Supervisors Add El Toro Base Initiative to Ballot : Reuse: Action could be reversed if judge rules anti-airport signatures were improperly gathered.

Responding to a successful petition drive, the county Board of Supervisors Tuesday placed an initiative on the March 26, 1996, ballot aimed at blocking development of a civilian airport at the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station.

The decision came a week after the county registrar of voters ruled that a South County anti-airport group, Taxpayers for Responsible Planning, had collected the 75,000 signatures required to place the initiative on the ballot. Election laws require the Board of Supervisors to put such measures on the ballot if enough valid signatures are obtained.

Despite Tuesday’s action, the initiative could be tossed off the ballot next month if a Superior Court judge rules that the signatures were improperly collected.

Pro-airport forces launched a legal challenge to the petition effort this week on the grounds that petition circulators may not have been registered voters. Pro-airport leaders said election laws require the county to verify that signature collectors are registered to vote. But county officials have said such checks are not mandatory.

While some supervisors expressed the desire Tuesday to delay certification of the ballot initiative until the legal issues are settled, they said it is important to move forward with the process and avoid the perception of board bias against the initiative.

“I see no useful purpose in delaying this other than showing a [lack] of good faith to the people who collected the signatures,” said Supervisor Marian Bergeson, who represents South County. “I think [a delay] would be viewed as foot-dragging.”

Supervisor William G. Steiner cast the lone dissenting vote. “I do support placing the initiative on the ballot,” he said. “But I prefer to resolve the legal challenges first.”

Supervisors also requested that county officials prepare a study assessing the potential economic impacts if the initiative is approved.

The board spent well over an hour on the item, hearing testimony from more than a dozen residents and quizzing officials from the county counsel’s office about the legal issues involved.

Most of the speakers urged the supervisors to place the initiative on the ballot.

“I’m asking that you listen to us,” said Linda Moore, a Lake Forest anti-airport activist. By certifying the initiative, supervisors “would restore the faith Orange County voters have in the system,” she said.

Activists also said the ballot measure would give county residents a chance to reconsider what to do with the 4,700-acre base when it closes at the end of the decade. A year ago, voters narrowly endorsed Measure A, which calls for the possible development of a commercial airport at the base.

While some members of Taxpayers for Responsible Planning spent Tuesday lobbying supervisors, others were in Washington, where they hoped to meet with federal officials on the El Toro issue. But the government shutdown forced the cancellation of a key meeting with Defense Department officials.

“We had mixed results in that we couldn’t meet with them today, by law,” said Bill Kogerman, the group’s co-chairman. “They and we are hoping we can meet [today], and so it’s scheduled pending some resolution of the [budget] standoff.”

The anti-airport group did meet with an official at the Transportation Department and with members of the Orange County congressional delegation, who are split on whether to develop a commercial airport at El Toro.

Kogerman said their message to Washington decision makers is very clear: that no federal planning grants should be sent to Orange County pending the outcome of the March vote and the resolution of a lawsuit to block Measure A.

Rep. Ed Royce (R-Fullerton), who supports the airport, said after his meeting with the group: “Personally, I don’t think it hurts to start planning. But they have a different view.”