By Patric Hedlund
Within hours of Fresno’s 5th District Court of Appeals denial of an effort by the Center for Biological Diversity to halt construction of Tejon Industrial Complex East, Tejon Ranch Company (TRC) moved forward to resume building on the 1,450-acre site at the northern base of the Grapevine and to exploit designation as a Foreign Trade Zone (FTZ).
In a flurry of press releases on Tuesday, April 10, TRC announced a joint venture to secure an extension of Port of Los Angeles FTZ #202 "…for warehouse and distribution uses." They will build a 606,000 square foot warehouse building at the "master planned commercial development that anchors California’s central trade corridor."
A legal tug-of-war between environmentalists and the Kern County Board of Supervisors has been waged over the 1,109-acre expansion of Tejon Industrial Complex on the east side of Interstate 5 (near the juncture with Highway 99) since the board’s approval of the project was set aside in 2003.
At that time, Kern County Superior Judge Kenneth C. Twisselman II ordered the county to submit additional research to the Environmental Impact Report following a lawsuit filed by the Center for Biological Diversity, the Center for Race, Poverty and Environment, and other groups.
In March 2006 Judge Twisselman ruled the supplemental analysis to the EIR prepared by the county satisfied his original order.
Tejon Ranch Company President and CEO Robert A. Stine said in a courthouse steps interview at that time that the delay had cost TRC about $3 million dollars and that the company was eager to forge ahead.
Shortly after, the Center for Biological Diversity announced they would appeal Twisselman’s decision, which put the question into the Fresno Court of Appeals. On April 6, 2007 that court announced its decision to reject the appeal.
"We are pleased to have this issue behind us so we can move ahead with our vision…to provide for California’s future by creating jobs and economic opportunity for thousands," Stine was quoted in one of the company’s Tuesday press releases. TRC maintains that the Tejon Industrial Complex already provides about 1,000 jobs. Only about 25% of the project is developed at this time.
John Buse, staff attorney for the Center for Biological Diversity said Tuesday that as a result of their original lawsuit the "…project will be better and cleaner than the project Kern County approved in 2003, but it will nonetheless be a permanent blight on the landscape which will emit hundreds of tons of air pollutants each year in an air basin that already experiences some of the worst pollution in the nation."
In an email on Wednesday, April 11, Second District Kern County Supervisor Don Maben said, "It was good news that the court has finally given the green light to the Tejon project…. The ever increasing number of trucks on all of our highways is a challenge for all of us [but t]hey will increase with or without complexes like Tejon’s.’" Maben added, "The ideal situation would be to increase our rail capacity in order to have more goods shipped by intermodel units…"
"Our studies of imported goods and commodities moving into the U.S. markets through the ports of Los Angeles and Long Beach indicate that TIC is uniquely positioned to support the flow of…materials as they move into the marketplace. A TIC location also offers efficient access to the Port of Oakland, providing a link to all of California’s major ports from one location," a Rockefeller Group spokesman said.
This is part of the April 13, 2007 online edition of The Mountain Enterprise.
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