I've been meaning to post about this since this morning. Len Kranser e-mailed me mid-morning:
Newport Beach continues effort to gain control of JWA’s future
The Newport Beach City Council will revisit their campaign to gain control over the future development of John Wayne airport. The so called “spheres issue” agreement with the county is back on the city council agenda for Tuesday, October 10.
This website continues to seek documents to shed light on the deal. A second request for new documents recently was submitted to the county under the California Public Records Act.
The draft agreement that the NPB council will review is not published on the city website. Instead the agenda says "a final executed copy of the Agreement [will be] available to the public via the City's website following execution by the County." [Emphasis added]
By then, the future of John Wayne Airport – which already is limited by one agreement between Newport Beach and the county - may be burdened with another set of constraints.
Alicia Robinson posted a story on the Daily Pilot website about the same time:
A groundbreaking pact between Newport Beach and Orange County would give the city veto power if the county ever tries to build a second commercial runway at John Wayne Airport.That’s the key element of the agreement, but it also: provides for a cooperative study of how best to manage the Upper Newport Bay, looks at how city and county services are administered in the Lower Newport Bay, allows the city to develop — but not own — a park site at Mesa Drive and Birch Street in Santa Ana Heights, and says the county won’t object if the city nixes plans for an equestrian trail near the Back Bay. The City Council will consider the pact Tuesday, and Orange County supervisors are scheduled to discuss it Nov. 17.
The so-called "sphere issues" agreement — issues touching Newport’s sphere of influence — has been in the works since December 2003. It has included a variety of city-county topics, most of which dropped out in the course of the discussions, but the airport has always been the centerpiece.
You can read the rest of the story here.
Subsequent to my posting the story on the El Toro Info Site, the city of Newport Beach staff was very helpful and added links to the draft agreement and staff report from the council's agenda.
The agreement is also available at www.eltoroairport.org on the updated News page.
There is no pressing need to do this at this time other than that NPB may feel it has allies on the BOS.
The county and the traveling public get almost nothing in return for giving this one city what it wants . . . no lengthening of the runway and no converting the second general aviation runway for air carrier use.
It makes more sense to allow future supervisors to decide what to do with the county airport based on future conditions.
Posted by: Len Kranser | October 06, 2006 at 08:19 PM