Lake Forest, Laguna Reject County’s El Toro Plan : Demilitarization: But the two South County cities say they will seek compromise with county on Marine base closure.

Voicing displeasure over Orange County government’s unwillingness to give them a greater say in the future use of the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station, two South County cities reaffirmed their decisions to reject the county’s latest power-sharing plan but said they wanted to keep working toward a compromise.

In late night actions at council meetings Tuesday, the cities of Lake Forest and Laguna Beach voted to maintain solidarity with other South County cities that have declined to join the task force that county officials want to charge with responsibility for planning the base’s conversion to civilian use.

Although the Lake Forest City Council stopped short of endorsing the formation of a South County cities consortium to seek federal grants for planning El Toro’s future, four of five council members seemed to regard such a joint powers agency as an inevitable step.

“I think we have to stick with the other cities in South County,” Councilman Tim Link said. The county Board of Supervisors “cannot take on all South County cities and have any credibility” with the Defense Department, which dispenses federal grants for conversion planning purposes and will decide if the proposed use warrants the cost-free transfer of the base to some newly constituted authority.

The Lake Forest council agreed to explore the cost of joining a South County joint powers authority, and gave Mayor Ann Van Haun negotiating powers as communities neighboring the Marine base continue their talks on the politically charged issue.

Van Haun expressed disappointment over the supervisors’ rejection of a request from South County cities for more time to consider the county’s latest compromise proposal, which establishes two layers of advisory panels but gives final voting powers to the Board of Supervisors.

“This was a wonderful opportunity for the board to work with us,” Van Haun said. “We want to work with them, but we also want to be part of the decision-making process.”

Councilman Richard Dixon urged the council to gather more information before voting on becoming part of the joint powers authority. Referring to a supervisors’ decision to exclude from the advisory group any city that enters a joint powers authority, Dixon said, “At the risk of being disloyal, I think we need to be very, very careful” before crossing the county.

Supporting the effort to give South County cities a greater say in what happens to the Marine base, the Laguna Beach council on a 4-0 vote Tuesday endorsed creation of an agency with “significant” representation for South County cities, which will be most directly affected by conversion of the base.

Councilman Wayne Peterson gave the council a memo saying Laguna Beach had supported the idea of allowing county government to serve as the lead agency in planning the conversion on the assumption that South County cities would have a “meaningful role” in the decision-making process.

But the memo said that because the county’s proposed task force did not include all of the affected South County cities and the Board of Supervisors sought to maintain absolute control, the city should now support the creation of a more broad-based decision-making body.

Discussion was limited because the agenda item was not taken up until shortly after midnight. Due to the politically sensitive nature of such action, council members were still exchanging phone calls Wednesday morning to make minor adjustments in the wording of a resolution the council eventually adopted, Peterson said.

“We’re not saying the county should not be the lead agency,” he said. “We expect them to assume that role. We simply feel very strongly that the South County cities need to have a position which allows them to be part of the final decision, because of the impact this is going to have on us.”

Peterson and Councilwoman Kathleen Blackburn have been taking turns in recent weeks meeting with elected officials and other South County cities on the subject. Mayor Lida Lenney was absent from the meeting.