Area Growers, Officials Praise Newhall Delay

Ventura County growers and elected officials on Thursday praised a court ruling that stalls the massive Newhall Ranch housing development east of Fillmore in Los Angeles County, saying the decision preserves the Santa Clara Valley’s pastoral charm, if only for a while.

“Whiskey’s for drinking, water’s for fighting!” declared a jubilant Kathy Long, chairwoman of the Ventura County Board of Supervisors, who along with her board colleagues has opposed the project for years, fearing its draw on ground water in the Santa Clara Valley could threaten the county’s billion-dollar agriculture industry.

Supervisor Judy Mikels predicted the ruling will help county leaders and environmentalists in their quest to forestall the development, which would bring 22,000 homes along the county’s eastern flank.

“Ventura County will continue to feel like Ventura County and not L.A. County,” Mikels said.

But Supervisor Frank Schillo and others acknowledged it’s just a matter of time until the development near Six Flags Magic Mountain is built and traffic swells along California 126. Instead of stopping the project, they hope Kern County Superior Court Judge Roger D. Randall’s ruling--which requires Newhall to conduct more environmental research on the project’s traffic and water implications--ensures the county’s agricultural industry in the lush Santa Clara Valley won’t be sucked dry.

“It’s difficult to assess whether this [ruling] will mean a real change or if it’s just crossing some t’s and dotting some i’s,” said Rex Laird, executive director of the Ventura County Farm Bureau.

Others say they hope the ruling will at least force the developers to pay the county for potential road improvements and give the county greater leverage in demanding that the number of houses be reduced.

“I’m very glad they’re looking more closely at the water and traffic issues,” said Fillmore Mayor Evaristo Barajas, who along with his council colleagues agreed to drop out of Ventura County’s lawsuit against the project in exchange for $300,000 from the developer.

“But in the end, I don’t doubt the project’s going to go through anyway,” Barajas said. “How can we control something like that? It’s not a reality. So now we have to make the best of it.”

Barajas said he sees positive aspects for Fillmore’s residents: a base of 70,000 potential tourists who might drive west to visit his city, or neighboring Santa Paula or Piru, for the day, and new jobs in construction of the development and in the service industry it creates.

Santa Paula Councilwoman Laura Flores Espinosa disagreed. She said there is no guarantee of jobs for Santa Paula residents. Espinosa said she sees only the threat of harm to the agricultural industry that supports so many of the city’s residents, as well as added stresses on traffic and the potential that more blue-collar workers would move to Santa Paula seeking already short low-cost housing.

Other advocates hope slow-growth measures headed for a November ballot in Santa Paula and Fillmore will effectively contain development up to the Los Angeles County line.

Regardless of those efforts, Jim Churchill, an avocado grower and a board member of the Environmental Defense Center, said construction of the Newhall project would “signal the beginning of the end of the Santa Clara River Valley as an agricultural valley.”

He said the court ruling renewed his hope that it won’t happen as quickly.

“This is a political fight, between the forces of sprawl and the forces of smart growth,” Churchill said. “In politics, anything can happen, always. If we haven’t actually stuck a stake through this thing’s heart we’ll just keep trying to as time goes on.”

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Judge delays 22,000-home development. A1