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Breaking Stories: Airportability
By Matt Potter, Reader City Lights, June 15, 2006
 As of early this week, only one campaign committee weighing in on the move of San Diego International Airport from Lindbergh to Miramar had filed its official papers with the county registrar of voters. A group calling itself Support Our Military-Vote No on Miramar registered last week, saying it will oppose November's ballot measure, according to a spokeswoman with the registrar. Its treasurer, she says, is listed as Bill Baber, onetime staffer to ex-mayor Dick Murphy, always a big booster of moving out of Lindbergh;
  John Kern, Murphy's top aide, is working for the pro-new-airport side.
  Meantime, rumors are circulating that Qualcomm billionaire Irwin Jacobs is preparing to sink a small chunk of his fortune into the drive to keep the airport downtown and may have been responsible for that poll a few weeks back conducted by Houston-based Voter Consumer Research.
  A nominal Democrat who normally shies away from hot local causes, Jacobs did give $100,000 to the failed November 2000 effort to dislodge school board incumbent Fran Zimmerman.
  But don't look for another veteran of local big-money politics to get into the Miramar fray. In 1994, bayfront hotel magnate Doug Manchester was a prime mover behind a ballot measure in favor of relocating the airport to Miramar. His ally in that fight, U-T owner Helen Copley, spent $50,000 on the campaign, which garnered 52 percent in favor of the move. This time around, though, Copley is in the grave, and Manchester, who's negotiating with the Navy to build an office and commercial complex on government property at the foot of Broadway, is said not to be in a frame of mind to cross the military brass, which is bitterly opposed to turning Miramar over to civilians. Pat Flannery on the Airport and Redevelopment
  All this talk about relocating the airport 100 miles out in the desert is part of a strategy to make the airport expansion seem not so bad after all. The developers are patient and thorough. They want to get their greedy hands on that whole area from I-5 to Dog's Beach and from I-8 to the Airport. That would make the NTC deal look small.
  Any developer worth his salt knows that the way to do big deals nowadays is to exploit an emotive public issue like the lack of an adequate school, a dysfunctional airport, a ballpark or anything else where the public will vote their emotions not their minds. The people want their airport near at hand not out in the desert. The developers know that.
  It will be portrayed by the developers and some money-hungry Councilors as just a few rich local residents along the coast bellyaching about increased noise mixed with nostalgia for the razing of older apartment buildings in the Midway and Rosecrans area together with the removal of now unsightly WWII industrial buildings along I-8 and I-5.
  Even if you fall for the inevitable slick PR and you come to see the whole airport expansion project as "progressive" and "forward thinking" there is still a serious issue that is less obvious. It is present in all large redevelopment projects around the country.
  Tens of thousands of individually owned titles to small pieces of urban property are being extinguished every day. The subdivision of yesteryear is being reversed.
  It is a bit like what happened in rural America when millions of individual farm holdings were merged into single titles held by large agricultural corporations. It changed America slowly but irreversibly. Most of the agricultural land of America is now owned by large corporations, many of them foreign. Is that what is in store for urban America.
  Take East San Diego for example. If Sol Price and the redevelopment kings have their way all that area from I-805 to La Mesa and from El Cajon Blvd to I-94 will be corporate owned. Tens of thousands of formerly individual city lots will be no more. They will disappear from the County Tax Assessor's Roll. Corporate apartment owners and shopping mall kings will become the urban equivalent of the agricultural combines.
 Is that good for America? I don't think so. Individual property ownership is what made America the great country it is. Will "redevelopment" do for the capitalist system what Stalin's "forced collectivism" did for Soviet communism? Will it concentrate power in the hands of a few? Stalin knew the power of individual ownership. That is why he killed 20 million of his own people to destroy it, in order to achieve power.
 I t is time We the People took a serious look at what is happening under the banner of "redevelopment". We are heading in the wrong direction with regard to ownership. San Diego Reader City Lights, April 13, 2006, Breaking Stories
Deep cover Backers of moving San Diego International Airport out of Lindbergh Field insist that they are going about their business in full public view.
  But sources inside the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority accuse the agency's board majority of exploiting a gaping loophole in the Brown Act -- the state's open-meeting law -- to conduct its most sensitive business behind closed doors.The scheme works this way: over the past two years, the airport board has been quietly setting up a series of "ad hoc" advisory committees, the meetings of which are exempt from public notice and disclosure under a little-known provision of the Brown Act.
 The latest such clandestine group is known as the Legislative Issues Ad Hoc Committee and was established on April 4 of last year. It was originally meant to last only through the end of the so-called BRAC period -- the military base-closing process that proponents of moving the airport had hoped would shutter Marine Corps Air Station Miramar. Members of the authority engaged in a fierce behind-the-scenes battle, attempting to influence the administration and Congress to open up the coveted real estate, while in public saying they were remaining above the fray.
  Private discussions among some board members are said by one source to have included getting well-heeled local donors to pay for opposition research into the private lives of military brass and others who oppose booting the Marines out of Miramar.
  After their failure to get the government to close Miramar, the ad hoc committee became moribund, but the board "reconvened" it this February 6 for another nine months -- just long enough to take it up to the November election in which voters will be presented with a measure on whether to move the airport. When asked to provide details about the committee's most recent meeting, on March 22, airport authority assistant general counsel Edward A. Cahill fired back with a letter that noted the group "is composed solely of four Board Members (five Board Members are required to constitute a quorum)."Cahill added that the group was not a "standing committee" and thus also exempt from the Brown Act because "it was formed for the specific purpose of meeting with federal and state legislative officials and its term is short term, expiring before the November 2006 election. The Legislative Issues Ad Hoc Committee meets on an infrequent and irregular basis at the request of one or more of its members." All Cahill would disclose about the March 22 meeting was that it was called to "discuss issues related to recent communications with legislators.
