El Toro: Process Overhaul Is Key

Change is in the wind at the El Toro Local Redevelopment Authority but not to the degree and scope that we have hoped for.

County supervisors on Wednesday began considering a list of candidates for interim director of a new department that will plan an international airport at the base. While the candidates being floated may have various strengths, the question remains whether the county is prepared to make the fundamental planning changes that really are needed.

The county wants the new director to head a new LRA, and this has created a political crisis within the Hall of Administration over the authority of County Executive Officer Jan Mittermeier. El Toro had been in her portfolio, and removing it has led to a test of wills.

All this should be about the big picture and not Mittermeier’s job description or her performance. By making the style and management practices of airport planning under Mittermeier the issue, and indeed, by looking for a process friendlier to the pro-airport supervisorial majority, the larger crisis in El Toro planning is going unaddressed.

It’s fine for board Chairman Charles V. Smith to share with airport opponents a feeling that a more “open” process is desirable. But this is progress in inches, not miles.

Naturally, he wants a manager experienced with big projects in order to realize his vision of a big international airport. He misses the point if he imagines that a personnel change under the banner of the LRA is sufficient to address the community crisis surrounding base reuse. It has arisen from having the supervisors or their surrogates act as sole El Toro planning authority.

The proposed change fails to address the fundamental political problem. That is, there exists a planning apparatus insufficiently representative of the community’s interest in a range of real choices for El Toro. County leaders appear to have concluded that they can address satisfactorily the community’s unhappiness over El Toro planning without radically overhauling the process. It’s unlikely that they can do so.

Supervisor Tom Wilson, who will join Smith on the board’s selection subcommittee, is obligated as representative of southern cities to raise the question of the true representativeness of the LRA. He should take care about what he signs off on.

The board needs to think in much bigger terms about process. Changing personnel and flow charts probably won’t satisfy the huge number of residents who have expressed misgivings about El Toro planning in survey after survey and at the ballot box.