Rains Are Gone but Landslides Continue to Block 2 Roads : Traffic: While officials seek funds or approval to clear stretches of South Mountain Road and California 33, residents adjust to longer drives for routine errands.

The rains that pelted Ventura County during the winter are already fading from memory, but delays in clearing rain-related landslides from highways have aggravated hundreds of north county residents.

Neither county nor state transportation officials can say how long it will be before they begin to remove massive landslides that closed South Mountain Road near Santa Paula and California 33 north of Ojai.

And county officials, still reeling from budget cuts, are looking for ways to come up with the $300,000 that it will cost to clear South Mountain Road.

Residents of Lockwood Valley and a portion of the Santa Clara Valley say they are growing increasingly frustrated by delays in repairs to the two slides, which have forced them to drive up to two hours out of their way to run routine errands.

“Residents around here accept the fact of a landslide, but they are upset that nobody has done anything yet,” said Ventura County Sheriff’s Deputy Dave Kenney about residents of the Lockwood Valley affected by the closure of California 33.

For nearly two weeks since a landslide buried South Mountain Road near Santa Paula, residents along the rural highway say their lives have been disrupted by the ensuing isolation.

Instead of driving a mile or two into Santa Paula, residents of several dozen homes must now detour through Fillmore to go to Santa Paula, adding nearly an hour to the round trip.

As a result, many find themselves juggling work and school schedules, putting off errands or patronizing Fillmore shops for the first time.

“If the road was going to be blocked for a short while, then I could put up with it,” said Tony Deramo, who before the landslide left home near Santa Paula at 4:30 a.m. every day to drive to his job as a cook at Carrows restaurant in Ojai. Now he leaves 40 minutes earlier. “If this keeps up, I’ll have to consider transferring to Santa Paula.”

Deramo may as well put in for that transfer now.

County officials said Tuesday that it will cost $300,000 to remove debris and safely reopen South Mountain Road, money they said the financially beleaguered county cannot afford. Even after money is found, work crews will need six weeks to clear the 100,000 cubic yards of dirt and debris from the roadway and the unstable hillside above it, said Butch Britt, head of the county transportation department.

The Ventura County Board of Supervisors declared the landslide an emergency on Tuesday, authorizing transportation officials to ask the state and federal governments for emergency funds. County Chief Administrative Officer Richard Wittenberg said it was unlikely that such funds would be available.

Public work officials are reviewing the department’s $3.5-million budget to see if they can postpone tree-trimming or trim other projects to divert money to repairs on South Mountain Road, Britt said.

Ventura County Supervisor Maggie Kildee, who represents the area where the slide occurred, happened to be driving on South Mountain Road about 8:30 a.m. on April 3 when the slide started.

Kildee was driving west behind a pickup truck when the truck stopped for no apparent reason.

“My first reaction was anger at the driver of the pickup truck for stopping,” Kildee said. “I looked beyond the driver and could see the hillside was beginning to come down. A tree would come down, then a boulder would come, and then a lot of dirt.”

Kildee notified the Sheriff’s Department and the county Public Works Department.

When the soil stopped slipping, the scar that remained measured about 250 feet wide and a little more than 200 feet high, Britt said. A geologist investigating the site informed officials that the likelihood for further slippage from the unstable sandstone slope was high.

“We were afraid if we removed the toe of the slide, it would bring down the rest of the hillside,” Britt said.

Estimates of the cost to repair the slide escalated beyond the department’s limited financial resources, Kildee said. “Every time (Public Works Director Art Goulet) talked to me, the cost went up another $50,000,” she said.

While the county figures out how to pay for the project, residents near the slide have begun to adjust to long drives for errands that once took just a few minutes.

“I don’t go to town as often as I used to,” said Greg Martinez, who has lived in a house perched above South Mountain Road for four years. He said residents have not heard from county officials about the status of repair efforts.

Up the road, Deramo’s wife, Mandy, said the long drive to Santa Paula has made trips to their 4-year-old daughter’s preschool a hassle. “By the time we get home, it’s almost time to leave and pick her up again,” she said.

Mandy Deramo said the hardest adjustment has been learning where to shop in Fillmore, a town of about 10,000 residents, less than half the size of Santa Paula. “Fillmore only has one grocery store, and it’s much smaller than the stores in Santa Paula,” she said.

Sheriff’s Lt. Paul Anderson said deputies have not encountered any problems because of the slide, partly because the closest station is in Fillmore anyway.

Far more inconvenienced than the residents on South Mountain Road, he said, are residents of the Lockwood Valley who drive 50 miles to pick up mail in Ojai. A landslide closed California 33 on Feb. 19, and state officials are still seeking approval of an environmental review to begin repairs.

Highway officials said no cost estimate is yet available for clearing the slide and the house-sized boulders that fell on the highway linking the Ojai area with the San Joaquin Valley.

Because of the closure, residents in Lockwood Valley must drive an additional 90 minutes to two hours to reach Ojai via the Santa Clara Valley and Ventura, said Kenney, who lives with his wife and three children at the Lockwood sheriff’s station.