  "The members of the group are Joe Craver, a defense-industry procurement consultant who works intimately with the San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce; Chula Vista developer Paul Nieto; ex-construction-labor-union official Xema Jacobson; and William Lynch, a wealthy Rancho Santa Fe resident and active speculator in county real estate who has close ties to the downtown development establishment. Many regard Lynch as a pivotal advocate of the Miramar move. The impediments to a new airport for San Diego
Union Tribune: Letters to the editor, February 5, 2006:
  NIMBYismIn her Jan. 30 letter, Donna Vance promises that residents of communities surrounding Miramar will fight at all costs to keep an airport out of Miramar despite its being the most logical site for an airport that best serves the needs of the entire region. She worries only about the debatable impact the airport will have on a much smaller subset of communities.
  These communities already live with jet noise from Marine aircraft, in many cases much louder than the noise from commercial aircraft. If the Marines were to relocate to Pendleton (an alternative that seems to make sense), it is questionable how much additional impact there would be to these areas. Miramar and East Miramar are much farther separated geographically from communities than is Lindbergh, and airport noise would affect them much less than it currently does communities around Balboa Park, Downtown, Little Italy, Point Loma and Ocean Beach.
  Additionally, the ease of freeway access, central location and large, flat spaces at Miramar make it a perfect alternative.There is no disputing the fact that Lindbergh will not serve the needs of our community for much longer, and expanding it is not an alternative. It might be convenient, but let's face it, it's a poor spot for an airport for many reasons (space restrictions, topographic restrictions, coastal fog, etc). And if Lindbergh were gone, it would open up some of the best land in San Diego for bayside developments that might be enjoyed by all San Diegans.
  Because of the inadequacy of Lindbergh, we as a community must make hard choices. We must not, however, close off options because some residents suffer from NIMBYism.—JOHN CLIFFORD, San Diego

ShortsightednessIt seems like everyone thinks of Miramar as one isolated runway. Actually, it is over 20,000 acres of mostly level, federally controlled land that was once offered to the city of San Diego for an airport. It was rejected by our all-knowing City Council as too remote.
  In addition, it is adjacent to (abandoned) Camp Elliott and the Cleveland National Forest, altogether more than 300,000 acres. There is enough open, undeveloped and fire-blackened land there to build and operate an LAX-size airport and nobody would even notice. There is more than enough room for four commercial and two military runways. The area is bounded by major highways and could easily be connected to downtown by rail.
  The San Diego Association of Governments discovered this truth years ago but in its ultimate wisdom decided San Diego does not need four runways and abandoned the concept.The only real constraint is that we would have to move a lot of dirt, but we know how to do that.Hopefully, the airport relocation committee is just studying all those remote and ridiculous sites so they can say, “See we told you only Miramar would work.”KEN OBENSKI, San DiegoIncompetenceMike Hussey had an excellent suggestion (Letters, Jan. 30): swap Lindbergh Field with the Marines for Miramar. It was a brilliant idea – except for one small detail: The whole point in moving the airport is to free up valuable land downtown, which the incompetents who run things at the city, the port and the airport can then slice up and parcel out to developers in the same manner as the Naval Training Center.
  If you thought managing the city pension fund and handling NTC were examples of excellence in government, then you'll love what will happen to Lindbergh.— CHARLES KRATZ, San Diego

Airport search, Miramar, North Island must be studied
Union Tribune, November 20, 2005
  The single biggest threat to San Diego's long-term economic future is its inadequate airport. Cramped Lindbergh Field, with only one truncated runway, is swiftly approaching capacity.
 At 614 acres, Lindbergh Field is the country's smallest big-city airport. It is, in fact, a biplane-era airfield in the age of supersonic flight. A fully loaded Boeing 747 – 1960s technology – cannot even take off from Lindbergh, because the runway is too short.
  Within the next decade, as air travel continues to expand, Lindbergh Field will be maxed out. Chronic flight delays will hamper both passengers and cargo traveling to or from San Diego. And even before the single runway reaches capacity, gridlock will set in on Harbor Drive and other thoroughfares. This reality presents an urgent mandate to the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority: The commissioners must spare no effort in coming up with a solution to San Diego's airport dilemma for voters to consider on the November 2006 ballot.
 Already, however, the commissioners are under heavy pressure to rule out some of the most promising options for an expanded civilian airport – namely, Miramar Marine Corps Air Station and North Island Naval Station. These two facilities are among nine potential sites being studied by the airport authority.
  For more than a year, the panel postponed serious consideration of Miramar and North Island in order not to encourage the Pentagon to include them on the BRAC list of base closings. But now that the BRAC process has ended, sparing Miramar and North Island, it is time for a serious examination of these sites.
 In the case of both bases, the airport authority must conduct thorough studies to determine whether joint military-civilian use would be feasible. Opponents of a commercial airport at either North Island or Miramar assert prematurely that joint operations would be impossible and, besides, the military would never agree to share their air stations with civilians. Such arbitrary views should not be allowed to short-circuit the airport authority's careful, methodical review of all of San Diego's potential airport sites.
  Miramar, for example, is a sprawling installation of 4,500 acres on flat topography in the demographic center of the county. It also is the place where major north-south and east-west freeways intersect. It has ample room to add two full-length civilian runways to the two military runways that now serve the Marine Corps.
 We cite these facts not to single out Miramar as the solution to San Diego's airport needs, but rather to stress that it deserves a careful analysis, as does each of the other eight sites on the airport authority's list.
 So, at its Dec. 5 meeting the panel should press ahead with the due diligence required to carefully study joint use at Miramar and North Island, despite the predictable objections of those who want to rule them out without any study. San Diego's long-term economic well-being hinges on the airport authority's proposing in the end a credible, politically workable recommendation. That can't be accomplished unless all options are faithfully considered.

Looks like Miramar is preferred airport site
LOGAN JENKINS , Union Tribune, October 31, 2005 
  Though my mind is three-quarters made up, I went to an airport authority briefing Thursday to listen and learn.
 I came away with renewed faith that the regional airport of the future likely will be, and probably should be, Miramar. 
  Joe Craver, the high-octane chairman of the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority, spoke to a group of invitees, mostly business types, at the authority's offices. Craver was careful not to reveal his, or his nine-member board's, hand. Nevertheless, he offered tantalizing glimpses of the trump cards and how they might play out.
