Santa Clarita Rejects 2 Route Plans : Roads: Homeowners persuade the City Council to ask Caltrans for an alternate extension of California 126.

In a remarkable show of grass-roots political power, angry homeowners have succeeded in getting the Santa Clarita City Council to oppose two routes for a controversial, eight-lane extension of California 126 from the Golden State Freeway to the Antelope Valley Freeway.

The extension idea originated with the city, which is eager to avoid strangling on its surface-street traffic.

But after the city received two route proposals from the California Department of Transportation, homeowners strongly objected. On Tuesday night, they prevailed.

The 5-0 vote reflected residents’ concerns that building the extension would displace houses and wildlife habitat. The council stopped short of opposing any extension, and instead urged Caltrans to propose another route.

Caltrans officials have told the city that the agency will not build the road without the community’s support.

The council’s decision drew thunderous applause from the 150 residents who packed City Hall. Many in the standing-room-only crowd repeatedly shouted “Nooooo!” and “Yeahhhh!” with every significant change in the city’s response to Caltrans, which has pursued the project in earnest for two years.

During 90 minutes of haggling over a motion made by Councilman Carl Boyer and seconded by Councilman George Pederson, the council members and City Clerk Donna Grindey painstakingly softened words here, toughened phrases there, until they crafted a single sentence of 99 words that pleased the crowd.

“I’m very moved to see government in the United States really working,” said Bryan Bourg, a homeowner who said at the hearing that he moved to Valencia from Texas three years ago, only to learn that one alignment of the proposed highway would pass close to his house.

“The citizens of a community really do have a say in what’s happening in their community,” Bourg said. “That was proved tonight.”

The council rejected two proposed alignments of the nine-mile highway extension--one north of the Santa Clara River to be built at a cost of $283 million, the other south of the river for $307 million.

The council also criticized a draft of an environmental review of the project as “incomplete and inadequate,” and urged Caltrans to work with the city to find “an alternate route which is compatible with the needs of the entire community. . . .”

That, however, could foist the problem of traffic congestion onto other neighborhoods, warned City Manager George Caravalho.

“These interested people have a real concern now, but as we look at alternatives, it’s going to involve some other communities that may not be here because they are not impacted,” Caravalho said.

But such an impact can be avoided if other routes proposed by the Santa Clarita Citizens’ Transportation Committee are considered, said the group’s chairwoman, Vera Johnson. The committee opposed the two routes rejected by the council.

Caltrans officials could not be reached for comment.

Hunt Braly, chairman of the Caltrans-appointed 126 Advisory Committee and chief of staff for state Sen. Ed Davis (R-Santa Clarita), said he agrees that the two proposed routes carry liabilities.

But “the onus is on the city to come up with specific proposals for something else as soon as possible,” he said. “We intend to meet with the city, probably within the next month, in hopes of coming up with alternatives. Otherwise, the project doesn’t have much of a future.”

The council’s decision represents a homeowner victory over the highway project’s supporters among the business community, notably the Newhall Land & Farming Co., the largest holder of undeveloped land in the Santa Clarita Valley.

Two weeks ago, the valley’s Chamber of Commerce endorsed an extension in a letter to a Caltrans official from chamber President Marlee Lauffer, who wrote that “the overall benefits . . . must take priority over neighborhood concerns.”

Lauffer, also a spokeswoman for Newhall Land, said Wednesday that the decision does not diminish the chamber’s support of “some kind of east-west connection that meets everybody’s needs.” Lauffer said she was encouraged that the council is still willing to work with Caltrans.

“This project is a way of returning the Santa Clarita Valley’s state and federal tax dollars to the community to build a road that is needed for improved circulation of traffic,” she said.

Once the council took note of the huge crowd of homeowners Tuesday night and agreed to hear them out, opposition to the project quickly gathered momentum. The meeting came just six weeks after a crowd of more than 400 people noisily protested to Caltrans officials at a public hearing in Canyon Country.

While conceding that the city needs traffic relief, Mayor Jill Klajic said: “I do not support the northern route or any type of freeway overpass that desecrates the river. Any configuration of 126 must have the least impact on the community. I do believe there is a compromise, that we can find that road.”

However, Boyer repeatedly cautioned against alienating Caltrans, and pressed for relief from overcrowding and increased growth that he predicted will “double this valley’s population by more than 100,000 in 20 years.”

“Telling Caltrans to stop and start over is not a good motion,” he told the crowd. “Fifty years from now, people are going to stop by and spit on my grave if we did that. . . . You have a right to go home and sleep soundly tonight, knowing we aren’t going to approve a project which is going to destroy your property values over 30 years.”

As hoots and snickers from skeptics rippled across the room, Boyer’s voice rose: “People, you’re going to win. . . . If we don’t keep Caltrans working on this project in some cooperative fashion, and if we don’t solve the problem of cross-valley traffic, you’re going to hate yourselves for having blocked it, and you’re going to have an ungodly mess on your hands.”

Perhaps the loudest audience response of all was triggered by Arnie Rodio, a former Lancaster mayor and current city councilman who said he helped with Santa Clarita’s incorporation five years ago.

After warning that any extension of California 126 would also have an effect on the Antelope Valley, Rodio told the crowd that he is running for the state Assembly in the 36th District. Then, to a burst of laughter and applause, he told the council: “I’d hate to have you ask me for funds for a highway that the citizens don’t want.”

Proposed Expressway Caltrans is considering building an expressway across the Santa Clarita Valley. The City Council on Tuesday night opposed the northern and southern routes.