Group Submits Petitions for Ballot Vote on Airport

A citizens group submitted petitions Tuesday hoping to force a public vote on nighttime curfews and a mandatory flight cap at Burbank Airport.

Restore Our Airport Rights submitted a similar petition last year, but it was disqualified. The group turned in 10,700 signatures to Burbank officials Tuesday.

If at least 7,663 signatures are determined to be valid by the city clerk’s office, a special election must be called within six months.

If ROAR falls short of that number, but has at least 5,109 valid signatures, the measure would qualify for the February 2003 ballot.

“The City Council has ignored us; they’re too cozy with the airport,” said Howard Rothenbach, ROAR chairman and a candidate for Burbank City Council. “This is the people of Burbank exercising their rights over their own community.”

The measure would require the airport to have a curfew on all nonemergency air traffic from 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. It would also place a 10% cap on all new airport growth and development. Additionally, the initiative would prohibit the airport from changing or modifying any of its existing runways, and it would require the airport to prepare a new environmental impact report.

According to the initiative, only once these provisions were met would the city be allowed to grant the airport any zoning or financing on its development projects.

The initiative would also increase the number of votes required for local approval of an airport development project from a simple majority of registered voters to a two-thirds majority.

Both local and airport officials question the potential constitutionality and enforceability of the initiative.

There are also questions of possible redundancy.

The airport has already retained a consultant to evaluate and prepare a federal Part 161 Study--the first step in formally requesting a 10 p.m. to 7 a.m. curfew from the Federal Aviation Administration.

Rothenbach says the Part 161 Study is not enough. But some argue that the ROAR ballot initiative takes things a step too far.

“This initiative is a total waste of time,” said Charles Lombardo, one of three Burbank representatives to the Airport Authority. “There’s not a single part of this thing that will meet a constitutional or court review.”

ROAR’s first ballot initiative was disqualified in March 2000 for not including the names of two chief proponents on the petition.