 Now that the latest round of federal base closings is all but completed, Craver said, the airport authority soon will begin studying military bases – Camp Pendleton, North Island Naval Air Station, March Air Reserve Base in Riverside County, and Miramar Marine Corps Air Station (both west and east) – as well as the much-analyzed civilian options: Lindbergh Field (the status quo), Campo, Imperial Valley and Borrego Springs.
  In fielding questions, Craver implied that distance will figure in his view of the three remote civilian sites. Absent an ambitious, expensive mass-transit system, I'm betting the distant airports are dead in the desert.
  As for Lindbergh, the authority's reason for existence is to find an alternative to the hemmed-in postage stamp of land by the harbor, as Thella Bowens, the authority's CEO, explained in well-rehearsed detail.
 In 15 or 20 years, Lindbergh will no longer be a charming throwback, a boutique one-runway airport, she said. It will be a serious drag on the regional economy.
   According to the state legislation that created it, the authority has until April to produce a binding initiative for the November ballot. If I'm reading between the right lines, Miramar will top the short list.
  "There's a lot of space, a lot of space," Craver said of Miramar. "Would you guess what the epicenter of the San Diego population is?"
  "Miramar," someone murmured.
  "I only throw that out as trivia," Craver said with a Mona Lisa smile.
 No new airport is a pain-free deus ex machina descending from the heavens, Bowens reminded the group of about 15 county residents.
  If history is a guide, the Marines will strongly object to sharing their sprawling 23,000-acre base that straddles Interstate 15. (In stark contrast, Lindbergh is 614 acres.) 
 So is it legally – and politically – possible to put Miramar on the ballot even if the Marines are hostile?
  "The legislation allows us to put anything on the ballot we want," Craver said. "The authority is going to do all the heavy lifting. We're going to the block-and-tackle work and we're going to say (in April), 'This is the best solution for this region that will take this region to the next 50 or a hundred years.' We're going to put it on the ballot. Hypothetically, if it was a military site, yes, why wouldn't we?"
  Those are fighting words in a county that instinctively salutes superior officers. But Craver refuses to grant the military veto power if the airport authority concludes that a joint-use agreement with Miramar is the only way to fly.
 As for joint military-civilian use, Craver is bullish. A former director of operations of one of the nation's largest Air Force bases, Craver was a decorated combat pilot in Vietnam. He said dozens, if not hundreds, of airports in this country and around the world handle both military and civilian missions.
  He acknowledges potential challenges in air traffic patterns – remember, nothing is easy – but he evidently believes that dual use is conceivable and probably doable.
  Southern California is littered with airport proposals shot down by NIMBY campaigns. El Toro and Brown Field scream to mind. (Think of the last airport that was built. You have to go back decades.)
In suggesting that San Diego County will buck the trend, Craver recalled a victorious 1993 county vote in favor of Miramar. That initiative failed to take off in part because the Navy said it would never move Top Gun from Miramar. (Of course, Top Gun moved a few years later.)
  Still, some politicians will line up against Miramar, either because they represent neighboring communities or, as in the case of Rep. Bob Filner, D-Chula Vista, they have a political stake in another location. (Fil/ner is pushing an airport in the Imperial Valley to prime the economy there.)
 Yet another pitfall comes to mind. What if the authority members are seriously divided? I've been told that at least one member has privately pledged not to support Miramar. What if the authority's message is mixed?
  "I have nightmares about that," Craver said. He sees it as his job to present a unified recommendation in April.
  Another nagging question, the answer to which Craver said is "yet to be determined," is what happens if the voters reject the proposed airport site. What's Plan B?
  Like a good military man, he said, "I can tell you this very straight. We have a strategy for success, not defeat."
  Brave words. To be sure, a superhuman effort will be required to push Miramar through the wringer.
 First, the Marines must be pacified and persuaded, either before or after the November vote.
  Second, the surrounding communities must be pacified and persuaded, at least enough to win a majority at the ballot box.
 Third, the congressional delegation must work together to change current federal law specifically prohibiting joint use at Miramar.
  "We're coming to the fourth quarter," Craver said. "After the first of the year is when you're going to start seeing a lot in the news."

Thanks to the Airport Authority, San Diego's Election Season Will Remain Open
BY SCOTT LEWIS, Voice Columnist, Oct. 31, 2005
  Voters with a little local election fatigue may feel tempted to imagine that after next week it will all be over for while.
  Yeah, right. We're just getting warmed up. Sure, the mayor's race may be the most important one in decades. It may be a dramatic and engaging fight between two totally different leaders and it may seem like once it's resolved, voters will be able to disengage at least a little bit. After all, what's the point of a representative democracy if the voters can't relax most of the time and let their representatives handle all these tough decisions?
  Don't we get to just watch at some point?
  Nope.
  Not only will there most likely be two City Council races still to be resolved, but both the mayoral candidates have plans to take some ideas to voters.
  Are you ready to make a decision about bankruptcy? Changing the City Charter to make the city auditor an elected position? A hybrid pension plan that combines the aspects of both a defined-contribution retirement system and a defined-benefit plan?
  Didn't think so.
 But even that's only the beginning of what's going to come before voters after next week.
  Ever heard of the San Diego Chargers? How about the airport?
 Yep, a year from now -- assuming all the promises come true -- we'll be inundated with information about two of the biggest civic projects ever imagined for the city: a new airport and a new football stadium. All on the same ballot and all only a short year away.
  The Chargers and their allies and their counterparts at the city still have a lot of work to do to prepare for a promised ballot measure in 2006 that would either authorize the city to move forward on a stadium proposal or actually approve a comprehensive proposal. Neither of those two are very easy things to produce so there may still be some question as to whether we'll actually see something from the Chargers on next year's ballot.
 The airport is a different story though.
  The San Diego County Regional Airport Authority has a legal obligation to put something on next year's ballot that will, for once, supposedly solve one of the hardest questions that the region has wrestled with for half a century: What can we do, if anything, about the airport?
 Since its inception, the Airport Authority has had to walk this delicate line between promoting the idea of a new airport and merely studying the viability of a new airport. In other words, at any given time, the Airport Authority is either engaged in a process of proving that a certain option won't work or working to persuade residents that they need and actually do want a new, larger, more modern airport.
