RHV Closure!?
Can the County Legally Close RHV?
The county attorney believes they can.
This is actually the third time that the county has tried to close RHV. During the first closure attempt, back in 1986, County counsel presented his legal opinion in two documents:
1. RHV Closure–Legal Opinion 1986-03-31 (3.5MB pdf)
2. RHV Closure–Legal Opinion 1986-04-10 (1.6MB pdf)
Notice that contract law does not necessarily depend on the original intent of the contract, but rather it is predicated on what is actually written in the contract (and the various interpretations that the parties may have of the language).
Interestingly, this opinion relies heavily on the premise that the airport would be closed for public safety, a position which was later completely negated by the County’s own safety study (Risk Assessment of the Reid-Hillview Airport Closure Evaluation Project, Final Report November 1993, SRI Project 3333). That study concluded that the airport was in fact the safest possible use of the property.
The County likely has more recent opinions that do not rely on the public safety argument.