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By Gene Williams
Staff Writer
April 23 -- Airport neighbors, hoping to ban jet
planes in Santa Monica, carried picket signs and covered their
mouths with filter masks Saturday at an Earth Day weekend
demonstration outside the airport's administration building.
The crowd of some 100 Sunset Park and Mar Vista residents
said the luxury aircraft threaten the health and safety of
their neighborhoods and blame toxic particles from idling
jet engines for a variety of diseases, including asthma and
cancer.
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| LA City Council member
Bill Rosendahl addresses crowd as State Assembly member
Ted Lieu looks on. (Photos by Gene Williams) |
Speaking to the demonstrators, Los Angeles City Council member
Bill Rosendahl said that his constituents in Mar Vista bear
the greatest health risks.
"This is toxic, it is poisonous, and it cannot continue,"
Rosendahl said. "The jets must go to Van Nuys, they must
go to LAX, and they cannot go into the lungs of our people."
Rosendahl said that prevailing winds blow jet fumes across
Centinela Avenue and into the Mar Vista neighborhood. Making
matters worse, Santa Monica’s airport -- unlike other
airports -- has no "buffer zone" between its runway
and residential areas, he said.
Joining Rosendahl were other elected officials who rallied
support for AB 700 -- a bill in the State legislature that
would mandate a study of jet pollution at the airport. Proponents
of the bill see its passage as the first step toward cutting
back on the jets or eliminating them from Santa Monica altogether.
(see
story)
The bill's author, State Assembly member Ted Lieu (D., 53rd
District), told Saturday's crowd that increasing jet use at
the airport makes pollution monitoring a must. Jets now take
off and land at the airport some 10,000 times each year, up
1,500 percent from two decades ago, he said.
Although Lieu failed to gain Santa Monica City Council support
for a similar bill last year, he stands a better chance of
getting the council's thumbs up this time around.
Unlike the earlier bill -- which could have forced the City
to fund the $500,000 study – monitoring under the new
bill would fall on the shoulders of that California Air Resources
Board (CARB).
It is also possible that State legislators could feel pressure
from elected officials in Washington to pass the bill.
During Saturday's protest, Rosendahl said the demonstrators
could count on support from U.S. Representatives Henry Waxman
and Jane Harman, both of whom are critical of jet operations
in Santa Monica.
But even if Lieu's bill gains enough political muscle to
become law, getting rid of the jets would likely involve a
long and difficult battle with Federal agencies, including
the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), and aviation interests.
Speaking at the demonstration, Santa Monica City Council
member Kevin McKeown said, "The FAA and EPA have the
real control over what's happening here today."
McKeown said he dislikes the name Santa Monica Airport, because
it gives the impression that it is under the City's control.
Airport operations are largely governed by a complex maze
of State and Federal regulations and lease agreements.
After pledging to support Lieu's bill, McKeown vented his
frustration with the FAA, with which the City has been negotiating
for improved safety at the airport. (see
story)
"The negotiation is over," McKeown said, "You
cannot negotiate with a Federal government that is in bad
faith with you."
The City has long wanted safety zones that would keep a runaway
plane from going off the end of the airfield and into neighboring
residences. Talks with the FAA had focused on safety measures
that would be 90 percent effective, McKeown said.
Then, at a recent meeting, the FAA pulled the discussion
off the table, offering instead to talk about a 50 percent-effective
zone, McKeown said, adding that 50-percent safety is not good
enough.
McKeown said he will urge the City Council to "play
hardball" with the FAA when airport issues come before
the council Tuesday.
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| Protesters gather outside
airport administration building. |
In addition to jet traffic, the steady conversion of industrial
sites to community use also is spurring a growing concern
for health and safety in and around the airport.
A few feet from where Saturday's protestors gathered, the
City's new Airport Park -- an 8.3-acre recreation area with
play equipment and a soccer field -- will open next Sunday.
Adjacent to the park, Santa Monica College's Bundy Campus
opened last summer in buildings that once belonged to BAE
systems -- an aerospace manufacturer.
At the opposite edge of the airfield, a 1930s DC-3 airliner
sits in mothballs -- an echo of the past -- visible through
a chain-link fence at a business park where Douglas Aircraft's
manufacturing plant once was.
Large and underdeveloped, the future of the airport raises
contentious land-use questions, as the City and others keep
a close eye on the property.
Some residents say they would like to see the City take complete
control of the land when the current operating agreement with
the FAA ends in 2015. However this seems unlikely to happen.
The last time the City tried to close the airport, it ran
into stiff opposition from the FAA and aviation interests.
The result was a 1984 settlement which kept the airport open,
but cut back on take-offs and landings and made some land
off limits to aviation uses.
The City is likely to get the same treatment next time around.
Challenges to the airport's future will probably end up in
the hands of a Federal judge.
Saturday's demonstration was sponsored by Concerned Residents
Against Air Pollution and cosponsored by Friends of Sunset
Park.
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