County Still Has Plenty of Airport Fight Left in It, Smith Says

In January 2000, I met Chuck Smith for lunch to ask whether he could reverse the momentum that clearly was running against the proposed El Toro airport. The supervisor, then Orange County government’s most visible pro-airport spokesman, was confident he could. He said he was certain an El Toro airport would be built.

I met Smith for coffee the other day to see how he was holding up in the wake of Measure W’s passage two weeks ago. That was the vote many people believe finally killed an airport on the former Marine base.

We agreed to meet at the same restaurant. When we got there, we found it had gone out of business.

Metaphor, anyone?

We drove on to another place down the street. Try as I might over the next hour, I couldn’t get Smith to burst into tears or fly into a rage over the apparent demise of the El Toro project he’d championed in recent years.

It must be a very personal loss for you, I said.

Nope, he replied.

It must be your lowest political moment.

Not by a long shot.

You will concede, though, that an airport won’t be built at El Toro?

Nope, he said, won’t concede that.

If I’m making it sound as though Smith is combative or in denial, that’s not the case. He’s saying all this in good humor, while also making it clear he won’t be out front in reviving the issue. He won’t have to, he says, because the need for the airport will force the issue back onto Orange County’s plate somewhere down the road.

“Look at the outcome of Measure W,” he says. “It lost 60-40 in 21 North County cities. It won 85-15 in 13 South County cities. Voter turnout was 35%, or something like that. There’s a message there. The outcome was ruled by a few very passionate people with a lot of money [spent on the campaign].

“Things could change when North County cities become more passionate, when every time they go to LAX it becomes a zoo, when they can’t get a flight out of John Wayne Airport, when freeways are jammed. Things could change.”

So, I ask, you wouldn’t be stunned to see an El Toro airport in 20 years?

“I wouldn’t be stunned to see one in 10 to 15 years,” he says.

Smith was the acknowledged leader of the three-member board majority that pushed for the new airport, but he refuses to see the defeat in personal terms.

“I don’t have any guilt feelings whatsoever,” he says. “I think I did everything I reasonably could have done to make it happen.... We fought the good fight, and we didn’t win it.”

Smith, who will be 70 in July, says he’ll spend the final 21/2 years of his term concentrating more on specific needs of his ethnically diverse district, which includes Garden Grove, Westminster and Santa Ana. Affordable housing for seniors and the working poor top the to-do list.

He’ll keep an eye on El Toro, but when I ask what he won’t support, he says, “Illogical use of the base. I would fight that, and that will include a Great Park, because of the cost of the cleanup [from base contamination].”

He doubts the Great Park envisioned by Measure W supporters will ever be built.

“If Measure W sticks--who knows, it probably will--it won’t be my problem, but it will be a future board’s problem to figure out how to meet the [air] traffic demand.... The airport is never dead, because the demand is going to stay, and eventually that demand has to be met. That’s just the way things are.”

So, I suggest, you may be vindicated in 20 years?

“In 20 years,” he says, with a laugh, “I won’t care.”

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Dana Parsons’ column appears Wednesdays, Fridays and Sundays. Readers may reach Parsons by calling (714) 966-7821 or by writing to him at The Times’ Orange County edition, 1375 Sunflower Ave., Costa Mesa, CA 92626, or by e-mail to dana.parsons@latimes.com.