EL Toro Debate Focuses on Contamination Levels

Re “Health Issues Cloud El Toro,” editorial, Dec. 30:

Your Dec. 30 editorial strongly suggests that the entire base is loaded with so many contaminated waste products that the land has been designated one of the most polluted in the nation. It concludes that the base is so contaminated that public health and safety will require any development to be put on hold. This impression is utterly false.

Here’s the truth from the public record: The base is more than 4,700 acres, fewer than 60 have been identified as toxically dangerous and fewer than 700 are still being examined as potentially, but not necessarily, contaminated. The remaining acres are safe to use and to develop. After cleanup, every inch of the base will be safe.

What the county, and apparently you too, ignore is the fact that during the last several decades thousands of Marines and their family members have been eating, sleeping, working and playing on the base, and none--not a single one--has mutated into a raging toxic hulk.

Furthermore, for years commercial agriculture has flourished on the base. In fact, you, like thousands of Orange County residents, might have eaten strawberries grown there by local farmers. Quick, turn out the lights. Are any of your staff members glowing?

Ed Dornan

Chairman

Safe and Healthy

Communities Fund

Irvine

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Even before the Orange County Great Park initiative, Measure W, was certified for the March 5 ballot, the pro-airport crowd picked up its bat and began taking wild swings at it, missing each time.

The latest and wildest swing at Measure W comes from the Airport Working Group’s hired gun, Greg Hurley, who asserts that El Toro is contaminated with toxins and nothing can safely be built out there--except, of course, an airport. Wrong yet again!

Let’s look at the facts. El Toro is 4,738 acres--7 square miles in size. After eight years of study by federal, state and local authorities, a grand total of 60 acres have been cordoned off as unsuitable for near-term reuse because of toxic contamination. An additional 650 acres have been identified for further study and near-term cleanup by the federal government.

The balance--more than 4,000 acres, or 85% of the entire property--has been identified as ready for reuse. In fact, hundreds of acres are being safely reused--for child-care, golfing and equestrian facilities, for agriculture and for a 1,000-acre nature and wildlife preserve. Moreover, Cal State Fullerton is paying millions of dollars to locate a satellite campus at El Toro. Plans are underway to reopen 1,189 housing units.

The plain truth is that whatever the toxic contamination at El Toro, it is the federal government’s responsibility--by law--to clean it up. I’m pleased to report that the cleanup at El Toro will be meeting high residential standards, regardless of whether it costs the government $35 million or $350 million.

It’s shameful that the pro-airport forces are offering to pave over any toxic problems and let the federal government off the hook. (By the way, it’s not possible to move 40 million cubic yards of earth to build an airport without first addressing the cleanup issues.) The pro-airport forces should stop playing politics with the public’s health. Whether you favor a massive airport at El Toro, or whether you favor creating a Great Park that is much more gentle on the land, let’s all agree to put the public’s health and safety first.

Larry Agran

Mayor

Irvine

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Re “More Pros and Cons on the El Toro Proposals,” Letters, Dec. 23:

The desperation of the pro-airport side is bordering on the ridiculous. One author claimed an airport at El Toro will create (exactly?) 84,714 jobs by 2020. Certainly an amazing number for such a long-term projection, and also patently false. The real economics of El Toro are simple. First, airports in and of themselves are not economic engines and generate relatively few jobs. Most airport activity, and any related jobs, are actually part of the ripple effect from the overall economic activity of the surrounding community.

More important, even if El Toro were to open, actual job creation would be minimal. Admittedly, thanks to the sweetheart deal signed two years ago, the labor unions would benefit from the construction phase of the airport. After that burst, however, any jobs created by El Toro would be offset by the jobs lost when John Wayne closes, which has always been the singular goal of Newport Beach. The county itself has admitted that true international flights out of El Toro are not possible, so that fact eliminates any thoughts of a job bonanza from international trade.

One must conclude that the economic benefits from an El Toro airport would be about equal to any economic activity currently generated by John Wayne. The wonderful truth is that we can have all job creation attributable to any airport for free by simply allowing the artificial caps at John Wayne to expire. Then we can avoid the $5-billion expense of building a new facility to supply the same economic benefits that we already have.

Richard Soden

Lake Forest

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Orange County citizens have the choice this election of continuing orderly planning of an El Toro airport, where no one is in the noise zone and without resorting to dumping air travel demand onto other airports, unduly affecting minorities.

The Southern California Assn. of Governments has calculated that each additional million air passengers at other airports adds thousands of people to the noise zone. Most of them are single mothers, children and minorities. It got so bad at LAX that expansion had to be halted.

Orange County will support the noise-free El Toro Airport because a vote for the Great Park is a vote for bigotry.

Donald Nyre

Newport Beach

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Apparently the only constant in the lengthy El Toro airport debate is that absolutely nobody will be changing their mind between now and March 5. My guess would be that this has been true for the last couple of years resulting in a colossal waste of money on both sides. Thankfully, a recent ruling precludes the county from continuing the expense of its comical “Just the Facts” campaign. The thought that Supervisors Chuck Smith, Cynthia P. Coad and Jim Silva may be held accountable for the funds wasted on this effort is encouraging.

What would do it for me is an honest accounting by each of why they have so doggedly stuck to this airport plan when it has never made any sense. After all these years, the only pro-airport fact that is true is that there is a bunch of concrete in Orange County that airplanes might land on.

What has possessed these three to ignore the facts, ignore the voters, ignore common sense and ignore their own consciences to try to foist this on the citizens of Orange County?

Bob Rennie

Rancho Santa Margarita

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The biggest sham ever is being pulled on the residents of Orange County. That an airport would contribute more to pollution and traffic than the Great Park is patently false. If an airport is built, 14,000 acres of land will be set aside as buffer zone. No residences may be built there. We all know that 14,000 acres of homes or apartments with their families and cars will generate much more pollution than the airport.

The tax implications of a Great Park are unknown, as well.

Larry Stahl

Mission Viejo