El Toro Closure Would Cost O.C., Panel Told

The closure of El Toro Marine Corps Air Station would cost Orange County an estimated $60 million in military and defense industry contracts that generate a payroll of $175 million for the local economy, according to a study released by Gov. Pete Wilson as hearings on the proposed base shutdowns opened Sunday.

When combined with the scheduled 1997 closing of the Tustin Marine Corps Air Station, Orange County’s unemployment rate is expected to rise from 6.5% to 8.3%, according to the report prepared by the governor’s Office of Planning and Research.

But as the governor painted a somber picture of the economic devastation that would occur in the state, his report to the Defense Base Closing and Realignment Commission showed that Orange County will suffer relatively light economic damage from the proposed cutbacks, compared to other areas of the state.

The study by the governor’s office--an update on how the communities would be affected by the defense cutbacks--concluded that Orange County would suffer the least of all the California counties expected to lose jobs through base closures.

Wilson and Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) hammered away at what they called dire consequences for California on Sunday, telling the commission that planned shutdown of 10 major state facilities is both economically unfair and strategically unwise.

The commission, in the first of three regional hearings on the closures, seemed impressed by the well-orchestrated California presentation, which spanned more than four hours and included nearly 20 witnesses.

Much of the testimony was aimed at knocking down the complicated methodology that the Pentagon used to arrive at its recommendations. But Wilson and Feinstein seemed to score points by dramatizing the cumulative economic effects on California by previous rounds of base closings.

Using separate charts and graphs, Wilson, and then Feinstein, were able to repeatedly drive home that proposed job cuts would hurt California disproportionately to the rest of the nation.

“California has less than 15% of the total domestic military and civilian Defense Department personnel,” Feinstein said. “Yet we have endured over 50% of all personnel reductions as a result of base closures in 1988.”

“That is quite staggering,” said Commissioner Harry C. McPherson Jr. “I didn’t know that, and if that’s true, that would seem out of line.”

Local economists have previously estimated that the loss of military and civilian jobs at Tustin and El Toro, and their subsequent effect on local businesses, could cost Orange County $500 million every year.

But as daunting as those numbers are, they pale in comparison to other parts of the state.

In Northern California, where the commission is holding two days of hearings before arriving in San Diego on Tuesday, the unemployment rates in four out of five communities facing base closings are expected to at least double, according to the state report.

Of the eight areas in the state on the base closing list receiving benefits from defense-related contracts, Orange County is a distant fourth. McClellan Air Force Base in Sacramento yields contracts totaling $850 million, followed by the Naval Air Station in Alameda, which has contracts valued at $144 million.

After the hearing, Wilson said he was “optimistic that they are learning things that are going to cause them to take a very different view. . . .”

But by law, the commission must put more importance on military value than economic impact, and most testimony focused on flaws or miscalculations in the Pentagon reasoning.

Wilson argued that California bases were needed to protect American security interests with Pacific Rim trading partners, and noted that some regimes, like North Korea, posed unsettling military problems.

Feinstein attacked the Navy’s decision to close Alameda Naval Air Station, while leaving a far-less developed facility in Everett, Wash., unscathed.

She called for a “dedicated side-by-side analysis” of all naval facilities to gauge their cost-effectiveness. “The military values of Everett and Alameda were calculated using different criteria,” Feinstein said. If the two bases are compared with the same criteria, “Alameda would have scored decisively higher.” The bulk of Sunday’s testimony was devoted to McClellan Air Force Base near Sacramento. Led by Rep. Vic Fazio (D-West Sacramento), a panel of local officials pointed out many apparent errors in the Pentagon analysis of the base’s strengths and weaknesses.

McClellan, which is one of five aircraft maintenance centers nationwide, scored poorly in base-by-base comparisons, but Tom Eres, of the Sacramento Metropolitan Chamber of Commerce, questioned the accuracy of the data and rebutted nearly two dozen conclusions.

On such varied issues as lost work time, nearness of bombing ranges, spousal employment and public transportation, Eres was able to show flawed or confusing rationales for closing McClellan.

“We have found flawed information to be a common complaint,” said commissioner Robert D. Stuart Jr., who praised Eres’ analysis. Fazio urged that commissioners spare McClellan in this round, seek a broad study of excess maintenance capacity throughout the other service branches and not rely on “this very imprecise data.”

Like the four other air logistics centers, McClellan faces daunting environmental cleanup costs, estimated as high as $10 billion.

Today’s hearing will focus on the decision to close Alameda Naval Air Station and four other related Navy installations in the Bay Area. The commission will travel to San Diego on Tuesday to hear testimony on El Toro Marine Air Station and the Recruit Training Center in San Diego.