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Alpine man to represent county on Regional Airport Authority
By Joe Naiman
The Alpine Sun
ALPINE — Alpine resident Bob Watkins is
the County of San Diego’s new representative on the San Diego
County Regional Airport Authority.
Sheriff Bill Kolender recommended Watkins for the
four-year term, which expires on Dec. 15, 2010. The San Diego
County Board of Supervisors confirmed the appointment. Watkins,
who also serves on the San Diego County Board of Education, will
retain that seat.
“My intent is to follow the rules, the laws, and what
the public has said,” Watkins said.
The San Diego County Regional Airport Authority was
created by state legislation signed into law in 2001. The
airport authority manages the operations of San Diego
International Airport and works with local jurisdictions to
create land use plans that ensure that development near airports
is compatible.
The airport authority is also charged with finding a
new airport, a task which led the airport authority into
conflict with county residents and the military, when the
airport authority recommended use of Marine Corps Air Station
Miramar for civilian commercial flights.
The proposed airport at Miramar went to the county’s
voters as an advisory measure in the November election and was
rejected. The proposal has created acrimony and also generated
calls for the restructuring of the airport authority. Watkins
feels that he can help mitigate the acrimony.
“My reaction is there’s another opportunity to take a
look at something from a governance point of view,” Watkins
said.
Watkins places economic viability as his top priority
for his tasks on the airport authority.
“I really think that the residents of San Diego and the
tourists and visitors we get here need to know that we’ve got
the best access and the best facility we could put out,” Watkins
said. “We need to be a functioning airport.”
Minimizing land use conflicts through coordination is
also on his priority list, and his governance priority includes
making the airport authority more accountable to the public.
“I have no agenda other than those things,” Watkins
said of his plans for airport authority service.
An amendment to the original bill creating the San
Diego County Regional Airport Authority gave the Sheriff, rather
than the Board of Supervisors, the authority to appoint the
county’s member, although the Sheriff’s choice is ratified by
the supervisors. In 2002 Kolender sought applicants.
“I picked up along the grapevine that the county had
not been successful in identifying somebody,” Watkins said.
Watkins called the Sheriff’s Office and was told that
Bill Lynch had been recommended just days before. Lynch was
appointed to the four-year position but did not seek a second
term.
“When it came up this time I got a call from the
Sheriff’s Office asking me if I still had an interest,” Watkins
said.
Watkins grew up in San Diego. He attended Jefferson
Elementary School, Horace Mann Junior High School, Crawford High
School, and San Diego State University.
Watkins was appointed to the County Office of Education
board when Jim Kelly resigned after being elected to the
Grossmont Union High School District board in November 2002.
“There was a lot of acrimony on that board at the
time,” he said of the county education board.
At the time the County Board of Education
included Ernie Dronenburg, who is also a Crawford High School
graduate; Watkins was a sophomore at Crawford when Dronenburg
was a senior.
“Ernie was on the board, and together we got the
acrimony out of the way,” Watkins said. “I think we’ve done a
good job.”
Watkins was on Crawford baseball team before graduating
in 1961. His coach was Ash Hayes, who later served on the
President’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports.
“Ash is still a very good friend, and I still have the
greatest respect for the man,” Watkins said.
Watkins is professionally the chairman of R.J. Watkins and
Company, a management consulting firm that assists in
organizational development, executive recruitment, and venture
capital. His professional career has focused on regional
economic development. He is a founding member and trustee of the
San Diego National Sports Foundation, which organized and built
the Olympic Training Center in Chula Vista, and he has
previously served as chairman of the board of the San Diego
County American Red Cross and on the board of directors of the
San Diego International Sports Council and the YMCA.
He is also chairman of the United States Rugby
Foundation and serves on the boards of the San Diego Economic
Development Corporation, the Corporate Directors Forum, the La
Jolla Institute for Molecular Medicine, and Regenesis
Biomedical, Inc.
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