  The mission, they say, is not only to solve the area's transportation needs, but to put the question to rest once and for all.
 And they have one more year to do it.
  Last year, about this time, they flew in the former mayor of Denver -- Federico Peña, who after his time in Colorado served as Secretary of Transportation under President Bill Clinton.
  Denver was the last major city to construct a new airport.
 He described in captivating detail the bureaucratic challenge the Denver airport was. And he made a point that still resonates today: For Denver it was rather obvious that a new airport was needed. Cities like Salt Lake City were advertising their destinations to businesses and tourists solely on the basis of how congested and inconvenient and problematic the Denver airport was.
  The new Denver International Airport, he said, would have never became a reality if the Colorado capital city had not mobilized all its power, all its energy and made a collective decision that it needed a new airport to become the city it wanted to be.
 That was a city that not only served its own needs but those of a worldwide network.]
  Then he said something that should stick in the mind of every San Diegan as a damn good question: Has San Diego made that decision?
 Have we decided that we want to be something more than we are?
  That we want a new airport to handle all of the things we're afraid we won't be able to handle? That the continued expansion of our business and cultural cosmopolitanism is dependent on a new airport, and that we're willing to solve the logistical nightmare that will inevitably affect thousands, if not tens of thousands, of San Diegans?
 Peña said he wasn't sure that we had.
  Yet we only have a year left.
 The Airport Authority has so far deftly handled the boomlets of controversy related to its project. But by doing so, it now finds itself with really only one option on the table. And that is to build a new airport far out in the eastern desert areas of the county.
 The Airport Authority's administrators deferred to the powers to be that didn't want them to look harder at the military sites or to give the impression that San Diego did not want to protect the country's military investment in the region.
  As was announced this week, the military's Base Realignment and Closure, or BRAC, process is now more or less complete and the San Diego region has kept its major military installations.
 So the Airport Authority did its part -- it didn't screw up the BRAC process that so worried other power bases in San Diego.
  But that left it without much in the way of options of sites to build a new airport. And the Airport Authority now has one year to put something on the ballot.
 Got voter fatigue? You better sleep it off. YAHOO NIXED: AIRPORT PROPOSAL:
Lindbergh EXPANSION Plan: 2 Runways that will destroy Sports/Midway, Point Loma & Ocean, and the quality of life in PB, Mission & La Jolla Coast: http://www.san.org/documents/assp/Concept_SDIA.pdf
Airport Authority Website/Masterplan: http://www.san.or

Airport Community Watchdog Updates at: SANnoise.org

Forget expansion of Lindbergh Field
I attended the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority meeting on Sept. 8. It was very clear that the expansion of Lindbergh Field made no sense at all.
  It violates the authority's own rules: 20,000 residents would be ejected from their homes, when the maximum allowable is 5,000. Access to the airport will be seriously congested, since many Point Loma residents and submarine base employees will have to use Harbor Drive. Rosecrans Street will be eliminated. Spending over $5 billion just to buy the land (which was about the total cost of building the new Denver Airport) makes no sense.
  Interstates 5 and 8 will be congested for years by large trucks hauling the remains of 8,000 homes, leveling the hills and bringing in construction materials. The airport authority knows this is not a viable option. Consideration of it is causing undue anger and concern among the 78,000 residents in the Point Loma, Ocean Beach and Midway areas. The well-being of the citizens is more important than a bureaucratic process. The airport authority should act responsibly and take Lindbergh Field expansion off the list now, not wait until April.
—TOM DELAHANTY, San Diego, Letter to the Union Tribune

Activist and OB/PL Residents Responses to the below 2nd runway plan shown in the Union Tribune 6/21/05
"You gotta be kidding?"
"We are paying huge salaries to the Airport Authority to come up with this crap?"
"The Airport needs to move to Miramar... we need to stop wasting time and money."
"What developers would make money off this boondoggle?"
"Lindbergh isn't safe.. this isn't going to solve the problem..only create more"
Is the Airport Authority on drugs? Who's brainchild is this?
"Good luck on taking all those PL homes... they will have lawsuits until hell freezes over!."
"This sounds like a Byron Wear scheme.. Is he still involved with the Airport Authority?"
"The NTC residents thought they had problems... wait until they see this!"
"This airport has to move!"
(Some of the language in the responses was so fowl we didn't print those, but needless to say most people are irate about this plan) Second runway for Lindbergh? Some call plan outlandish; further study recommended
By Jeff Ristine, Union Tribune, June 21, 2005
 Airport planners have come up with an idea for developing a second runway at Lindbergh Field without Marine Corps property, but some say the notion is so outlandish it actually helps make the case for building a new regional airport elsewhere.
  A committee of the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority yesterday recommended that the full board of directors authorize additional study of the concept for a new, 10,000-foot runway through the Midway District.

Committee members aren't yet treating the concept as a serious alternative to proposed airport sites in Boulevard and Imperial County, and openly fretted over misunderstandings with residents of Point Loma and Mission Hills.
  However, some said a more detailed analysis may help convince the public Lindbergh Field is not suitable for a second runway. "We do not need to alarm a bunch of people," said William Lynch, a member of the full board who sat in on the committee meeting. "The possibility is probably somewhere between remote, slim and none." The 3-1 recommendation, with San Diego Councilman Ralph Inzunza opposed, goes to the full board July 7.
  In the same vote, the committee also recommended performing no additional study of a proposed airport site in Ocotillo Wells, near Borrego Springs, which would put the site on ice until further notice. Additionally, the panel said, sites in Boulevard and southwestern Imperial County should stay on the list for further review. The Lindbergh idea emerged from a consultant's analysis of "out-of-the-box" options for expanding the capacity of San Diego International without using land occupied by the Marine Corps Recruit Depot. Expanding Lindbergh is one of nine options in the airport agency's site-selection project. In its current single-runway configuration, Lindbergh Field is believed to have a practical capacity of about 24 million passengers a year. The passenger count for 2004 totaled more than 16.3 million; the agency estimates demand ultimately could reach 35 million.
