Anti-Airport Forces Band Together to Coordinate Efforts of 6 Groups

One of the sharpest criticisms against groups opposed to building a civilian airport at El Toro Marine Corps Air Station is that they’ve acted independently and failed to coordinate their efforts. Now that’s changing.

The Taxpayers for Responsible Planning, Project 99 and the recently created Coalition of Homeowners Assns. have formed an umbrella organization to come up with joint strategies to defeat the proposed civilian airport.

The new era of cooperation is giving South County residents reason to think the airport isn’t a done deal despite a series of disheartening setbacks in court and the ballot box, say members of the newly formed El Toro Unified Coalition.

“The despair that we used to fight is starting to dissipate,” said Larry Agran, leader of Project 99. “I’m feeling very, very good about this” new coalition.

The El Toro coalition is meeting monthly to make sure anti-airport forces are not overlapping their efforts, thus wasting precious time and money. The coalition comprises the three larger anti-airport groups and three smaller grass-roots organizations.

In the past, communication among the groups against the airport would be limited to members bumping into one another at anti-airport rallies.

“We would try to raise money and people were confused about who all these groups are and what they do,” said Jim Davy, a Coalition of Homeowners Assn. spokesman. “Everybody really needed to get together.”

Starting in May, the groups sat down to single out the most important issues and divide workloads.

For example, while Taxpayers for Responsible Planning takes the lead in filing legal action against the environmental impact report for the airport that the County Board of Supervisors approved late last year, Project 99 workers will research legal strategies for the case and educate the public about court battles.

“I think everybody recognized that it is imperative that the people opposed to the proposed El Toro international airport have to work together,” Agran said. “Now, it’s beginning to happen in a very concrete way.”

TRP and Project 99 were pushed together by the Coalition of Homeowners Assns., whose members openly complained that anti-airport factions were splintered. Last week, the coalition sponsored the largest anti-airport rally to date, held at the Ritz-Carlton, and raised $85,000 for TRP.

“Inactivity had lost us Measure A and Measure S,” said Wayne Rayfield, chairman of the homeowner coalition. Measure A approved the airport, and the South County-supported Measure S would have reversed that approval.

“We were feeling a great sense of urgency, and a number of us thought that if we were going to be effective, we had to have common strategies and a set of priorities.”

Rayfield said the coalition has already seen a resurgence of enthusiasm from South County residents since the Ritz-Carlton fund-raiser.

“We’ve had people coming out of the woodwork full of energy,” Rayfield said. “It’s given us a lot of support and motivation.”

Establishing a line of communication among the largest grass-roots groups in the anti-airport movement was critical, said Susan Withrow, a Mission Viejo councilwoman who is a board member on the El Toro Reuse Planning Authority, a collection of South County cities opposed to the airport.

“Our focus over the next year is coming up with a nonaviation alternative for the airport,” said Withrow, “and both TRP and Project 99 are going to be at the table. This is such a critical issue and it’s important that there aren’t any turf wars going on.”

South County residents fear the noise and traffic from a commercial airport will have a devastating effect on their communities. Proponents say an airport would provide a huge economic boost to the county’s economy.

Airport supporters predict the new coalition won’t make any difference and point out that the airport plan already has been approved by the Board of Supervisors. It is now undergoing review by federal authorities before El Toro is abandoned by the military in 1999.

“We’re focused on keeping the process [of building an airport] on track,” said Julie Puentes, spokeswoman for the Orange County Business Council. “The fragmentation of our opponents is not something we’re concerning ourselves with. It’s not our problem.”

The business council also separated itself this week from an El Toro Reuse Planning Authority proposal to be picked by county supervisors to develop a non-aviation alternative for the Marine base.

The South County cities felt that including pro-airport groups like the council to participate in the non-aviation plan would make their proposal more credible to the supervisors.

However, not wanting to lend support to South County’s campaign to stop the airport, the business group sent a letter on Wednesday to Supervisor William G. Steiner making it clear that it would not participate.