Foes of El Toro Airport Back Ballot Initiative

A coalition of south Orange County city officials approved an abrupt change in strategy Monday for fighting a commercial airport at El Toro, agreeing to move ahead with a countywide initiative in 2000 to bar new airports, landfills or jails without voter approval.

Officials with the seven-city El Toro Reuse Planning Authority will reconvene at a special meeting early next month to approve final language for the proposed Safe and Healthy Communities Act.

The measure would call for regional land uses that are deemed noxious to be approved by a two-thirds majority of voters countywide.

“This initiative, while not a direct attack on [an airport at El Toro] is designed to kill the airport,” Lake Forest Councilman Richard Dixon said in support of the new tactic. “We don’t just want to kill the airport but to make sure that the planning fiasco doesn’t take place again in the future.”

The new initiative is a radical departure from past promises to put a non-aviation alternative for the base up for voter approval this year. For months, South County officials have advocated repealing the airport zoning through a special election in 1999.