Exemption’s Lapse a Blow to Airport

In another setback for the planned El Toro airport, Orange County officials said Wednesday that they didn’t fight to extend a special state exemption that would have made it easier for the Board of Supervisors to approve cargo and airline leases.

The county had until last Friday, the close of the legislative year, to try to keep the exemption.

Instead, it will try next year to devise some other way to get around a state law requiring a super-majority vote of county boards to start the leasing process, said Ellen Call, spokeswoman for the county’s El Toro planning effort.

Under an exemption spurred by the county’s historic bankruptcy five years ago, the county needs only three votes from its five-member board to approve leases. That exemption expires Dec. 31. After that, four votes will be needed.

The difference in votes is crucial for future airport plans at El Toro.

The board has a bare 3-2 majority supporting the conversion of the former Marine base into an international airport. Anti-airport Supervisors Todd Spitzer and Tom Wilson already have vowed to block any aviation leases at the base.

“By letting this exemption lapse, the county is acknowledging that, at the earliest, they would not be able to go forward with any aviation at the base before Jan. 1, 2001,” Spitzer said. “The momentum against the airport has never been stronger.”

How the lease issue will affect progress on the airport is unclear. Planning can continue on 3-2 votes, but if officials cannot find a way to circumvent the four votes needed for leases, they could be stymied in proceeding with cargo flights and airline operations.

The county had pledged to begin cargo flights July 3, the day after the base was closed. But a series of setbacks, including legal challenges by South County foes, obliterated that optimistic timetable.

The county recently revised its planning schedule for the airport, moving back the expected date for final acceptance of the project from December to May.

However, county officials still hope an initial phase of the airport will open by 2005. The county’s plan calls for a new international airport to serve as many as 28.8 million people a year by 2020.

Lobbyists and legislators from South County kept vigil last week for any sign that the county might try to slip in a way to extend its exemption. South County legislative staffers scrambled to read reams of bills so members wouldn’t be caught voting unaware. Anti-airport lobbyists circled legislators’ offices, urging them to vote against any pro-airport language.

Meanwhile, county officials, including legislative director Robert L. Richardson, repeatedly refused to discuss the county’s plans to resolve the looming loss of the exemption. One county staff member who asked not to be named said the fix was “buried so deep, no one will ever find it.”

The announcement that the county was letting its lease exemption expire created a new round of speculation about the county’s strategy.

One possibility raised was that the county might try to circumvent future super-majority lease votes by turning over airport planning and construction operations to a separate government entity called a joint-powers authority, a partnership of public entities.

Indeed, a bill passed last week but yet to be signed by Gov. Gray Davis would broaden the powers of joint-powers authorities.

Several airport supporters said this week that forming such an authority could provide another advantage: Such an agency would not be subject to an initiative headed for the March ballot that would restrict the county’s ability to build the airport. The initiative, if passed, would require a two-thirds approval by county voters for any airport, large jail or hazardous-waste landfill.

Having El Toro built by a joint-powers authority “is not beyond the realm of possibility,” said Anaheim Mayor Tom Daly, chairman of the Orange County Regional Airport Authority, which is itself a joint-powers authority. Formed in 1983 to plan and build a second airport, the authority is composed of 15 pro-airport cities.

Transferring airport planning to a joint-powers authority would be a “frightening” development to anti-airport forces, said Susan Withrow, chairwoman of the El Toro Reuse Planning Authority, an eight-city coalition fighting the airport.

“If this is what they’re [considering], it confirms what we’ve said: that they’ll build an airport at any cost,” Withrow said. “It’s a pretty clear indication of how desperate they’ve become.”

Assemblywoman Patricia Bates (R-Laguna Niguel), a staunch airport opponent, said that any move by airport planners to form a separate authority would be challenged in court.

Both airport supporters and opponents said they were furious over the secrecy involved in the county’s plans and the back-door approach to handling such a major public-policy project.

“Just because an issue is divisive is no excuse for not informing the public,” said Patricia Harrigan of the League of Women Voters of Orange County, which is neutral on the airport.