Environmental Issue : Newport Seeks Limited Ruling in Airport Suit

The City of Newport Beach will try to persuade a federal judge not to rule on matters involving state environmental regulation of John Wayne Airport when the judge considers the county’s bid for an order protecting a new airport expansion plan from legal challenges.

Meanwhile, a hearing on the airport issue before U.S. District Judge Terry M. Hatter Jr., in Los Angeles, was postponed from Monday until March 29, to allow time for consolidation of motions filed by the county, the city and other interests in the case.

City officials and homeowner groups opposed to the airport expansion were stunned and angered last week when the county launched a preemptive first strike by filing a lawsuit in federal court, instead of waiting to be sued in state court, where noise and environmental litigation was heard previously.

Hatter last week issued a temporary restraining order prohibiting the city, the Airport Working Group, the organization Stop Polluting Our Newport and various airlines from suing the county. The March 29 hearing will address the county’s attempt to make the court order permanent, pending resolution of the airport-expansion issue.

County officials said they went into federal court so that one judge could resolve all the questions. In years past, Hatter has ordered the county to allow more airlines to use John Wayne. The former Superior Court judge, Bruce Sumner, limited the number of commercial jet departures to 41 each day, placing the county in a position in which each airline might be alloted so few flights that it would be unprofitable to operate there.

But Steven Pflaum, special appointed airport counsel for Newport Beach, said Wednesday that he will try to convince Hatter at the March 29 hearing that the county’s lawsuit should be dismissed.

He said that, in the alternative, he will argue that Hatter should not rule on any part of the county’s lawsuit that involves the California Environmental Quality Act, the statute under which Newport Beach and environmental groups successfully sued the county, blocking the airport’s expansion in 1981.

The county has appealed the 1981 case, and a ruling on the appeal is expected in April.

Pflaum said the appellate decision on that case could “set guidelines” for judges who might handle any new airport litigation, since some of the issues are similar.

Environmental and homeowner groups have criticized the county’s legal offensive as a political ploy to bury their state environmental claims in a morass of federal commercial-airline access issues.

Representatives of these groups said last week that the county’s legal maneuvering has helped stimulate contributions and support for them, but they did not give details.