City Suggests Vote Against Airport Plan

Meeting in a highly unusual special session Sunday night, the Burbank City Council instructed its three representatives to a board overseeing Burbank Airport to vote against a proposal to finance a new, larger terminal.

A resolution to approve raising $109.8 million through bond sales and other means to purchase land comes before the airport’s nine-member operating board at a meeting today at 9 a.m.

News of the Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority’s planned vote on the proposal stunned and angered some members of the Burbank City Council, who said they had not heard about it until Friday.

On Saturday, Mayor Bill Wiggins scheduled the emergency session to discuss the financial ramifications of the measure.

Although three of the five council members voted to instruct Burbank’s three airport commissioners to vote against the proposal, the order is not binding and it remains to be seen what the commissioners will do.

All three commissioners, however, assured the council they would follow their directions--an action that would effectively kill the proposal. Under an agreement signed by the cities of Burbank, Glendale and Pasadena in 1991, the Airport Authority must have a two-thirds vote from each city to approve the issuance of bonds.

The Airport Authority board will consider issuing $109.8 million in tax-exempt bonds, taxable bonds or short-term promissory notes to buy 140 acres of Lockheed Corp. land for a new terminal.

“I think this was an extreme act of bad faith, and I don’t appreciate being here today,” Vice Mayor Dave Golonski said Sunday. “I think the Airport Authority has a long way to go in gaining the faith of the people of Burbank.”

Burbank’s airport commissioners are Brian Bowman, president of the Airport Authority, and Councilmen Robert Bowne and George Battey Jr., who will both leave the commission in May when their terms as council members expire.

Sunday’s three-hour special meeting at Burbank City Hall was attended by about 30 people, some of whom asked the council to replace the commissioners immediately unless they agreed to vote against the resolution.

“I’m kind of dumbfounded as to why we are all here,” said Joel Schlossman, who lives in Burbank under the airport’s flight path. “We have two members on the council who serve over there. Did you think to mention it to us?”

Sunday’s special meeting was the first to be held in Burbank in at least 10 years.