  The choices for a second runway were severely limited by rising terrain, new noise impacts and the need for land occupied by homes and businesses.
  The result was a runway sandwiched into a densely developed region between Interstates 5 and 8, north of the Marine Corps training depot.
  As imagined, the footprint for the new airstrip and its support facilities includes the ipayOne Center (the former San Diego Sports Arena), the Midway Drive post office, Sharp Memorial Hospital, the Liberty Station redevelopment project on former Naval Training Center land, and everything along Rosecrans Street northeast of Nimitz Boulevard.
  The second runway, as conceived, would be used primarily for departures, over the ocean.
  The plan also envisions the existing runway being extended 4,000 feet. Inzunza questioned whether it was fair to residents of the area to treat the proposal seriously.
  Gregory Wellman, from the consulting team Ricondo & Associates, told the committee the analysis would help illustrate the enormous trade-offs required to make Lindbergh Field meet the region's future air transportation needs. Committee members saw shortcomings right away.
  The enormous commercial development in the Midway/Sports Arena area would make land there "very expensive," lawyer Paul A. Peterson said. It's not yet clear whether the proposed expansion of Lindbergh would pass tests used to rule out two dozen other proposals, such as those for Ramona, Oceanside and the Silver Strand.
  Five military sites, including the Marines' Miramar air station, are off the table until November's expected completion of a nationwide base-closure review.  
  Jeff Ristine: (619) 542-4580; jeff.ristine@uniontrib.com

A second Lindbergh runway? 11,000 people would have to move
By: MARK WALKER - Staff Writer, North County Times, April 2, 2005
Adding a second runway to Lindbergh Field would require moving 10,850 people and purchasing more than 1,800 acres of land, according to a report prepared for airport directors.
The expansion also would force the purchase of 3,220 homes surrounding the downtown San Diego airfield, the report says, and would require the airport to take over the adjacent U.S. Marine Corps Recruit Depot.
Prepared by the San Diego County Regional Airport Authority's operations division, the report dated April 4 appeared as an agenda item for a meeting of the authority board scheduled for Monday.
The report was obtained from the authority's Web site on Wednesday, but it had been removed from the site on Thursday.
It was unclear why the report was taken down, and airport staffers were out of their offices Thursday in observance of Cesar E. Chavez Day, which recognizes the birthday of the late founder of the United Farm Workers.
Airport board Chairman Joe Craver said Thursday that he was unaware of the report and that it would be inappropriate for him to comment on it until the document had been formally submitted.
The nine-member authority board is working to find a site for a new regional airport or to come up with a plan to expand Lindbergh.
Lindbergh is the nation's busiest single-runway airport and is expected to become too crowded to operate by as early as 2015.
The authority, established by the Legislature, took over supervision of the airport from the Port of San Diego in 2003 and is charged with coming up with a plan for the region's future airport needs.
County voters are slated to vote on a location for a new airport ---- or an expansion of Lindbergh ---- in November 2006.
The possible sites for a new airport include an Imperial Valley desert location, an all-but-abandoned Borrego Springs site and a site in Campo. Five military sites also under consideration are March Air Reserve Base in Riverside County, two sites at Miramar Marine Corps Air Station in San Diego, Camp Pendleton, and North Island Naval Air Station in Coronado.
The 34-page report addressing a Lindbergh expansion includes satellite photos showing the existing airfield and overlays of what land around the airport would need to be purchased to have two 9,400-foot runways or two 12,000-foot runways.
In order to get the acreage necessary for that kind of expansion, the report says 578 acres of commercial and industrial properties around the airport would have to be acquired along with 712 acres of military property and 536 acres of residential and other properties.
The military acreage is occupied by the recruit depot. That site is considered at risk in an upcoming round of nationwide military base closures with the Pentagon slated to release its list of recommended shutterings on May 16.
The authority has agreed not to discuss any possible military sites until May 17 at the earliest, when it will convene to decide how to proceed in the wake of the base closure list. But Marine Corps Recruit Depot is not technically on the list of proposed new sites.
The report also says that expanding Lindbergh would have noise impacts on more than 5,600 acres and 21,000 homes not now affected by airport noise.
All those factors underscore why one group does not believe expansion of Lindbergh is the solution to the county's future airport needs, said group leader John Chalker.
Chalker heads up Alliance in Support of Airport Progress in the 21st Century, a group formed in 2002 to advocate for a new airport of at least 3,000 acres.
"Our position is Lindbergh cannot meet the future demands of the region," Chalker said Thursday. "We believe a new airport should be developed somewhere else in the county and Lindbergh should be shut down."
The alliance he represents wants to see the land redeveloped as commercial waterfront property. The alliance includes the Carlsbad and Oceanside chambers of commerce as well as several San Diego groups and the AFL-CIO Labor Council. Chalker also serves on the airport authority's 32-member citizen advisory group.
Authority board member Mary Sessom said Wednesday that while she had yet to see the report, she would like to see several alternatives developed for possible expansion of Lindbergh.
"All I keep hearing about is Lindbergh's deficiencies, and I haven't heard our staff say what could be possible," she said. "For example, what if we prepared a plan that moved all the parking underground? How much more room would that give us?
"I think all the possibilities need to be discussed."
A new airport would cost somewhere between $1 billion and $10 billion depending on the site, according to the airport authority. It would be paid for largely through federal grants and airport revenues.
The authority board meets at 10 a.m. Monday in the Wright Conference Room on the third floor of the airport's Commuter Terminal No. 1.
Contact staff writer Mark Walker at (760) 740-3529 or mlwalker@nctimes.com.

