Swim Club Hopes for Stroke of Luck in Bid for Base Pool

The battle over the former El Toro Marine base has been about a lot of things: airport noise, traffic, safety, political pressure, ballot initiatives.

But it’s also about those who love to swim.

For more than a year, youngsters from the Irvine Novaquatics, a nationally ranked swim club, have waited while their adult leaders negotiated with Orange County to lease an unused pool at the base.

Club officials have spent dozens of hours negotiating with the county and obtained a $20,000 grant to refurbish one of the base pools, but their members have not been able to swim a stroke. They are caught in the county’s political storm over the future of a proposed international airport at the base.

“We’re a nonprofit organization that is airport neutral. We’re apolitical,” said Tony Gauthier, head of the pool search committee for the Novaquatics. “All we wanted was to see if we could lease one of the swimming pools.”

The El Toro battle is now having an effect on the people who rely on it for swimming, horseback riding, golf and other recreation.

Gauthier was enthusiastic after he saw an ad in a newspaper seeking community groups interested in leasing facilities at the base.

Plenty of warehouse space, a theater, military dorms and swimming pools were available.

Gauthier called for information and began negotiations with the county government, which was expected to sign a lease with the Navy for the 4,700-acre base last September.

Besides the pool, there is a classroom nearby for swim instruction and waiting areas for family members to watch their children in the pool.

Gauthier is not alone in his frustration. There are groups already using El Toro for child care, horseback riding and stables, RV storage and golf. The Board of Supervisors may vote as early as today to end the programs, citing a mounting financial deficit.

However, if the programs are spared and a lease agreement is signed with the Navy by July 1, the swimming pool deal could be struck, according to Supervisors Chuck Smith and Tom Wilson.

“If we get a master lease signed by the July 1 deadline,” Wilson said, “the Novaquatics will be in the pool. I can’t see why Chairman Smith and I can’t work to make that happen.”

Smith is hopeful that leases for for-profit programs such as housing and warehousing, can offset losses from child care, the Novaquatics and other nonprofit groups allowed to use the base, said James Campbell, an aide to Smith.

When Gauthier first began talking with county officials, things went smoothly. There was the usual red tape: file a letter of intent of use, get county Health Care Agency approval, agree to pay for refurbishing the pool.

But then negotiations started to go sour. First, Gary Simon, with whom the Novaquatics had spent months in discussions, had his contract terminated by county Executive Officer Jan Mittermeier. Two months later, Mittermeier froze El Toro planning expenditures--a mandatory move under Measure F, the anti-airport initiative that county voters overwhelmingly passed March 7.

“Everyone would love to see a pool for children, but I don’t have the authorization currently to subsidize the base,” Mittermeier said. “This is a policy issue for the Board of Supervisors.”

County officials told Gauthier that Mittermeier’s order stopped the processing of their application. Gauthier said the Novaquatics received a letter a week ago from the county Health Care Agency’s approving its plans for refurbishing the pool.

For the Novaquatics, it has been a lesson in Political Science 101. The swim club, which last year won national titles, has more than 500 competitive swimmers from age 5 to in their 70s.

Coach David Salo said the club was forced to seek another training venue after Irvine officials said that the city’s Heritage Park Aquatics Complex would be closed for at least two years for renovations.

“We were told by the city that you need to go find some additional space, and the timing of that coincided with the announcement of the base closing,” Salo said. “The city has since delayed renovation, but we’re still looking for a pool just in case.”

To defray refurbishing costs for the El Toro swimming pool, the Novaquatics won a $20,000 grant from USA Swimming, the governing body for competitive swimming in the United States.

But to raise money to pay for the lease, which was estimated during the early stages of negotiations at more than $25,000 a month, the Novaquatics proposed a swimming instruction program for 1,500 children.

“A learn-to-swim program could provide revenue, which was secondary to us,” Gauthier said. “But we wanted a cost-neutral thing for the county and for us. We would provide a safe place for kids to learn to swim at a reasonable rate.”

The club, through word-of-mouth and by circulating fliers in several communities, received 400 requests for service from children enrolled in nearby elementary schools.

“Simon wanted us in on March 1,” Gauthier said. “But we needed to know how long we could go in for. Obviously we weren’t going to spend all this time and money for something that could end by July 1 if a lease could not be agreed upon.”

The stumbling blocks “have been politics,” Salo said.

“Those of us interested in the facilities recognize it’s a temporary usage that may be for four to five years until the county makes up its mind,” Salo said. “We jokingly told Tom Wilson that if it becomes an airport, just run the conveyor belts for luggage around the pool.”