Council discusses baggage facility

CITY HALL — Councilman David Gordon continued to call for a re-examination of the proposed baggage facility at Bob Hope Airport during the City Council meeting Tuesday, citing an apparent inconsistency from the Transportation Security Administration.

But the council, by a 3-to-1 vote, rebuffed Gordon’s attempt.

“Our legal opinion has not changed,” City Atty. Dennis Barlow said.

The facility in question, which the council approved in January, is a blast-hardened, 6,500-square-foot baggage facility that would house a new luggage screening apparatus adjacent to Terminal B.

Supporters of the facility maintain that by removing the inspection of luggage from the vicinity of the public — now completed inside the lobby of Terminal B — they are improving passenger security.

But opponents of the proposal, including Gordon, said the Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority never received an explicit federal mandate to construct the facility, something they say is required by the city’s 2005 development agreement with the airport that prohibits terminal expansion.

A recent letter from a TSA official to Gordon seemed to bolster the councilman’s claim that the authority never received a mandate.

“As to the allegation that TSA issued an ‘explicit mandate’ to Bob Hope Airport, let me assure you that no one at any level did so,” wrote Adam Tsao, chief of staff in the office of operational process and technology.

Justification for moving forward with the facility — and the correspondence that ignited the mandate-versus-no mandate debate nearly one year ago — centered on a July 31, 2007, letter from Assistant Federal Security Director Blanca Morales, who wrote that the current space allocated to the TSA to conduct baggage screening at Terminal B is “inadequate” and a “security concern.”

Her findings, and the subsequent conclusion of the airport and the city’s legal counsel, were used as evidence that the authority did receive a mandate.

Officials at the airport, including Burbank Airport Commissioner Charles Lombardo, said Morales’ statement was enough justification to move forward with the project.

“The TSA does not issue federal explicit mandates due to their liability and the fact they would have to pay for the whole facility,” he said. “Morales told us what operational elements are needed. Is that a directive? I think so. We needed a directive, not a mandate.”