Landing Directly in the Line of Fire

It couldn’t have been much fun standing at the lectern before county supervisors being grilled about why a $13.9-million price tag for planning the reuse of El Toro Marine Corps Air Station was now $20.3 million.

But if the terse questions from two supervisors rattled Courtney Wiercioch, the county’s assistant chief executive officer for public affairs, it didn’t show more than a slight flush to her cheeks.

As project manager for El Toro’s conversion to civilian use in 1999, Wiercioch has endured scores of angry outbursts from South County residents who passionately oppose having an international airport built nearby. She’s been labeled unqualified by critics as she attempts to hold back a tide of county residents questioning whether the Marine base--despite two countywide votes--should be converted to commercial use.

It’s certainly not the first time the 36-year-old Brea native has bumped against airport controversy. She grew up in a household where her parents opposed plans for an airport in Chino Hills in the 1970s and worked at John Wayne Airport after its controversial expansion in the late 1980s.

“Bye, planes” were among the first words spoken by her 2-year-old daughter, Lindsey, as the toddler gazed into the sky at their North Tustin home, beneath John Wayne Airport’s landing pattern.

Wiercioch (pronounced weer-chuck) is aware that she has become a target for some folks unhappy with the county’s planning process for El Toro. She responds to criticism in typical fashion--staunchly defending the job she’s been asked to do by her boss, Chief Executive Officer Jan Mittermeier.

“The politics isn’t my realm,” she said. “But from my perspective, as a student of politics, good public discussion results in good public policy. I’d rather have the discussion focused on policy rather than personalities, and that applies across the board.”

Critics of Wiercioch’s planning efforts, including supervisors Todd Spitzer and Thomas W. Wilson, are equally emphatic that politics isn’t ruling their critique.

Spitzer, for example, said he wanted explanations in August for the $6-million bump in planning costs from an estimate provided by Wiercioch not because he opposes the airport--which he does--but because it represented a whopping 43% cost increase.

“Number crunching goes hand-in-hand with credibility,” Spitzer said. “This doesn’t give people confidence that the planning process is going smoothly.”

It would be tough to find someone more opposed to a commercial airport at El Toro than UC Irvine political science professor Mark Petracca. Yet Petracca is among the staunchest defenders of his former student Wiercioch, who received bachelor’s and master’s degrees from UCI’s Politics and Society program.

He said Wiercioch has been given the job of executing public policy without being allowed critical analysis. Her defense of that policy--which often comes across as rigid--belies her talent for balancing alternatives and forces her to act “on autopilot,” he said.

“It’s very unfortunate that someone with her talent has been given this incredibly self-destructive job,” Petracca said of Wiercioch, whom he praised as one of the best students in his master’s program.

“Courtney’s strengths are that she’s incredibly competent, she presents herself well and she’s terribly loyal in a good way, though perhaps in ways that reduce her autonomy,” he said. “It would be a mistake to underestimate her background and her intelligence. As an airport opponent, I just wish it wasn’t her.”

Eileen Padberg remembers Wiercioch as a young intern who went to work for Padberg and fellow consultant Bob Nelson in 1986. She left several months later to join the county in the summer of 1986 as an executive assistant to then-Supervisor Thomas F. Riley, whose district included John Wayne Airport.

In February 1990, she left Riley to work at the airport, eventually becoming a deputy airport manager under Mittermeier. While there, Mittermeier said, Wiercioch handled several controversial projects involving noise issues and the arrival of cargo carriers.

“When these projects were approved by the Board of Supervisors, not a single voice of opposition was heard,” Mittermeier said. “These were technical, controversial, complex projects that Courtney managed with great skill and intelligence.”

In 1993, she enlisted Petracca’s help to hire two UCI graduate students to begin compiling comparative information on military airfield conversions. A year later, county residents voted to designate airport zoning for El Toro.

In her new job, Padberg said, Wiercioch “needs a flak jacket.” Among things she was criticized for was proposing to hire Nelson, her old boss, for a $475,000 public information program lasting to 1999. Supervisors whittled the Nelson Communications contract to $326,000 for work through June.

“I remember her as very competent and a very hard worker,” recalled Padberg, who isn’t active on either side of the El Toro controversy. “She had a good sense of humor, but she was very serious about the projects she worked on. Both she and Jan are just trying to do their jobs. Whether she loved or hated an airport, she wouldn’t do anything other than do her job.”

Wiercioch admits that her narrow focus is to accomplish the mission set by a majority of supervisors and two countywide votes: plan for the reuse of the 4,700-acre Marine base into an airport and surrounding aviation-compatible uses. A specific plan, master plan and a more detailed environmental impact report are due to be completed in early 1999.

If supervisors at a future date decide to change course to a non-airport use, which would require another countywide vote, that’s fine too, she said.

“My directive from the board is to plan for a two-airport system [John Wayne and El Toro], and we will proceed until there is some other directive provided,” she said.

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Profile: Courtney Wiercioch

Age: 36

Lives: North Tustin

Family: Husband, 2-year-old daughter

Education: Bachelor and master of science from politics and society program, UCI; University of California Regents fellow, 1985

Job: Assistant chief executive officer, public affairs

Salary: $85,488

Duties: Program manager for county’s reuse planning for El Toro Marine Corps Air Station; manages all aspects of the county’s legislative, community and media affairs programs

Background: Hired in 1986 as executive assistant to then-Supervisor Thomas F. Riley. Transferred to John Wayne Airport in 1990 to run public affairs. Promoted to deputy airport director under airport manager (now county CEO) Jan Mittermeier. Promoted to the CEO’s office in June 1996.

On the airport fight: “My preference would be for the attention to focus on facts and analysis rather than personalities and perceptions.”

Source: Courtney Wiercioch; Researched by JEAN O. PASCO / For The Times

Los Angeles Times