Campaign under way to delay airport vote
By CATHERINE MACRAE HOCKMUTH, San Diego Daily Transcript, August 12, 2004San Diego business leaders have been waging an increasingly prickly e-mail war in the last week over a proposal to delay the airport site selection vote by two years. In a series of letters and policy alerts dated Aug. 6 through Aug. 11, the San Diego Military Advisory Council (SDMAC) and San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce have been urging their members to contact state legislators.SDMAC is calling for the airport vote to be delayed from November 2006 until 2008 to avoid any conflict with the Defense Department's Base Realignment and Closure Process in 2005. The council, whose members include representatives of defense industry, retired military and other private sector officials, believes the timing of the airport vote could send mixed signals to the military.The chamber disagrees. But apparently, the modern-day word-of-mouth campaign is working as state legislators are being flooded with letters from both sides, particularly Democratic state Sen. Dede Alpert, who represents District 39.Alpert's Senate Bill 1874 would amend existing law to extend the term of the East County representative on the San Diego Regional Airport Authority's board of directors from two to four years. SDMAC is pushing Alpert to tack a two-year airport vote delay onto the measure.Five military bases are among nine sites selected for consideration for a new international airport -- a fact that SDMAC would like to see changed, according to President Frank Hewitt. If the sites are not to be removed from airport consideration, then the vote should be delayed, Hewitt said.Hewitt and members of the SDMAC board have e-mailed letters to all mayors in the county as well as state legislators and San Diego's congressional delegation, which includes Republican House Armed Services Committee Chairman Duncan Hunter.Hewitt said he has received favorable responses from Diane Rose and Tom Smisek, the mayors of Imperial Beach and Coronado, respectively. Rose and Smisek could not be reached for comment on the issue; however, the Coronado City Council on May 4 voted in favor of urging state legislators to delay the airport vote due to concerns that it could make San Diego military bases vulnerable in the BRAC process.San Diego Mayor Dick Murphy on Aug. 12 told a crowd gathered at the chamber's Military Affairs Advisory Committee meeting that he does not support delaying the airport vote.Lemon Grove Mayor Mary Sessom, who is also on the Airport Authority board and vice chair of the board of San Diego Association of Governments, said there is no delay to discuss because there is no legislation pending. Sessom said she would be in favor of a public discussion by airport board members if Alpert introduced the legislation.DOD officials are reviewing existing force structure and infrastructure with a goal of reducing domestic installations by about 25 percent. The defense secretary will recommend a list of bases for closure in May 2005 to a BRAC commission, which must complete its recommendations to the president by the following September.Hewitt said the airport vote comes dangerously close to the BRAC decision-making process. "They will have to do a lot of politicking in 2005 to prepare for a 2006 vote" on the airport, Hewitt said Aug. 11. While acknowledging that the military wouldn't simply surrender a base it wanted just because local governments have designs on it, Hewitt fears the consequences of signaling such plans to the military. "Why open up the door even a little bit for it to be looked at?" he asked.According to SDMAC, delaying the airport vote would have little impact on the site selection process.Alpert is conflicted on the issue, according to her spokesman Chris Shultz, who said the senator has asked all members of the local state delegation to report their position on the proposal by the close of business Aug. 13. Alpert may amend her legislation if there is a consensus in favor of a delay.State legislators could not be reached for comment on the proposed delay by press time; however, Republican Assemblyman Jay La Suer is generally in favor of it, according to Barry Jantz, chief La Suer's District 77 office. Republican Assemblyman George Plescia, District 75, introduced legislation to delay the vote two years in May. The measure died in committee.Shultz said Alpert has received a tremendous amount of correspondence on the proposal, mostly in favor of keeping the 2006 vote.On that end, chamber Vice President for Public Policy Mitch Mitchell and San Diego Regional Economic Development Corp. President Julie Meier Wright wrote Alpert in the last week urging her to stick with the original plan. The EDC is leading the city's efforts to save San Diego bases from closure. EDC and chamber officials have accused SDMAC of refusing to discuss whether there might be some common ground."We were all so proud of the fact that everyone was on the same page with regard to fighting BRAC," Mitchell said Aug. 12. However, Mitchell said the airport issues has been put off for decades and needs to be resolved to stave off a looming capacity problem.Mitchell and Wright said there is no conflict between the 2006 airport vote and BRAC. Mitchell said it would cost the region $93 billion in economic opportunities to forego a new airport altogether.Thella Bowens, president and chief executive of the Airport Authority, said she has been making individual contacts with state legislators over the last two weeks to state the airport's case. The airport had 15.3 million passengers in 2003 and expects that figure to grow by 2 percent to 3 percent through 2030. Proponents of a new airport said Lindbergh Field would be suffering serious capacity constraints between 2015 and 2022. Delaying the vote will only increase development around prospective sites, possibly rendering them useless as new airport locations."Every year we delay just makes the impact around the existing sites all the more difficult to overcome," Bowen said. Proponents of the 2006 vote said there is no reason to think it could affect the military's decision-making given that it will occur more than a year after the BRAC list is released.Related Article:New Chargers stadium, airport could be on same ballot in '06 (Jul. 29, 2004)

Leavin' On a Jet Plane
By Matt Potter, San Diego Reader, Feb. 24, 2005
(Entire article) www.sdreader.com/php/cover.php?mode=article&showpg=1&id=20050224
Excerpt: ACCORDING to records obtained from the airport authority under the California Public Records Act, contracts totaling at least $4.2 million have been signed with public relations consultants, lobbyists, and pollsters. Though the agency disputes it, the critics contend that much of that public money is being poured into a hardball, take-no-prisoners campaign plan to combat stiff resistance among the citizenry to the controversial notion of moving Lindbergh Field. The plan, they say includes keeping tabs on citizens who oppose the agency's political agenda and working with those who favor it.
The authority insists that its campaign plan is simply to "educate and inform" voters. But many of the consultants boast long records of fighting community opposition to development projects. They also advertise their long-standing contacts with local reporters and editorial writers -- known in the campaign business as "free media"-- who are at times wined and dined with funds provided by project sponsors. Sometimes, according to their airport authority contracts, the largely under-the-radar consultants even write the stories and editorials themselves.
Critics argue that such activity goes far beyond informing and educating the public and that spending the taxpayers' money to gather intelligence about the authority's political foes may even violate state privacy laws.
"The airport authority is charged by law with making a recommendation on a site for a new regional airport," says Bruce Henderson, "but only after an exhaustive review. These contracts suggest the members of the authority have already reached their decision well before the end of that process." Henderson, an attorney, has been monitoring the authority with former San Diego county supervisor Lou Conde, perhaps the authority's severest public critic.
