Bates Shelves 2 Anti-Airport Assembly Bills

Assemblywoman Patricia Bates, an ardent foe of Orange County’s plans for an airport at El Toro, pulled her two anti-airport bills from consideration Tuesday as they appeared headed for certain rejection at a hearing today.

The Laguna Niguel Republican acknowledged that she didn’t have the votes needed to get the bills through their first committee test.

She said Tuesday that she instead turned the measures into two-year bills, giving her more time through the rest of the year to persuade her colleagues that the bills should be adopted.

She blamed the bills’ poor chances on a “sweep of misinformation” by pro-airport forces in the final hours before today’s hearing of the Assembly local government committee.

“There was a lot of misinformation dumped up here in the last 48 to 72 hours,” Bates said. “We need to neutralize that.”

The next opportunity for a hearing on the bills isn’t until January. Bates said she was approaching a deadline to clear bills out of committee and didn’t have time to schedule another hearing earlier.

But by next year, bills aimed at stopping El Toro could be too late. The Marines will close the air base in July and are expected to turn the property over to the county for an airport sometime next year.

One of Bates’ bills would have required the county to hold a public vote before selling revenue bonds for the airport. Orange County obtained an exemption in 1986 from a requirement for public votes on such bonds. Airport backers argued that a public vote isn’t needed because the bonds would be repaid by airport users, not taxpayers.

The other bill would have added Irvine to the planning authority deciding how to reuse the base, whose fate currently rests with the county Board of Supervisors.