Group Steps Up Efforts to Halt New County Jail : Courts: A legal challenge against a flood wall at the site near Santa Paula is the latest attempt by environmentalists to stop construction. Work on the facility continues.

As construction continues on Ventura County’s Todd Road jail on a lemon grove west of Santa Paula, a group of environmentalists have stepped up their efforts to undermine the new lockup.

A Santa Barbara Superior Court judge in less than two weeks will consider a request by the group Citizens to Save the Green Belt to halt construction of a flood wall along the Todd Barranca, which is just west of the jail site.

The request is just one of a series of actions the group, led by nearby Santa Paula rancher Ken Chapman, has taken to halt the $53-million project since it received the go-ahead from the Board of Supervisors nearly three years ago.

On Friday, the group asked Santa Barbara Superior Court Judge Ronald C. Stevens to amend its petition alleging that the studies on the environmental impact of the jail were inadequate. Stevens is expected to issue a decision this week.

The group’s attorney, Rosemary Woodlock, said she also intends to file a separate lawsuit against the state Department of Fish and Game on the grounds that the agency violated state laws by allowing the county to use the Todd Barranca for storm-water drainage from the facility.

“One of our main issues is protecting the barranca,” Woodlock said.

But county officials say the group is just “grasping for straws” in a last-ditch attempt to block the project, which is expected to be completed late next year. Officials estimate that 10% of the jail’s construction is already done.

“This is a waste of county staff and attorney time in a case that is frivolous,” Assistant County Counsel Robert R. Orellana said.

County officials anticipate that the lawsuits will ultimately have little impact on the outcome of the jail because the building is expected to be finished by the time the case goes to trial. But the legal actions are “distractions” that just add to the cost of the project, Assistant Sheriff Richard S. Bryce said.

County officials estimate that they have spent hundreds of hours responding to the group’s complaints--all at an uncalculated cost to taxpayers.

Even before the supervisors agreed to move forward with plans to build the jail on the 157-acre lemon grove, Chapman and other group members were trying to persuade county officials to pick another location.

During public testimony, he showed county supervisors a videotape of a large bird that appeared to be an eagle nesting at the site. Officials later said they found no such bird.

Group members also suggested that there were steelhead trout spawning in the barranca. Officials said they have been unable to find the fish.

“To say there is an eagle nesting in the lemon trees is a bit ludicrous,” said Bryce, who is supervising the project for the Sheriff’s Department. “And steelhead trout? There might be some tadpoles in the barranca. But not steelhead trout.”

But Chapman said the group is determined to make sure that county officials do not exploit the area’s ecosystem.

“Someone has to hold them accountable,” he said. “The long and short of it is the county doesn’t feel they need to follow any of the rules. We are doing this as private attorney generals. We are asking that the laws on the books be upheld and enforced. The county is not immune to them.”

On April 16, the group will ask Stevens to prohibit the county from building the wall. The Santa Barbara judge was assigned to the case after all Ventura County judges had disqualified themselves on the basis of a conflict of interest because they had urged the county to build the new jail to ease crowding at the main jail in Ventura.

Peter Roy, jail project manager, said the six-foot wall is needed to prevent the barranca from flooding the jail’s parking lot during heavy storms.

“The flood analysis showed that in a 100-year flood, there would be water in the staff parking up to three feet deep,” Roy said. “We decided to be prudent and put in the flood wall to divert it. It’s not a big deal in my view.”

But Chapman and Woodlock contend that there is no provision in the county’s environmental impact report that allows the county to build the structure.

“No one knew about the wall,” Woodlock said. “Then, all of a sudden, Ken saw this big ditch being dug. Then they started building the wall.”

Chapman, who has been warned by the county to stay off the site, said: “We think they have violated dozens of state environmental laws down there.”

But county officials say they have carefully followed environmental codes. They also say they have gone out of their way to make sure that the facility is unobtrusive by constructing it in earth tones and limiting its height.

Bryce said the county plans to install a plumbing system in the jail that uses little water.

“We have gone the extra mile in every way we possibly can to make sure the environment is protected,” he said. “We have gone to a lot of trouble to look at every possible issue that they’ve raised. But this borderlines on the ridiculous.”