"For example," continues Henderson, "the authority appears to have already excluded upgrades to Lindbergh Field. When did they do that, and were key decisions made without public hearings? Already the authority is entering into contracts with political consultants to push conclusions -- not educators to assist the public in participating in the process and to assist the public in ultimately, at the ballot box, making an informed decision. If the public was excluded from meetings in which key decisions were made narrowing down possible sites, that would be a violation of the Brown Act."
A violation of the Brown Act is one concern; an illegal political campaign is another. If a public agency were to spend public money on a political campaign, those expenditures would represent a gift of public funds to the private interests organizing the campaign.
"Already, the PR campaign that has been conducted seems to have crossed the line to political advocacy," Henderson says. "But the authority was not created to advocate; it was created to educate and to recommend a possible solution -- but only if there is a true problem, that is, a true need for a new airport. If the board members broke the law, it may be a matter for the grand jury to look into." Landmark $500 Million Community Benefits Agreement To Help Communities Near LAX
http://www.laane.org/lax/cba.html
The city of Los Angeles has approved an historic Community Benefits Agreement (CBA) that will bring a far-reaching package of environmental, economic benefits to residents affected by the proposed airport modernization.
The legally binding agreement - the result of months of discussions between the City, LAWA, and more than 20 community groups, environmental organizations, school districts and labor unions - will establish a national precedent. At half a billion dollars, it represents the largest and most comprehensive community benefits agreement ever negotiated, covering a broad range of impacts including environmental, labor, noise, health and accountability issues.
The key improvements that will result from the Landmark Community Benefits Agreement include:
* Sound proofing all affected schools.
* Increasing funding for the sound proofing of homes.
* Retrofitting diesel construction vehicles and diesel vehicles operating on the tarmac to curb dangerous air pollutants by up to 90%.
* Electrifying airplane gates to eliminate pollution from jet engine idling.
* Studying the health impacts of airport operations on surrounding communities and making those studies public on the LAWA web site.
* Providing $15 million in job training funds for airport and aviation-related jobs.
* Creating a local hiring program to give priority to local residents, low-income and special needs individuals for new LAX jobs.
* Enhance opportunities for local, minority and women-owned businesses in the modernization of LAX.
* Monitoring LAX, enforcing the agreement's provisions and holding LAX accountable to the community.
"This agreement is a milestone for the growing community benefits movement," said Rev. William Smart, senior community organizer with the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy, which pioneered the concept of community benefits agreements and played a lead role in the negotiations. "We have demonstrated that when communities have a place at the table, economic development works better for everyone." More Featured LAX CBA News Stories
City of L.A. Approves Landmark $500 Million Community Benefits Agreement for Residents Near LAX: The Wall Street Journal writes that in the latest sign of the growing coordination among community groups and the sway they are having on development projects, the city of Los Angeles has agreed to pay nearly $500 million to provide environmental mitigation and jobs-related benefits programs to the neighborhoods affected by plans to upgrade and expand LAX. The airport accord is the latest in a growing number of community-benefits agreements. The concept was pioneered in Los Angeles by LAANE and allows local residents a say in shaping major development projects. More
Los Angeles Groups Agree to Airport Growth, for a Price: The $11 billion LAX modernization plan includes $500 million in measures to ease the expansion's effects on surrounding communities. The New York Times reports on the LAX community benefits agreement, the largest of its kind in the nation, and discusses LAANE's winning strategy of combining the tools of community organizing with the hard-nosed tactics of political and economic pressure. "These agreements completely redirect the priority of economic development toward raising the quality of life in communities," says Madeline Janis-Aparicio, LAANE executive director. Don't breach the City’s Airport Approach Overlay Zone (“AAOZ”) ,an important public safety ordinance— a 50-foot buffer zone between the FAA approved flight path into Lindbergh Field and any new buildings and other structures.
BANKERS HILL- PARK WEST COMMUNITY ASSOCIATION (619) 574-0109
Re: Item 336: City Council Agenda, Jan. 25, 2005: Bankers Hill Townhouses
Dear Honorable Mayor and City Council:
I am writing this letter on behalf of the Bankers Hill/Park West Community Association, whose membership comprises over 100 residents and business owners from the Bankers Hill and Park West communities.
A substantial portion of the southern portion of Bankers Hill/Park West is within the City’s Airport Approach Overlay Zone (“AAOZ”). The AAOZ is an important public safety ordinance, enacted in 1985. It created a 50-foot buffer zone between the FAA approved flight path into Lindbergh Field and any new buildings and other structures.
The section of the Airport Approach Overlay Zone that restricts height is contained in Section 132.0205, which states:
“No structure shall be constructed or altered and no use shall be established that results in any permanent encroachment within 50 feet of the FAA-established approach paths as set forth in Drawing No. C-842. Proposed structures or uses that are 40 feet in height or less, measured from the grade of the property as established by Map No. C-842 or by the City Manager shall not be limited by this section.”
This restriction was meant to be absolute. The only exception is for structures 40 feet in height or less. The ordinance is clear on its face in this regard. In 1990, I attended a meeting of property and business owners, who were part of what was then informally known as the Park West Association. The AAOZ was on the agenda, and was clearly interpreted as an absolute height restriction, with no exceptions, enacted in the interest of public safety.
At the time of the enactment of the ordinance, there were several existing structures that exceeded the height limitation. The intent of the ordinance was to prevent yet more structures, which would create, in effect, an obstacle course that would distract a pilot in a situation of trouble or impaired visibility.
Somehow, the AAOZ was forgotten in the mid-1990s. Perhaps it was because it was only recently that projects have been proposed that intrude into the 50 foot buffer zone.
The Bankers Hill Townhomes project is one of the first of such projects. City staff has openly admitted, in a staff report dated August 9, 2004, that they totally missed the applicability of the Airport Approach Overlay Zone (AAOZ), and did not learn of it until informed by the City’s Attorney’s Office. (In fact, in early 2004 members of our organization discovered the omission, and began to question why the ordinance was not being enforced.)
