Strange radio communication -- to me anyway

[Andrew Doubleday]

John Wayne radar identifies VFR aircraft operating within the surface area off of the Long Beach ASR-9 radar site which is located about 10 miles NW of the field up near KSLI. They don't pick up targets in the air until they're through about 200-300 feet or so in the climb since the site is located off-field so it's necessary to verify mode C on departures they are radar identifying. If they could verify altitude on the surface from an on-field radar site, they wouldn't need to validate your mode C as they could simply confirm it with field elevation, if that makes any sense.