Despite a hostile 3-2 City Council vote, the online “Citizens Petition to Build the Veterans Cemetery in the Great Park” continues to gain hundreds of Irvine petition-signers.

After a four-hour acrimonious City Council meeting, and after hearing public testimony from dozens of citizens, the Council voted 3-2 (Mayor Wagner and Councilmembers Shea and Fox voting YES) to abandon the Great Park location for the pending State Veterans Cemetery.

The developer “land-swap” proposal to kill the previously approved plan for a Veterans Cemetery in the Great Park is running into a buzz-saw of questions and criticism from City staff and from Irvine residents.

Irvine, as a community, has expressed our everlasting gratitude to those hundreds of thousands of men and women — soldiers, sailors, and airmen — who are among the fallen in defense of our nation.

In a stunning development that threatens to derail the entire Veterans Cemetery project, Mayor Don...