The Gull's Call - Jan/Feb/Mar 2025

CLASS Submits FEIR Response to OAK Expansion by John Hamilton, CLASS President

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URELY BY NOW CHBIOA RESIDENTS ARE AWARE that the Oakland Airport plans to expand their terminals to allow for double the number of passengers by the year 2038. Both larger planes and more of them will be required to support this passenger increase. The impact to CHBI is more noise and air pollution. The Oakland Port board, which governs the Oakland Airport, voted to adopt the final environmental impact report (FEIR) as is on November 21st effectively setting a 30-day clock during the holiday season in which you can file a lawsuit. Filing a lawsuit can be very expensive. Any lawsuit at this point would be in response to the FEIR shortcomings as defined by both the CLASS response and the response filed by the city of Alameda. Since both were filed before the Port voted to accept the FEIR they are admissible in court as evidence that the Port has not met the requirements of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) is a state law that requires public agencies to identify and disclose the potential environmental impacts of their proposed activities. CEQA also requires agencies to take steps to reduce or eliminate those impacts. Writing this article on November 22nd for a publication that will be sent to residents in January presents a bit of a dilemma, in that the outcome will be unknown as this article is written. Funding to challenge the Oakland Airports decision to move ahead with the plans as presented will be a challenge as it has been expensive to prepare and file documents for both the EIR and FEIR to get to this point in the process. The last airport expansion in 2000 resulted in a lawsuit by KJOB (Keep Jets Over the Bay), the City of Alameda, and CLASS against the airport which was very effective in obtaining a settlement and getting the City of Alameda and CLASS a seat at the table for activities and a strong enforcement of the “voluntary” noise abatement procedures. 93% of the business jets depart from the “regular” South field where SWA planes depart. Without

the 2000 lawsuit these business jets would have been departing over Bay Farm and your homes all day. You likely caught the word “Voluntary” in the last paragraph and should be alarmed with that. But this was a result of a 1990 law passed by both parties in congress to regulate air travel at a federal level under an interstate commerce control restriction. The US federal government controls the airspace making any city restrictions on air travel null and void. This was sold as a reduction in noise because older jets would be outlawed. However, industry pressure on lawmakers and an engine “hush kit” kept these jets in the air with little effective noise reduction. In effect, the 1990 law called ANCA stripped local control and opened the door for unmitigated aircraft growth. There are typically only 30 to 50 discrete callers/ individual homeowner filing noise complaints out of the 15,000 people living here on Bay Farm Island in any given month - so perhaps there is no noise or pollution problem. If you feel that there is a problem with noise and pollution refer to CLASSalameda.com or just google noise Oakland airport and file your noise complaint and tell your neighbor. With the airspace noise due to cargo jets, passenger jets, business jets, propeller aircraft, and jets from San Francisco airport overhead your complaints will count. Don’t stop at noise complaints for Oakland Airport either since some of the noise heard can be attributed to San Francisco planes headed towards the Oakland hills. Google SFO noise and make a complaint there as well. Don’t forget to volunteer your time to help CLASS via an email to info@CLASSalameda.com. REGISTER YOUR AIRPLANE NOISE COMPLAINT flyquietoak.com/community/file - noise - complaint CALL 510.563.6463 SCAN THE QR CODE BELOW

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