AGUA DULCE AIRPARK ISSUE

ACTION PLAN OUTLINE:

DATE SUBMITTED: 2/5/2004

NAME OF GROUP/ORGANIZATION OR INDIVIDUAL: Eye On Agua Dulce

CONTACT PERSON: Lorene Cangiano

MAILING ADDRESS: 9515 Yucca Hills Rd. Agua Dulce, CA 91390

EMAIL ADDRESS: lcangiano@chomg.com

TELEPHONE CONTACT NUMBERS: Cell 805 358-0329

• Action Plan Outline:
• GOAL(S) hoped to be achieved by the group (i.e., “Close the Airpark”, “Maintain status quo with S.P. 1404”, etc.)

Maintain a public use airport per S.P. 1404 (5) with some mutually agreed upon restrictions to control noise, type of aircraft, and nighttime flying.

• ACTION PLAN FOR ORGANIZATION/GROUP/INDIVIDUAL

• MISSION STATEMENT – Clearly state the Mission Statement, if one exists for the organization/group

Eye on Agua Dulce is community service organization with the intent to disseminate, collect, tally, and present information in order to give community voice to all residents of Agua Dulce. Eye On Agua Dulce strives to show courtesy and respect for all community opinions with the goal of reaching solutions that reflect the majority view but acknowledge the minority concerns.

• POSITION STATEMENT –

Eye on Agua Dulce has taken the position, supported by the feedback of its participants, that the Special Permit 1404(5) is a valid permit. Furthermore, the Airpark is an asset to our community and has been a part of the Agua Dulce identity for approximately 50 years. Flying is not an antisocial activity but rather a reflection of some of the best achievements of our culture.

Moving into a community with a 50 yr. old public airport is a choice. Moving into a community with the intent of changing that community to suit ones personal wishes is not a right.

The following position statement utilizes the information contained in the Permit Modification Discussion Draft no. 8. If the conditions stated in the document have not been the focus of community contention, and they seem reasonable, then they are not addressed here and may be considered acceptable.