Even now, the City Manager’s position seems to be to deny the applicability of Section 132.0205 as an enforceable City ordinance. Instead, the City Manager seems to be claiming that AAOZ only requires that a project be submitted to the County Airport Authority for review under the Airport Land Use Plan, and that an Airport Authority’s determination of “inconsistency” can be override by a two-thirds vote of the City Council.
The County’s Airport Authority Land Use Commission has reviewed the Bankers Hill Townhouses project, and found that building the 60-foot structure was “not consistent” with the San Diego International Airport Comprehensive Land Use Plan (with encroachments in the range of two feet to twenty-one feet). In making this determination, the Airport Authority uses the exact same criteria as contained in the City’s AAOZ, so the same level of encroachment exists for purposes of Section 132.0205.
However, the Airport Authority’s review and the application of Section 132.0205 are totally separate issues. What the City Council will be doing if it overrides the Airport Authority determination is absolving that agency of any subsequent liability for damages from a lawsuit regarding a violation of the AAOZ.
The issue of the City’s potential liability and the possible assumption of liability by the builder are important from a taxpayer’s perspective. However, they are secondary to the fundamental issue, which is the safety of air travel. Anyone who loses a family member or loved one in an airplane crash attributable to a violation of the AAOZ will not be consoled by the fact the City attempted to shift potential liability to a third party. As a matter of public safety, the City Council must enforce the heights regulations contained in Section 132.0205.
The Bankers Hill Townhomes project needs to be redesigned so that it meets the requirements of the Section 132.0205. Until this is accomplished, we would request you deny approval for this proposed project.
—Leo Wilson, Interim Chair¯ Bankers Hill/Park West Community Association

Breaking Stories, San Diego Reader City lights, Jan. 13, 2005
Executive suit San Diego Regional Airport Authority board member Bill Lynch is getting more than a bit of personal education in the pitfalls of running an aviation-related business. Back in November 2001, according to a recently filed case in San Diego superior court, Lynch's company, Lynch Air LLC, signed a contract to buy a 1979 Dassault Falcon, a two-engine executive jet, for $1,575,000. Lynch Air then agreed to lease the plane to a charter outfit called ExecJet, Inc., for 15 years at $10,937.50 a month. But, the suit alleges, ExecJet, a successor firm called EliteJet, and their principal, B. Scott Walker of Del Mar, stopped making the payments on July 1, 2003, and have "failed to pay since." The suit also complains that Walker failed to maintain the plane, forcing Lynch to come up with $454,521.44 worth of "repairs and maintenance," along with $11,000 or so in back taxes, as well as other miscellaneous costs. Lynch, the suit says, re-leased the Falcon to an outfit called Object Development Corp., which records show to be a software business in Orange County, in November 2003 for $6000 a month. According to documents filed in the case, Walker no longer lives in San Diego County and was served at an address in Overland Park, Kansas. Lynch was named to the airport board (which is putting together a proposal for expanding and perhaps moving Lindbergh, to appear on the November 2006 county ballot) by his close friend Sheriff Bill Kolender in November 2002. He gets paid $139,000 a year in that job and has said he contributes the money to his personal foundation.San Diego Reader, San Diego Reader, City Lights, 12/2/04
Excerpt: Cornerstone Strategies, the outfit tied to Democratic ex-state senator Steve Peace
and his onetime aide de camp, Arturo Casteneda.
Excerpt: Coincidentally, Cornerstone also has a $60,000, six-month contract to do political consulting for the San Diego Regional Airport Authority, set up by a Peace-authored bill.Discuss the process for monitoring and resolving the aircraft departure paths that create so much noise
I'm glad that we were able to meet on Friday 10 December to discuss the process for monitoring and resolving the aircraft departure paths that create so much noise for my neighbors. Mssrs. Frazee and Buckles were representing the Airport Authority and FAA, respectively.
As I understand the proposed process, the following summarizes the approach:
1. On a weekly basis the Airport Authority will create a list of departing and missed approach aircraft that apparently violate the 'early turn' series of dots to be places on the Radar monitor. (I gather that Mr. White will be increasing the number of dots projected on the Radar monitor to clearly identify the 1.5 mile clearance off the coast of Point Loma.)
2. Based on this listing of aircraft, Mr. Buckles will review the tower log to determine if there were clear reasons for the departure being off course. These may include such events as an on-coming aircraft and significant cross winds.
-- At this time, Mr. Buckles agreed that 'missed approaches' should also be directed to the 275 or 290 departure headings unless there is a conflict, such as other departing or arriving aircraft.
3. If there are aircraft that do not have a clear reason, that list will then be forwarded to Mr. White at FAA Tracon. Those flights will be reviewed to determine if there were orders given by the FAA Air Traffic Controllers and the reason for that departure instruction. If there is no instructed departure change, that flight will be assumed to be off-course without authority. Instructed departure changes by the FAA will be reviewed to ensure that departure procedures are followed and safety is not compromised at any time. At this point Mr. Buckles stated that the FAA has no 'gray area' for this sort of independent judgment in IFR controlled departures. He stated that it is 'black and white' if the pilot is not following the departure instructions and there is no tolerance allowed other than natural forces (cross winds) and reasonable variability of a few degrees in heading (sloppy flying is not tolerated?).
4. The corrective action may come in several forms:
a. Mr. Buckles has a good working relationship with the Airlines and Cargo Carriers - he expects that a call/meeting with the chief pilot should be sufficient to correct most behavior.
b. If the departure violation is sufficiently demonstrated, it may be appropriate for disciplinary action (we probably need to set some limits, e.g. repeat of violations or extent of off course heading?). -- I'm not sure of this disciplinary process, but it should be described by someone familiar with the FAA procedures.
c. It is also possible that the community (maybe ANAC) will be called upon to contact the Executive Management of corporate aircraft that repeatedly violate these departure instructions. It was mentioned that the public exposure of such violations is additional incentive for the offending Corporations to more closely monitor their aircraft operations.
IMPLEMENTATION:
It was agreed that this process will be instituted after a review by the ANAC members at the next meeting on Janua