Grand Jury Enters Debate Over El Toro

Wading into the debate over planning the future of El Toro Marine Corps Air Station, the Orange County Grand Jury announced this week it is reviewing the county’s process for deciding the fate of the base.

The grand jury will not evaluate “the merits of the alternatives being studied,” including the controversial plan to turn the base into a commercial airport, grand jury foreman James P. Kelly said in an Oct. 21 letter advising county supervisors of the review.

“Rather, the focus will be on the process itself,” Kelly wrote.

The announcement by the 19-member grand jury was the latest in a rare string of good news for opponents of the airport plan, who had encountered defeat after defeat after the airport proposal emerged three years ago.

Earlier this month, the county Board of Supervisors voted to allow South County cities to oversee planning for non-aviation uses of the base, giving the cities a say in the base-conversion process for the first time.

The same week, a Superior Court judge in San Diego issued a tentative ruling labeling the county’s environmental impact report on the airport proposal unrealistic and inappropriate. Judge Judith McConnell said the report minimized an airport’s impact on noise, traffic and pollution in surrounding South County communities.

Airport opponents for years have called for an investigation of the county’s El Toro planning process, saying that their concerns about the fate of the 4,700-acre military base have been ignored by the county. A lawsuit they have filed against the county is pending.

County officials deny that they have tried to cut anyone out of the planning process, which they vigorously defend.

“The process has been run very well [and] in accordance with all federal base-closure regulations,” said Courtney Wiercioch, manager of the county’s El Toro Master Development Program. “We’re sure that any report [the grand jurors] may issue will support the planning process.

“We have absolutely no concern about the [grand jury] inquiry. Why they are choosing to do it, I don’t know. But we aren’t worried about it.”

Wiercioch said grand jury members have asked to meet with her and other county officials next week.

In its role as government watchdog, the grand jury regularly looks into the workings of local government agencies. Its recommendations are sent to county boards, districts and commissions.

This grand jury, constituted in July, is not the first to ask questions about the El Toro planning process. Previous grand juries have conducted interviews on the issue. But until now, those inquiries have never become public. No reports on the inquiries have been issued.

Members of the grand jury, which normally operates in strict secrecy, did not return calls from The Times regarding the current review. If a report emerges from the review, it will be issued before the grand jury’s term expires on June 30, 1988.

County voters have twice endorsed plans to transform the base into a commercial airport when the military abandons the facility sometime before 1999. But its future remains one of the county’s most controversial planning issues.

“The process has had its shortcomings because, from the get-go, the South County input has been eliminated. It hasn’t been accepted as being valid, and that worries me,” said Supervisor Thomas W. Wilson, who cast the lone vote in opposition to an El Toro airport when the issue came before the board last December.

“Any time you are trying to eliminate an alternative opinion, that bothers me somewhat,” Wilson added.

Melody Carruth, a former mayor of Laguna Hills and an airport opponent, agreed.

‘I’m not at all surprised that the grand jury is looking into the process of El Toro conversion,” Carruth said.

“The county designed a military base planning authority that’s unlike any other in the whole country. In every case, save for here, the impacted communities are full participants with a meaningful vote. The EIR has deceived the public with half-truths. . . . I think the county’s actions have raised a flaming red flag. I’m glad the grand jury sees it.”

Airport supporter Clarence Turner, spokesman for the Airport Working Group and a former mayor of Newport Beach, said he welcomed the grand jury review.

“I hope they analyze it to death, because I think it has been fair, and I think it will hold up under any scrutiny they want to give it,” Turner said.