Issue	Position	Reasoning
Validity of SP 1404 (5)	The permit is valid	The County has determined this permit to be valid on: 5/24/1960, 9/25/2000, 8/15/2003. The airport has operated under this permit since 10/27/1959
Privately owned, public use Airport vs. privately owned, special use (private use) airport	This airport should remain a privately owned, public use airport	Changing the airports designation to a privately owned, private use airport would merely give this community a private flying club in its midst with little or no advantage to the community.
Guest pilot and community serving flight operations	Restriction is not necessary. The community members and their families and friends should not be restricted from utilizing this airport. There should be no daily limits.	Historically there has not been an excessive, or unreasonable demand for fly-in privileges by community members or their families and friends. A historical expectation of usage would not be more than an average of five landings and five takeoffs per day.
Airport operation and safety regulations Pilot instruction regarding designated approach and takeoff patterns Pilot affidavit signing Detailed log of all flight operations Written Operation and Safety Regulations	Unnecessary Unnecessary Unnecessary Useful, but need not be supplied to any group except as required by law. Should be made available to any group that requests	This type of information in listed in the Pilots’ directory and on pilot charts. Pilots are very concerned with their own safety and educate themselves to the particulars of an airport they will land at. This exceeds requirements of any other airport Flying is not antisocial behavior.
No nighttime landings or takeoffs	Acceptable	This airport has never had nighttime flying activity and there has been no demand for it.
Ground School Student Training Flights	Acceptable No flight school to be established at the Airpark, however, an occasional student pilot should be able to takeoff and land with their instructor. There are no touch and goes or stop and goes allowed at this airport and that would hold true for a student pilot.	Does not affect community negatively in any way
No external Tie Down leases	Some accommodation must be made for financially reasonable aircraft storage.	One plane per hangar and no external tie down leases is prejudicial toward the non-wealthy pilots. This airpark should not exclude pilots in a manner inconsistent with other airports.
Exterior tie down for guests	Should be limited by space issues, not flight control	Itinerant flight control is achievable through simple measures like fuel price, landing fees, overnight fees etc. No action to limit itinerant flight traffic should be prejudicial to community members, pilots, families or friends.
Eviction of (old) hangar owners and relocation of old hangars	Unacceptable	Airports are about pilots. Evicting the pilots that have made this an airport for fifty years is inexplicable. Paint and/or move the old hangars so as to make them blend in with the rest and remove them upon some agreed upon attrition method (to be agreed to by hangar owners and airpark owner)
Airport based helicopters limited to three and decreasing to one after 15 years No guest helicopters	Restrictions seem unnecessary	The demand is small and restrictions would be prejudicial to community pilots.
Aircraft size restrictions Weight restrictions Engine restrictions, propeller Turboprops	The restrictions seem to be within a reasonable range Noise levels should be determined	Most non-pilots have little information on this subject and may see noise and safety issues where none exist. There should be a source of good solid information on this subject before any aircraft or engine type is excluded
Hangars Maximum of 55 Height Hangars at 35 feet above finished grade Maintenance of flyable, certified, operational aircraft only No storage of items other than aircraft by owner of hangar	This is an arbitrary limitation that would best be determined by demand of community based (and neighboring communities) pilots and airpark space limitations. This has been approved height by the FAA Unacceptable Unacceptable	Agua Dulce and the surrounding communities have finite need for aircraft storage. Should allow for the building of new aircraft, or restoration of an aircraft, by a private pilot for his/her own use. What is stored inside a hangar, for private use by the owner, as long as it meets safety considerations, has no effect on the community of Agua Dulce
Based Aircraft Maximum of 65 (including helicopters	This is an arbitrary limitation that would best be determined by demand of community based (and neighboring communities) pilots and airpark space limitations.	Restricting community pilots, other than for lack of space or safety issues, is unnecessary and defeats the purpose of a community airport. The key here is to serve the community demand and that demand is finite.
Steering Committee	Unacceptable as to representation Acceptable as to intent	The steering committee should consist of community representation and representation from those who can provide expert information and the means of implementation. Therefore, reasonable representation would be by the two community groups Town Council and Civic association, with the understanding that they are to represent the community as a whole, and the Airpark and Agua Dulce Pilots association should be represented to provide the necessary expert information and the power to effect recommendations.
Filming	The airpark should not have filming restrictions that do not apply to filming within the community in general	Agua Dulce needs to establish a filming sub-committee to determine a fair and equitable set of rules for filming in our community.
Community Events	Events should be limited as per county code	The airpark should not be constrained from events in a manner different from any other property owner
Café, swim club membership	Café open to public. Pvt. Swim club	Has potential community benefit
Airtel	This does not seem to be in the current plans of the Airpark but does have future community value	Enough of the community expressed interest in facilities for out of town guests that this should not be excluded for future consideration.

• REASONING – Clearly state what facts led to the stated position and goals as stated by your organization/group

Listed in the above position statement.

• LEADERSHIP – Who will lead the effort

Lorene Cangiano is providing the elbow grease for this effort but the input of the community members provides the agenda.

• SUPPORT – Provide factual evidence for claims of support within the Agua Dulce Community. Where germane, evidence of support from entities outside the Agua Dulce Community should be included.

Eye On Agua Dulce (EAD) stands apart by the very public nature of its project, and the accessibility of its information. EAD has invited all members of the community, regardless of point of view, to participate in gathering, providing, and disseminating information, opinion, and comment, on issues affecting Agua Dulce. EAD considers all comments as valid input (within rules of politeness), and sends out information and position statements to all who request to be kept informed via e-mail or post mail notification (referred to hereinafter as informed residents). Informed residents of EAD pass the information on to family and friends. EAD also posts all community information, documents, editorial commentary, informed residents commentary, community announcements etc., on the website; and has offered to post respectful, polite, constructive position statements from any group or individual in Agua Dulce. EAD frequently elicits informed residents’ opinions on community issues (i.e., the airpark, videotaping of Town council Meetings, etc) as well as invites correspondence from those who visit the website. All comments are considered, negative and positive. EAD then reflects the majority opinion of these who respond, but also indicates opposing views to give balance. EAD has created, and is presently conducting, an on-line survey on the Airpark permit modification draft (8).

200 plus Agua Dulce Households were notified via e-mail of the Town Council Airpark Action Plan and the EAD response, and were asked to comment. Additionally, the Town Council Airpark Action Plan and EAD response, was posted on the EAD web site and comment was received from web browsers. This input was incorporated into the EAD response to the Town Council Airpark Action Plan.

