V-plan supporters, opponents exchange accusations
Deirdre Newman
NEWPORT BEACH -- The legal wrangling over a petition drive to place an
alternative El Toro airport on the November ballot rages on as
accusations fly between supporters and opponents.
Members of the New Millennium Group, which supports the V-plan, charge
it’s illegal for the Committee for Safe and Healthy Communities to try to
stop their petition drive. The group is trying to obtain 72,000
signatures by June 17, but it will not disclose how many have been
collected so far.
They also accuse the committee of disseminating false information
about the plan.
The V-plan calls for sending planes to the southwest over undeveloped
land, instead of over homes in Irvine, Lake Forest and other cities. It
is an alternative to the airport county supervisors envisioned. That plan
was defeated in March with the passage of Measure W.
The New Millennium Group has already sent the committee a letter
threatening legal action unless it stops making “damning and false
statements.”
“They’re both fine and jailable offenses,” said Bob McGowan, a group
member and former United Airlines pilot. “You can’t just say anything you
want.”
Nonsense, said Bill Kogerman, the committee’s chairman.
“I didn’t go to Vietnam and expose myself to enemy fire fighting for
freedom of speech to come back and be muzzled by silliness,” Kogerman
said.
While McGowan said the group’s attorney was going to fire off another
letter informing the committee of its illegal action, attorney Deborah
Rosenthal said she could not confirm the committee was doing anything
illegal. Rosenthal said she has not had a chance to look into the
allegations since hearing about them Wednesday morning.
An attorney for another anti-airport group, the El Toro Reuse Planning
Authority, said the New Millennium Group is misinformed about election
laws.
“The group doesn’t know anything more about election law than they do
about initiative petitions,” Richard Jacobs said. “That is as wrong as
wrong could be.”
The Millennium Group’s charges are in response to accusations the
committee has made against the V-plan, most recently in an e-mail by
Kogerman last week. The e-mail issues a call to action to raise funds to
challenge the initiative before the November election. It charges the
V-plan would “severely impact Newport Beach and other coastal cities, as
well as most Orange County cities.
“Even though our attorneys believe their proposed airport initiative
is both unconstitutional and contrary to election law, airport die-hards
continue to seek political and financial support for an airport at El
Toro. Their actions must be stopped,” the e-mail says.
Rosalyn Lever, the county’s registrar of voters, said Wednesday that
airport opponents do not appear to be breaking any election codes.
* Deirdre Newman covers education. She may be reached at (949)
574-4221 or by e-mail at o7 deirdre.newman@latimes.comf7 .
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