Big Noise Over Renters : Airport-Area Homeowners Besieged by Loud Jets Say Leasing Plan Will Lower Values

As she finished washing her car on her front lawn, Lillian Johnson barely paused when a large jet made its noisy ascent from neighboring John Wayne Airport.

“You learn to with live it,” Johnson said resignedly, her words nearly drowned by the din overhead.

After living in the flight path of New York’s LaGuardia Airport and in a housing tract here since 1966, Johnson said she and her husband, Eric, thought they had learned to cope well with whatever problems flew their way.

But the Johnsons and other residents, who decided against selling their homes when the airport underwent a major expansion, were sent reeling this month when they learned that the county now plans to rent more than a dozen homes in the area instead of selling them.

“We would much rather see them sold than rented,” Johnson said of the houses bought by the county through its noise-abatement program. “We are worried about our property values if people don’t keep up the yards or keep junky cars out front. These houses have been vacant for years. I don’t have much confidence that the county will ever sell them.”

“You get good and bad both in renters and in homeowners,” said Ed Hall, who has lived in the neighborhood for nearly 30 years. “We have nothing against renters, but we do have something against renting properties out when they should be sold. We just don’t think it’s fair. The county agreed to resell the property, and that’s exactly what they should do.”

In a 1985 agreement, the county offered to buy houses affected by noise from the airport. The buy-out area was defined by how loud the noise was. Homeowners who chose not to sell could have the county pay for acoustically insulating their houses.

The county originally also planned to soundproof the homes they bought, and later resell them. But the county suspended the buy-out program indefinitely last year because of a federal government review of take-off procedures for the airport.

Airline pilots contend that a rule, which requires them to cut power when they reach an altitude of 500 feet to reduce noise over Santa Ana Heights, is unsafe. Pilots have proposed to the Federal Aviation Administration, which regulates takeoff procedures, that the cutback in power be changed to 800 feet.

If the FAA agrees with the pilots, the number of homes affected by the noise could greatly increase and cost the county millions of dollars.

This also placed in limbo the county’s plan to sell the homes, 11 of which are in Santa Ana Heights and four in neighboring Newport Beach, said George Britton, the county’s project manager for Santa Ana Heights redevelopment.

“We can’t, in good conscience, sell those homes right now,” Britton said. “There are legitimate concerns in the neighborhood concerning new neighbors, but we decided that it would be better to have them rented out than have them sit there. There are also neighbors who say they are nervous about the homes being empty.”

Officials say they are confident that a strict screening of applicants will eliminate any irresponsible tenants.

The homes, which have between two and five bedrooms, will be offered with one-year leases, with rents ranging from $1,045 to $1,540 per month.

Tenants will be required to pay a security deposit equal to twice the first month’s rent, so the minimum cost to move in is $3,135. Credit and reference checks will also be conducted.

“It’s a choice between leaving the houses vacant or renting them out,” said Charles West, real estate director for the county’s General Services Agency. “We feel that renting them out will give the county additional income and will offset the cost of maintaining the houses during the interim time.”

Britton said the county still has every intention of eventually selling the homes.

“We are aware that there are a lot of folks who are interested and concerned with what is going on in their community,” he said. “We hope that this current situation is only a short detour in our plans to sell the homes, which we will do as soon as take-off procedures are solved.”

Although they want to see the vacant homes sold, neighbors said they also want the airport to be as safe as possible.

“We think the planes should have full power until they get to sufficient altitude,” Hall said. “If it’s a question of whether we want it noisier or safer, we want it safer. But if it gets to be too terrible, they should just go ahead and condemn this neighborhood.”

In the meantime, Hall said that he and the neighbors will continue to fight to preserve the quality of their neighborhood.

“I think all of the problems have drawn us closer together,” Hall said. “We all have something in common.”