Critics Besiege Airport Board at Its 1st Nighttime Meeting

Burbank Airport commissioners, who for years have resisted demands to meet at night because they feared they would be swamped by protesters, held their first night meeting Monday. As they expected, they were swamped by protesters.

For more than two hours, speaker after speaker accused the nine-member Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority of doing little or nothing to reduce Burbank Airport noise since buying the facility in 1978.

Most of the 85 people in attendance also cheered those who criticized the authority’s proposal to soundproof nearby homes and schools, saying that the noise relief program was a cover for airport expansion.

Under the plan--the fruit of a federally sponsored noise control study--about 2,300 homes and four schools would be insulated against noise over the next 10 years.

“We could live in Minnesota or Alaska if we wanted to live all boxed up,” said Wally Berns, a leader of the Burbank Flatlanders Home Protection League.

Refusing Night Meetings

For years, the authority held its twice-monthly meetings on Monday mornings, steadfastly refusing to meet in the evenings except for legally required public hearings.

Members expressed fears that much of the evening sessions would be taken up by repetitive and abusive comments from local gadflies, who they say contribute to prolonging the Burbank City Council’s night meetings, often to six hours or more.

But leaders of established homeowner groups from communities west and south of Burbank complained that the morning sessions also prevented them from registering their opposition to airport noise and to what they view as the authority’s inadequate response to the noise problem.

In August, the Burbank Council, long an advocate of night meetings for the airport board, voted to televise authority meetings and broadcast them on community cable TV, with or without the authority’s permission.

In response, authority members agreed to Monday night’s meeting and tentatively agreed to hold at least one night meeting every three months.