Steiner Warns Against El Toro Mini-Metropolis

The mini-metropolis proposed this week for the El Toro Marine Corps Air Station might compete with existing Orange County venues such as Edison International Field of Anaheim and the Performing Arts Center in Costa Mesa, Supervisor William G. Steiner warned Tuesday.

“We don’t want to make one part of the county viable at the expense of another part of the county,” Steiner told airport opponents, whose alternative plan was unveiled Monday. “We are planning to invest $2.5 million to market Orange County [for the convention center] because it is so competitive, and we have had businesses lured away by Las Vegas and San Diego.”

There are plans to expand the Performing Arts Center and the convention center in Anaheim.

He also criticized the anti-airport plan for the absence of programs or housing for the homeless, as required by the federal government.

But representatives for the El Toro Reuse Planning Authority, the agency that prepared the alternative plan, said their market studies indicate that the county could absorb another site for entertainment and sports facilities. And, they said, they could easily add a homeless facility or a children’s facility based on Orangewood in Orange to their plan.

The non-aviation plan includes a 360-acre central park with botanical gardens, about 500 acres for homes, a 76-acre stadium and about 1,300 acres for a business and technology center that would include a university campus.

The plan has scant hope of becoming a reality unless Measure A, which changed the county’s General Plan in 1994 to permit a commercial airport at El Toro, is overturned by another ballot initiative. No such initiative is in the works.

Another major obstacle to the non-aviation plan is that anti-airport Supervisors Thomas W. Wilson and Todd Spitzer are in the minority on the board, which is in charge of the reuse process.

In April, the county is expected to release four long-awaited preliminary plans for a commercial airport, a proposal opposed by nearly all of south Orange County, where residents fear more noise, heavier traffic and lower property values.

The non-aviation proposal will be submitted to the county for environmental review along with the county’s airport plans.