O.C. Gets 175,000 Pro-Park Names

“Great Park” supporters hauled 175,000 petition signatures in a rented armored truck Wednesday, delivering more than double the number needed to let Orange County voters decide whether to build an urban preserve rather than an airport at the former El Toro Marine base.

But the validity of the signatures remains in doubt pending a state appeals court decision on whether the language of the proposed March 2002 ballot measure is misleading.

Escorted by a column of cars driven by airport opponents, the truck delivered 40 boxes of petitions to the registrar of voters in Santa Ana shortly before noon.

They decided to press forward with the signatures despite the legal uncertainty. And they chose an armored truck as a symbol of what they called the county’s “efforts to hijack the people’s will,” said Leonard Kranser, spokesman for the ballot measure proponents.

Banking on a favorable court decision, initiative backers were racing to meet a Sept. 17 deadline to qualify the measure for the March ballot. If that were to happen, it would mark the fourth time Orange County residents were asked to decide the fate of the shuttered 4,700-acre base.

Timing is critical for both sides of the airport fight. The pro-airport majority of the county Board of Supervisors has fast-tracked the environmental approval process in an effort to persuade the U.S. government to hand over the base before any vote could be held. The Navy has set a June timetable for turning over the land, which prompted airport opponents to target the March ballot.

At stake is a proposed international airport that would serve as many as 29 million passengers by 2025, which supporters say is needed to meet growing regional demand. But airport opponents say it would destroy the quality of life of south Orange County residents.

The ballot measure would rezone the former base for a large urban park, schools, health-care facilities, museums, industrial buildings and sport complexes.

On Tuesday, after a raucous public hearing, the three pro-airport supervisors indicated they are ready to vote on the county’s plan. Board Chairwoman Cynthia P. Coad has suggested the board consider a smaller airport, one that could handle about 18.8 million passengers a year.

But anti-airport organizers said the fight isn’t about the size of an airport.

“An airport’s an airport,” said Kranser, a spokesman for the Committee for Safe and Healthy Communities, which supports the ballot measure.

Number of Signatures Is 2 1/2 Times What’s Needed

Supervisors went to court to block a previous anti-airport initiative, Measure F, before it was placed on the ballot, and again after it was approved overwhelmingly by 67% of the voters, Kranser said. Measure F was later overturned by a judge whose ruling has been appealed.

The proposed urban park measure would zone the land for parks rather than an airport.

The number of signatures submitted Wednesday was 2 1/2 times the 71,206 needed to qualify the park initiative for the March ballot. The registrar’s office must certify that the signatures are those of registered voters.

The proposed initiative was challenged earlier by Citizens for Jobs and the Economy, a pro-airport group. Superior Court Judge James P. Gray ruled the initiative’s ballot title and summary--prepared by the county--was misleading and declared all the signatures invalid.

But a San Diego appeals court breathed new life into the initiative when it stayed Gray’s ruling. A final decision is pending.

As volunteers unloaded the petitions Wednesday, anti-airport county Supervisor Tom Wilson suggested dedicating them to Gray and Judge Richard Otero, who ruled against Measure F, and to the “three members of the board of supervisors.”