Developers Outline Plans for Newhall Ranch Project

Before an overflow audience of 250, Newhall Land & Farming Co. executives Wednesday laid out their plan to build a Santa Clarita Valley community that would be the largest housing development in Los Angeles County history, promising that all traffic and environmental impacts could be remedied.

“This has been meticulously planned, the environment has been protected, it is fiscally sustainable,” said Newhall Land Senior Vice President Jim Harter, who is directing the massive project. “This is what long-term planning can accomplish.”

The hearing, before the County Planning Commission at Valencia High School, was reserved for Newhall Land representatives and other proponents of the Newhall Ranch project.

But it kicked off what is likely to be a protracted debate on the project. The Planning Commission will be the first agency to vote on the project, but over the next several months the County Board of Supervisors and several other local and state agencies will also have to approve various parts of the plan.

Gloria Glenn, vice president of the company, said the new development is necessary given the county’s expected growth over the next two decades.

“Almost half a million people left California between 1992 and 1995, but L.A. County went from [a population of] 8.9 million to 9.4 million from 1990 to 1996, despite the recession,” Glenn said.

Newhall officials also said the project will add money to local government coffers--$300 million over the 25-year building period for the county, and about $28 million to the city of Santa Clarita. The funds would come from fees, licenses and other costs associated with construction.

The development would include 25,000 homes, 10 schools, several shopping centers, a business park and a golf course on a 19-square-mile tract between Six Flags Magic Mountain and the Ventura County line. It would be made up of five villages linked by a network of roads, including extensions of Chiquita Canyon Road, Magic Mountain Parkway, Valencia Boulevard and San Martinez Grade.

To mitigate traffic concerns, California 126, which would run through the proposed development, would be widened, officials said.

The land is now owned by the publicly traded company and is currently used primarily for farming and cattle grazing. Environmental groups are concerned that the Santa Clara River, Southern California’s largest remaining wild river, would be irreparably damaged by the project, part of which would be built in the river’s watershed.

The area also contains at least two creatures on the federal government’s list of endangered species, the Bell’s vireo, a bird, and a small fish called the three-spined stickleback.

Responding to critics concerned about the environmental impact of the project, Newhall executives earlier this week said the company was prepared to devote 49% of the ranch’s 12,000 acres for use as open space, including hiking trails along the Santa Clara River.

An environmental consultant hired by the company told the crowd Wednesday night that the development would improve the health of the river, because grazing would be phased out and river channels cleared.

“The river will likely be made more dynamic, and in the end, the river channel will likely support more habitat,” Paul Frommer said.

The next public hearing, also at Valencia High School, is for opponents of the project. It is scheduled for Nov. 6 at 6 p.m. in the multipurpose room.