Pooling Their Resources

A developer is working with state wildlife officials to preserve one of the county’s only vernal pools.

To the untrained eye, the 600-foot-long pool, just north of Tierra Rejada Road and east of California 23, may appear to be nothing more than a pond. And during dry seasons, it may look like just a basin of mud.

Yet environmentalists say it is special because California orcutt grass, an endangered wetland species, thrives there. It’s also home to the endangered Riverside fairy shrimp, which lies dormant in the pond’s clay beds during dry seasons but comes to life once the pool fills with water.

“Those vernal pools, because they’re so fleeting and ephemeral, they tend to support rare resources,” said state Fish and Game ecologist Rick Farris. Unlike ordinary ponds, vernal pools are lined with a layer of clay that helps trap water, thus creating a unique habitat.

For months, Mission Viejo-based developer Lennar Communities and the state Department of Fish and Game have tried to solve a dilemma: How do you build homes near those rare resources and still preserve them--not only when the homes go up, but also 10, 20 or 30 years from now?

While the two sides have not yet worked out how to answer that question, the City Council has approved grading for some of the Lennar land, a 37-acre section of the property some distance from the vernal pool.

The 388-acre Lennar property, where the developer plans to build 522 single-family homes, is the southern half of a rectangle bounded on the north by New Los Angeles Avenue, on the south by Tierra Rejada Road, on the west by Spring Road and on the east by California 23. Another builder plans commercial development on the north half of the rectangle.

Eventually, Lennar President Emil Haddad hopes to build homes on a 40-acre section in the southeast part of the project that includes the vernal pool.

Haddad said engineers have shown the developers which areas are considered the watershed, a circular area that funnels rainwater into the pool. Homes, Haddad said, will not be built within that area.

Yet even if the homes are built outside the watershed, wildlife officials worry there could be a number of indirect effects as a result of the development.

“The real question is, what’s the biological value of the pool when it’s completely surrounded by houses?” Farris said.

Officials also worry that new residents may dump everyday toxic waste products, such as motor oil, in the pool, Farris said. Another concern is contamination from household goods or pesticides, he said.

With residents occupying homes nearby, there may be more pressure for mosquito control in the pool, which could disturb the endangered shrimp.

While agencies are focusing their attention on the matter now, Farris wonders what happens after the homes are built and the developers are long gone.

Deborah Rosenthal, Lennar’s attorney, said the developer is considering a number of options to protect the vernal pool.

Some possibilities include a fence or other barrier around the pool, Rosenthal said. In addition, the developer is considering handing over the property to a homeowners association. Then the residents would own it, and the area could be restricted from being used as a park.

The developer may also consider turning the pool over to a public agency to conserve it and inform home buyers of the rare resource and the need to protect it.

If a homeowners association ends up owning the property, Rosenthal said, that group would be charged with educating the residents about the pool.

“We obviously are working very closely with the agency so when the homes go in, they’re not impacting negatively the vernal pools,” Haddad said.

To a lesser extent, the developer and wildlife officials are also talking about what to make of two sightings last year of gnatcatchers on the Lennar property.

The gnatcatcher is a rare songbird that is threatened, but not on the endangered list. The species was spotted twice on the 388-acre plot, but not in sections where homes are planned.

A further study completed in May, which was paid for by the developer and approved by wildlife officials, has turned up no further sightings.

“They’ve done all the surveys and complied with the protocols to file the report,” Farris said.

“The fact that they haven’t observed it since then, we don’t know what that means. I think it’s premature to say the birds are not there.”