• ACTIONS TO ACHIEVE GOALS –

• Action(s) planned or seen as needed to achieve the organization’s/group’s goal(s
• By the organization/group
• By the ADTC
• By the Community
• By the Regional Planning Commission
• By Los Angeles County (including the BOS, and any county departments)

Eye on Agua Dulce will continue to be present at all meetings, continue to express its participants’ views, and trust that a respectful and reasonable solution will be found. Eye on Agua Dulce appreciates that the ADTC, the Agua Dulce community, the Regional Planning Commission, and the Los Angeles County have accepted our input and EAD stays dedicated to its goal of total community involvement.

• Provide a gauge of the likelihood for the action(s) to be considered, committed to, and/or completed (1% thru 100%)

100%

• PROCESS – Outline the steps to be taken to achieve the stated goal(s) in specific detail.

Our process is in place, our website is in place. We are ready to conduct on-line surveys. We have done, and are doing, that which we said we would do.

• TIMELINE – Specific or estimated dates for action item completions

As above.

• EXPERT ASSISTANCE –

• Hired or Pro Bono

Pro Bono webmaster. Pro Bono commentary on Town Council meetings, Civic Association meetings, and any other meetings that involve community decision making and have community ramifications. Pro Bono surveys and data tabulation.

• Who pays

All costs have been covered by Lorene Cangiano

• Chain of reporting

All reporting goes through Lorene Cangiano

• ANTICIPATED AND KNOWN COSTS – Specify by categories (i.e., legal fees, consulting fees, printing costs, etc.)

Website costs for domain names, no costs to the community except their time and interest.

• COMMUNICATION PLAN – Include methods of communication to insure that all residents of Agua Dulce, as well as other interested parties, are fully informed of the facts surrounding the organization’s/group’s efforts to achieve its stated actions and goal(s).

Web site http.//www.eyeonaguadulce.com

E-mail broadcasts

On-line surveys

• CONTINGENCY PLANS – Detail plans to get around roadblocks or overcome adverse developments that would modify or nullify the organization’s/group’s Plan to achieve the goal(s).

Attend all meetings, write reports to the community, broadcast reports, gather feedback, present feedback and position statements at community meetings and to any other appropriate individuals or groups.

• KEY SUPPORT GROUPS and/or PEOPLE – Identify those groups, or public figures who would be necessary to make the Plan work.

The community residents are the key, but a team effort by all groups and communications systems within the Agua Dulce Community would enhance the effectiveness of gathering accurate, complete, and timely information, disseminating this information to the community, and surveying the community opinion. When this type of data is gathered it becomes a much simpler affair to bring resolution to conflict.

• Clearly outline the action(s) needed from each of them.

The Town Council, the Civic Association, the Agua Dulce Pilots Association, Eye on Agua Dulce, and the Country Journal are already active in the information business, what we need now is a new vision of team. The goal for all is to help Agua Dulce flourish; this cannot be accomplished by ripping it apart.

• Is there a financial or time cost for this support?

Financial and time costs will be incurred in the act of data gathering and disseminating. These costs, however, do not serve solely to bring about resolution to the Airpark issue. These are set-up costs that will reap rewards over and over, year after year, as this community works to resolve other issues.

• END RESULT – Identify and provide detail on the known or possible positive and negative impacts on the Agua Dulce community, in whole and in part, for the following

• DESIRED END RESULT –

The desired end result is to bring closure to the Airpark issue and mend community relationships. It is our wish that the Airpark will continue to operate under special permit 1404, with some modifications as listed above, and that this community can benefit from all that the Airpark has to offer.

• ALTERNATIVE RESULTS FORESEEN or POSSIBLE –

We believe that the special permit 1404 (5) will not be revoked; it is possible that the status will change from public use to special use and the modifications may be greater than we support.

• WORST CASE SCENARIO –

That some groups will not know how to gracefully accept the Regional Planning Department’s decision.

SUMMARY:

The ADTC and community need to know these answers, and perhaps more, before considering support for any organization’s/group’s position.

The next Regional Planning Commission hearing is scheduled to be held on March 16, 2005. If this hearing is postponed, then the ADTC may consider stretching out the “due dates”.

If you have any questions pertaining to the Action Plan Outline, please contact:

Agua Dulce Town Council – AguaDulceCouncil@aol.com

Andrew G. Fried, President – 268-1519

Diane Terito, Secretary – 268 - 8701