Waters Rebuffs Riordan’s Pitch for Support on Airport Expansion Plan

Trolling for support for a highly touted project from a usually reliable ally, Mayor Richard Riordan instead got an earful Thursday from U.S. Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Los Angeles).

As he made his Capitol Hill rounds, Riordan dropped by Waters’ office and began their meeting with pleasant conversational inquiries. But he had barely begun his pitch to the congresswoman about the need to expand Los Angeles International Airport when she interrupted, shifting from their informal conversation to carefully quotable remarks.

“Mr. Mayor, I am not convinced that that airport should expand,” she said. “That congestion is a real problem.”

Waters, who had allowed a reporter to sit in on the session, then used it to argue down Riordan at every point, complaining about noise from the airport as well as pollution, traffic and the burden that she said is being unfairly placed on Inglewood, a key part of her district. That city, she said, “is almost under attack,” noting that its residents were being asked to assume additional burdens from an airport that belongs to Los Angeles, which recently raided Inglewood of its basketball and hockey teams.

Riordan gamely tried to make his case, but the conversation continued to careen. Finally, an aide to the mayor asked the reporter to leave. A few minutes later, the mayor emerged, shaking his head in apparent exasperation.

Before he could take his leave, Riordan got his latest look at the lurking opposition to his plans for a new and enlarged Los Angeles International Airport. The mayor supports a plan that would nearly double the passenger capacity of the airport and add immensely to its cargo capacity. Estimates of the expansion’s cost range from $8 billion to $12 billion.

As he increasingly does in speeches and meetings in Los Angeles, Riordan on Thursday argued that the proposed expansion is key to the region’s economic future.

“It all comes down to if you want L.A. to be competitive, if you want L.A. to be the leader of trade in the next century, then you have to do it,” Riordan said.

“They always say that,” Waters responded crisply.

Trying another tack, Riordan argued that the issue was jobs, that areas like Inglewood might be inconvenienced by the airport but also depended on it. “Inglewood,” Riordan said, “relies on the airport.”

“For jobs,” the mayor said, “for industries that rely on the airport, jobs that support the airport. That’s why the unions support the airport.”

Even that gambit fell short.

“I don’t care about the unions,” Waters said. “They don’t just say jobs and pull my string.”