MAILBAG:

Rebuilding an eastside Costa Mesa house environmentally is much the same as opening the once planned El Toro International Airport, which will help save the planet, (“Starting over solar,” Feb. 4.)

The Great Park is much delayed, but the airport is already built, it is green and it is ready to go.

Housing recovery will take 10 years. Lennar Corp. lost a $1 billion last quarter.

The Federal Aviation Administration owns 1,000 acres of El Toro and plans to keep it.

The Navy retains ownership of 800 acres of El Toro and will not transfer it to Lennar until it is cleaned up environmentally. Lennar has only an option and lease.

Personnel continue to use El Toro for training and aviation despite the fact that the base is closed. Private pilots land there when they have engine trouble.

The airlines love the “green” fuel-efficient cross runways at El Toro that save time and money we need to save the planet.

El Toro airport is a business that will bring great wealth to Lennar and the city of Irvine, which controls it.

DONALD NYRE

Newport Beach

Thoughts regarding Nicolas Cage’s house

For the last couple of weeks I’ve been pondering the reasons Nicolas Cage might have had to sell his house and move from such a beautiful area (other than making a cool $35 million off a two-year investment, of course).

I think I have two possible additional reasons for the sale:

1) If he were a subscriber to the Pilot when he lived here, he would have read a lot about the evils that plague our fair Newport-Mesa area, including the evils of fluoridation, the evils of teaching evolution in science classes, the evils of skate boarding and soccer fields, the evils of rehabilitation homes, the evil contamination from one of the most honored hospitals in our nation, and of course, the evil Mexicans.

Perhaps he felt that selling to the head of the “Terrible Herbst” gas station chain would be a better fit overall;

2) His adjustable rate kicked in, and he couldn’t make the payments.

JOHN KNECHT

Costa Mesa

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