Party Like It's 1994

Published: Wednesday, September 13, 2006 7:47 PM PDT

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Jeez. One of those busy days. Some day I'll just get to sit here and post all day long. I have a lot of research gathered up. Perhaps tomorrow.

I just got back from doing Roger Hedgecock's show. It was swell.

I got a ton of feedback on my post about the port. I'm not sure how to present it all, so be patient. It seems like most everyone is split -- they'd love to see a working port but they find it hard to imagine being implemented here.

With all these debates (airport, port, railroads, highways) San Diego is always trying to decide whether it can be more than a destination. That is, we wonder whether we could be a place where people and goods stop to rest while on their way to somewhere else. There are a lot of economic benefits that come from being that kind of city.

A couple of points:

I see the San Diego Regional Economic Development Corp. has gotten over its initial hesitation about the airport authority's ballot language and endorsed the measure.

The board of that agency, however, declined to actively campaign for it. And it made sure to point out a couple of things, according to Rob Davis' This Just In:

All feasible measures to expand Lindbergh Field should be implemented.

Voters should have a chance to approve a final plan for a Miramar airport, which would disclose costs, environmental, traffic, noise and safety impacts.

A Miramar commercial airport must be configured to make sure no new land-use restrictions affect high-tech and biotech businesses near Miramar.

Sources tell me that the EDC board also asked that everyone in the county get a free scoop of ice cream. Makes sense, they're doing the best they can to make this taste as good as possible to the business community that somehow got confused about whether it preferred Miramar the way it is now or not.

EDC Chairman Tom Wornham intended to clarify why voting to put the airport at Miramar in the face of hostile opposition from the military was not, in fact, an action against the military.

In no way should this be interpreted as a vote against the military," Wornham said. Rather, he said, the vote sends the message that should Miramar be closed, business leaders want to avoid "another El Toro."

El Toro is the former Orange County Marine Corps base that was closed and is being developed after a public vote killed a proposal to put a commercial airport there.

I don't know but didn't we already have that vote in 1994? Doug Manchester pushed a ballot initiative that passed that said that if the military ever closed Miramar, we should put an airport there. If that is all that this measure is, why did we need to spend public money to mount this kind of effort?

-- SCOTT LEWIS

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