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STATE
OF THE AIRPORT MAYOR
BILL WIGGINS NOVEMBER
14, 2000 It has been some time since I
last updated you on the status of events about the Burbank Airport.
As you know, the City and the
Airport Authority agreed last year to set a process in motion for
negotiating a final agreement for a new passenger terminal at the
Airport. We agreed on a May
deadline for a final agreement. Unfortunately,
the deadline came and went without any agreement. The agreements described a
complicated process to dispose of the B-6 Property if we could not reach
a deal by May. You may
remember that the City had the option to buy the property after the
deadline passed. We decided
not to exercise that option. As
a result, the Authority is now required to sell about two-thirds of the
property for non-airport purposes.
The rest of the property has to remain vacant forever.
We are told that the Authority has hired a real estate broker to
help them sell the property, though we do not know whether the Authority
has been making a serious effort to sell it. Even though the deadline
passed, the City and the Authority have continued to look for creative
solutions that would allow for replacement of the terminal while still
protecting the City’s interests.
In June, we released a proposal called the Outline
of Terms, which took into account the comments we had received on
the previous proposals from the public, the Authority and the FAA.
The Authority never responded
to our Outline of Terms.
Instead of returning to the negotiation table, as we had
suggested, the Authority has, over the last several months, sent two
formal applications for City approval of a new terminal project.
These formal applications have triggered a number of events.
Tonight, I want to bring you up-to-date on those events. In its applications, the
Authority basically has set forth a new proposal for relocating the
passenger terminal. First,
the new proposal contains a smaller terminal than the Authority had
proposed in the past. Also,
the Authority has proposed to seek a curfew from the FAA and to
implement whatever curfew the FAA might approve before building the new
terminal. There is no
commitment for additional noise relief.
Some of the other elements of the City’s proposals were
included in the applications, but many were not. The applications are unclear
in some respects. For
example, while the Authority has promised to impose whatever curfew the
FAA approves, it has not promised that that will be a 10pm to 7am
curfew. As you know, that is a key element for the City.
The Authority also has promised to seek additional noise relief
in the future but has not detailed what it will be seeking or when.
The Authority has proposed to pay the City for lost taxes but the
applications are unclear on the amount. We hope that these and other
uncertainties in the applications will be clarified in coming months.
The City staff is reviewing the Authority’s applications now.
Because this review of the applications is a formal staff
process, the City Council is not involved in the initial review by staff
and will wait until that process is complete before commenting on the
substance of the applications. We
have told our staff to review the applications thoroughly but
expeditiously. There is no
reason to delay this process. Part of the staff’s review
will be to determine whether California law requires that the City
prepare updated or new environmental documents (like an Environmental
Impact Report). The
staff will make a decision on that issue within the next few weeks. We cannot tell you for sure
how long the staff review will take, but our staff believes it will be
several months at least – and many additional months if the City has
to complete new environmental documents.
But I can assure you that the review process is designed to give
the public many opportunities to comment on the Authority’s
applications before the City Council takes any action. It is important for everyone
to know that, even though it has applied for permission to build a new
terminal, the Authority is still required to sell the B-6 Property. The Authority has asked the City to change our agreements to
eliminate that requirement. We
have told the Authority that the City Council will make that decision only after the staff completes all the formal reviews
that are required for the formal parts of the Authority’s
applications. I know that this sounds
confusing. Here is the
bottom line: while the City’s staff reviews the Authority’s
applications for a new terminal, the Authority is still supposed to be
trying to sell the property. The Authority must keep trying to do that unless the City
Council decides to let it keep the B-6 property. The final approval of any
terminal project will not, however, end with the City Council. This is really important. In last Tuesday’s elections,
the voters overwhelmingly approved Measure B, which prevents the City
Council from giving final approval to any new terminal project without
voter approval. The City
Council wrote the ballot argument in favor of Measure B and is
absolutely committed to both the letter and the spirit of that
referendum. Contrary to the view held by
some critics of Measure B, it does not abdicate City responsibility for
making decisions; we absolutely will be involved in the review of the
Authority’s applications and close scrutiny of their proposal. What Measure B does do is guarantee that the people directly
affected by this critically important decision will make the final
decision. Let me put this point simply:
even after the staff review and City Council debate and public hearings,
there still will be no new terminal on the B-6 Property unless the
voters of Burbank approve it. In addition to these
activities relating to the terminal proposal, there have been other
activities at the Airport that we have been following closely. As many of you already know,
two airlines recently proposed to schedule flights during the hours of
the voluntary curfew. I
have written letters protesting both flights.
We are, frankly, outraged that two different airlines would
schedule additional nighttime flights after the Authority has finally
agreed that we are entitled to a mandatory curfew at the airport. At the same time that I am
pleased that, under intense pressure from the City, members of Congress
and others, both United Airlines and Southwest Airlines have announced
that, in coming weeks, they will cancel the most offensive of their
nighttime flights. I can
assure you that the City Council will remain very aggressive in letting
any airline know how we feel about nighttime flights.
We urge individual residents to do the same. In addition, the City has been
closely following the Authority’s study designed to seek approval of a
curfew from the FAA. In the
upcoming months, we expect that staff will carefully review drafts of
the Part 161 Study to determine if there is anything else the City or
Authority can do to improve the chances of getting the FAA to approve
the curfew. Remember that
approval of the curfew is in everyone’s interest both because it will
reduce the impacts of the Airport and because the Authority has finally
conceded that no new terminal will be built unless a curfew is approved
and implemented. Now is the time to roll up our
sleeves and get to work on FAA approval of the curfew.
We are committed to working with the Authority, as much as they
will allow, to help them get the 10pm to 7am curfew. We hope that we can conduct this very important study in a
spirit of cooperation recognizing that, as the Authority and the FAA
Administrator have both admitted, there will never be a new terminal
without a curfew. Regrettably, the dispute over
a new terminal is far from over. The
City Council is as committed as ever to fighting to guarantee that no
new terminal is built without protections for our residents. We will continue to work with our colleagues in Glendale and
Pasadena and will continue encourage them to direct their Airport
Commissioners to work cooperatively toward a solution.
We will continue to keep you informed about any new developments. #
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