton

NEWPORT-MESA -- A letter from a South County supervisor to Federal

Aviation Administrator Jane Garvey is only a last-minute political ploy

on the eve of an important vote, a Newport Beach airport consultant said.

“This is a pattern we’ve seen preceding any key vote,” said Dave

Ellis, the spokesman of the Airport Working Group. “I call it the

11th-hour desperation effort.”

Supervisor Todd Spitzer, in the Monday letter, said an Oct. 9 report

by the FAA “raises extremely significant issues” about the financial

viability of an airport at the closed El Toro Marine Corps Air Station.

In his letter, Spitzer said he was concerned the airport wouldn’t be

able to tap into a pool of federal grant money, which could jeopardize

the county’s effort to raise airport revenue bonds to pay for

construction.

While Spitzer could not be reached for comment, a spokeswoman for the

El Toro Reuse Planning Authority echoed the critique.

“If they can’t get federal funding, I doubt the bond market will have

much interest in it,” authority spokeswoman Meg Waters said.

The Orange County Board of Supervisors is set to offer a final vote on

an airport for the base at today’s meeting. Supervisors have said they

would choose a smaller airport than the on-the-books plan. Instead of an

airport that would handle 28.8 million passengers in 2020, supervisors

are aiming for a facility to handle 18.8 million.

“[T]he county may be proceeding down a dead-end path while spending

enormous amounts of public money unnecessarily and in an effort that will

ultimately prove futile,” Spitzer wrote in the letter.

A spokesman at the FAA’s Western Regional office couldn’t be reached

for comment on the letter.

In his letter, Spitzer, who did not return calls for comment, also

listed a number of bullet-point questions about the FAA’s report, which

declared the county’s airport plan safe, but not the most efficient use

of airspace.

The letter didn’t raise any alarms in the offices of the county’s

airport-planning Local Redevelopment Authority, spokeswoman Michelle

Emard said.

“There’s nothing new in there,” Emard said. “They’re trying to

manufacture an issue. We don’t have a high level of concern about it.”

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

be reached at (949) 764-4330 or by e-mail at o7

paul.clinton@latimes.comf7 .

FYI

* WHAT: Orange County Board of Supervisors meeting

* WHEN: 9:30 a.m. today

* WHERE: Board Hearing Room, 10 Civic Center Plaza, Santa Ana