December 23, 2003 - Year end report -
The soon to be MUD pile is still on hold.
Oh! if only they would have listened the voices of
those who live in the area!
But those who had control would not relinquish it.
It is the old story!!!
N I H (Not Invented Here) syndrome!
Our leaders could not admit that others knew more than
they did.
Now we see the result, waste, delay and possibly
danger!
Stay Tuned....
This is the last chance to save the OAK GROVE!!
Come to the Council Tuesday February 27th at 5:45pm.
If you wish to speak, speakers can only speak at the 6pm public comment
period, not to
the agenda item itself. This is our last chance. This is the oak
grove's last chance.
Your presence, your letters to the editor, your e-mails, your phone
calls, your faxes, your speech at public comments may well be the deciding
factor.
Please support the Linda Parks request to Council on February 27th to have
the City fund SECOR, the expert team that helped bring forward the
alternative proposal, to conduct borings and provide the initial design work for
an off-line basin in the field. If these experts find it can't be done,
we've done our best and reduced impacts through our due diligence. If
these experts find it can be done, when construction starts this year, it will
be for a sane project that preserves one of our City's finest oak groves.
The following are the contents of an email
discussing the state of the Lang Ranch DAM! READ IT AND TAKE
ACTION!
From: Linda Parks <toparks@gte.net>
Subject: Our Last Chance to Save the Oak Grove
Date: Mon, 12 Feb 2001 11:01:53 -0800
It's been almost a year since I presented "An Environmentally Superior
Alternative to the Ventura County Flood Control District's (VCFCD) Lang
Creek Proposed Debris/Detention Basins Project".
THE ALTERNATIVE
My alternative differs from the VCFCD project in three ways:
 | The Concept - the alternative proposes that the
detention basin be off-line, or out of the streambed as opposed to the VCFCD
basin which is in the streambed;
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| The Location - the alternative site is just a stones
throw downstream from the VCFCD dam site. Their site would require
removing federally listed endangered plants and chopping down dozens of
ancient oak trees (that average 30' in height) to make 2 roads and a 66.5
high dam embankment (that will store water to twice the height of the oak
grove in 100 year storm events). In contrast, the alternative site is
a flat field where several hundred loads of dirt have since been dumped in
anticipation of the Park District's plan to turn the field into baseball
diamonds, etc. The alternative would provide a dual use basin:
baseball fields in dry months, a detention basin in wet weather.
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| Debris Storage - instead of the VCFCD proposal
to build a 47 acre foot debris basin at the northeast corner of Lang Ranch
Parkway and Westlake Blvd. with a 500 foot brush clearance zone upstream, my
alternative proposes doing away with the debris basin altogether and instead
providing debris racks up stream. My alternative report included
evidence that both City and County staff agreed in 1995 that the
proposed 47 acre foot basin was way over-sized and a mere 17 acre feet would
be sufficient. This 17 acre feet estimate for debris would allow for
the less impactful debris rack that my alternative proposes.
THE HISTORY
When the City approved the removal of 140 oak trees to build a joint debris
and detention basin in city parkland on the west side of Westlake Blvd,
everyone thought the ancient oak grove was lost.
When the twin basin design that put the debris basin on the east side and
detention basin on the west side of Westlake Blvd. was approved in 1995,
everyone thought it was just a matter of time before the dam would be
constructed.
When a tri-party agreement between the developer, the County and the City
provided a bond to be repaid with residents' Mello Roos payments,
everyone thought once the County got their money the project would be built.
When the City allowed the developer to remove all temporarily detention
basins in Lang Ranch in anticipation of the permanent one, everyone thought
the permanent one would soon be built.
When the Parks Alternative was dismissed on March 21st, 2000, everyone
thought the debris and detention basins would be built just as the Ventura
County Flood Control District designed them.
But everyone was wrong!
WE'VE MADE A DIFFERENCE
The debris basin has been reduced to 18 acre feet (one-third of the
originally proposed size) in order to avoid the Chumash archeological site
we know is there and they for so long denied. The streambed east of
Westlake Boulevard will not be stripped of vegetation some 500 feet, as was
proposed in February 2000. The tri-party agreement to fund and build
the dam expired in January, 2001. The initial bond money the County received
in 1996 to build the project has accrued a million dollars in interest for
the County's General Fund (if not spent on the project). The
California Department of Fish and Game has asked for a supplemental EIR to
review the new information that has come to light.
It is known that the detention basin site has the same geologic constraints
from the Erbes Road landslide as the alternative site. There is new
information regarding the presence of water underground that may be
lubricating the slide and endangering the homes on top of it.
So why hasn't the Lang Ranch Dam been built even six years after the
"final" decision from the City, the County and the various
regulatory agencies? Because we never gave up.
Don't give up now!
LACK OF GOOD FAITH EFFORT TO DETERMINE FEASIBILITY
A year after my alternative was submitted there has been no study to
determine its feasibility. Most upsetting, the City has wasted tens of
thousands of dollars putting up a straw man and knocking it down. The
City hired a hydrologist (Hawks & Associates) who falsely interpreted my
alternative as being located on the steep hillside of known landslide
material instead of in the flat field. The City then hired a second
consultant (Gorian) geologists who studied the hillside and determined any
alternative in the steep hill of landslide material would likely cause a
landslide. Gorian even had 3 test borings done on the hill to back up
it's claim that the hillside of slide material is a bad place to build a
detention basin.
Never did the consultants check the flat field area where my alternative is
proposed. Steve Brady, Senior Hydro geologist for SECOR International,
the engineering firm assisting me with the alternative wrote "It should
be noted that the limits of Gorian's investigation did not include the area
of the March 2000 Parks proposed alternative retention basin."
The City also hired a third consultant, Impact Sciences to say from looking
at the Gorian and Hawks reports, my alternative wouldn't work. The City then
hired a fourth consultant, Rincon, that found the site out of the oak grove
was environmentally superior of the 16 alternatives studied, but based on
Gorian and Hawks, it was not feasible.
The City then hired the original archeologist from Lang Ranch
(consultant number 5) who said our claims were wrong and there were no
archeological sites where the VCFCD debris basin is planned. Fortunately the
original Chumash monitor who knows what's buried there came forward and
reminded the City that they promised to preserve the site. As a result
the debris basin was redesigned to a third of its size to avoid the burial
site. A 6th consultant wrote that the oak grove was not threatened and
oak trees can survive even if totally submerged for 24 hours.
Based on the Hawks and Gorian, and Rincon reports, and without doing
independent review of the geology, the Army Corps of Engineers found that
"From a hydraulic and hydrologic point of view, alternative 16 or a
variation of the off-line alternative (including Ms. Parks proposal) could
solve the flooding problem in Lang Ranch as long as all the design criteria
are met. It seems the location of the basin is primarily a
geotechnical and/or environmental concern."
The Army Corps issued their permit. At least two other permits are
outstanding, that of the California Department of Fish and Game, an agency
concerned about the environmental issues associated with the VCFCD project,
and the Division of Safety of Dams an agency concerned about the geological
stability of the VCFCD dam.
WHAT WE MUST DO
No one knows if my alternative is feasible. The geologists, dam
builders, landslide specialists, and hydro geologist who Ed Masry hired and
who have helped me propose the alternative believe it can be done. But first
borings must be taken in the ACTUAL location of my proposed site.
Until this is done its feasibility cannot be determined.
We have come this far. If my alternative won't work let it die based
on a review of it, not based on a review of a ridiculous concept to build a
100' hole in a landslide hill.
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