Countywide : Meetings Planned on Alternate Pipeline

The Metropolitan Water District of Southern California and the Calleguas Municipal Water District will sponsor two public meetings on a large pipeline that would give Ventura County an alternative supply line for water piped into the county.

Called the West Valley Project, the six- to eight-foot-wide proposed pipeline would run from near Castaic Lake into Ventura County along one of two proposed routes.

The public meetings are scheduled for Nov. 18 at Sequoia Junior High School, 3570 Cochran St., Simi Valley, and Nov. 23 at the Fillmore Senior Center, 533 Santa Clara Ave. Both meetings begin at 7:15 p.m. A third meeting will be held in Newhall in Los Angeles County on Nov. 12.

The project could cost up to $300 million and is scheduled to be finished by the year 2000, said project manager Wyatt Won.

Calleguas is a water wholesaler that serves nearly half a million Ventura County residents in the cities of Oxnard, Simi Valley, Thousand Oaks, Camarillo and Moorpark.

The new pipeline would provide an alternative to the single pipeline that supplies Calleguas with all of its water. That line passes through the Santa Susana Tunnel, which crosses a fault. Officials said an earthquake or other disaster that disrupted the tunnel would leave much of Ventura County without water.

Won said the existing pipeline is scheduled to reach capacity by the year 2000 because of continued growth in the service area.

One proposed route for the pipeline runs through the San Fernando Valley, generally along either Rinaldi Street or Devonshire Street, to the existing Santa Susana Tunnel in Chatsworth.

Calleguas would tie into the pipeline with a new tunnel, parallel to the existing one, and bring the water along another pipeline to the northern Las Posas Basin.

The second proposed route is along the Santa Clara Valley from Santa Clarita to Calumet Canyon. Calleguas would build a two-mile-long tunnel from the Happy Camp Canyon through the Oak Ridge Mountains.

Bob Gomperz, a Metropolitan spokesman, said the proposed project is part of the district’s $6-billion, 10-year capital improvement program, the district’s first major construction program in 20 years. Metropolitan and Calleguas would bear the costs of the pipeline.

As part of the project, Calleguas would build a network of wells in the Las Posas Basin, near Moorpark, that would act as a giant underground reservoir, allowing the storage of millions of gallons of water.

At the hearings, the public will be asked to comment on the scope of the environmental impact report for the project. A draft report is scheduled to be completed next year.