Faces were grim for some (such as school board president Anita Anderson) and jubilant for others as all Kern County Supervisors voted ‘aye’ to certify Frazier Park Estates’ EIR on May 11.
Frank Arciero comments on his Frazier Park Estates development minutes after the Kern County Board of Supervisors voted 5-0 to certify the Environmental Impact Report for his project.
Frank Arciero continues to comment on his Frazier Park Estates development minutes after the Kern County Board of Supervisors voted 5-0 to certify the Environmental Impact Report for his project.
A unanimous vote by the Kern County Board of Supervisors May 11 certified the proposal by Frank Arciero, Jr.’s Fallingstar Homes for the 557-home Frazier Park Estates project in Lebec.
For some who had fought the plan for seven years, it was a day of shock, anger and sadness to see approval of the project that is planned to surround Frazier Mountain High School and draw water for about 2,000 people and 25 acres of commercial development from the same aquifer as the high school well.
About 35-45 mountain residents attended the hearing. About nine spoke against it and two spoke in its favor.
Foremost in the concern of many speakers such as Dennis Mullins, attorney for the Lebec County Water District and El Tejon Unified School Board President Anita Anderson, was the board’s intention to approve the project before developers have “proved up” an adequate source of water. Anderson spoke of the 90 foot drop in the high school well since 2006.
JoAnne Klein spoke about declining water quality as the water table drops. She brought five bottles of water for the supervisors, offering them an opportunity to sample what she said was “foul stuff” filled with minerals and exceeding the state standards for fluoride.
Two residents spoke in favor of the project. Landscaper Richard Sheffield, owner of Antioch Nursery, said that the proposal has gone through major revisions since first presented and is now “a far better project.”
Bob Lame of Pine Mountain attended the hearing as a spectator, then got up to speak when he saw no one was addressing the cumulative impact of the several developments being proposed along the Interstate 5 corridor. Lame, a two-star general and former Los Angeles County civil engineer who spent 39 years in the military reserve commissioned by the Army Corps of Engineers, is a specialist in topography and logistics.
He said the 23,000-home proposal for Centennial on Tejon Ranch near Highway 138, the 3,450-home Tejon Mountain Village and the 557 houses of the proposed Frazier Park Estates could have a crushing impact on this region.
In an interview after the supervisors’ vote, Lame said, “it was a foregone conclusion, they knew how they were going to vote before any of us got there.”
Next week, we report the supervisors’ argument for the project.
This is part of the May 14, 2010 online edition of The Mountain Enterprise.
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