Newhall Ranch Plan

Re “A Plan for Responsible Growth,” April 20.

When Newhall Land & Farming Co. unveiled its plan to the public, it sent two representatives to the rural village of Val Verde to make a presentation at the monthly Val Verde Civic Assn. meeting.

During this meeting several residents questioned various aspects of Newhall Land’s proposal. A particular thorn was a planned industrial park to be built along Chiquita Canyon Road, we supposed because this area is adjacent to Chiquita Canyon Landfill (which Newhall Land insists is safe for residents of homes already existing in close proximity to it) and is therefore considered unsuitable as a residential neighborhood.

An industrial park in this area would be unfortunate for residents of Val Verde because, of the two entrances to our town, one already goes through an industrial park. The potential negative impact on real estate prices for us regular folks was--and is--obvious, but that isn’t the point of this letter.

The Newhall Land’s representative’s patronizing, arrogant response in the face of residents’ refusals to withdraw or modify their complaints about the industrial park is most illustrative of the attitude we in the Santa Clarita Valley have come to expect from Newhall Land (this is verbatim; I wrote it down): “Well, basically, it is our land . . . and we can do what we want with it.” Of course, she was right; everyone at the meeting that night knew these people were only there because they wanted to be able to say they had consulted local residents. Newhall Land’s cynical manipulation of people, politics and the legal process is a very sad counterpoint to life in this very beautiful Santa Clarita Valley.

And what of us regular folks? Well, we let them do it. And so do our elected representatives.

SUSAN LEDOUX

Santa Clarita

* We would like briefly to speak to [Newhall Land & Farming Co. Chairman and CEO Thomas L.] Lee’s remark that Newhall Ranch is a “systematic and organized” response to projected growth. What he left out was the word “need.” General Plan amendments are supposed to be based on need. In fact, according to Newhall Land’s own “Additional Information and Analysis of Westridge” (1995), there are already 52,000 pending or approved houses in the Santa Clarita Valley planning pipeline. That will more than adequately accommodate the county’s 2010 population projection of 270,000 people, a figure that in itself may be too high.

Consider this: A 1995 analysis found we have 170,000 people living here in 56,700 dwellings. To have 270,000 of us in the next 15 years means we need to accept 100,000 more bodies or 33,000 or so new dwellings. That’s a little more than 2,200 new dwellings sold every year or six new homes sold every day, seven days per week. And of course these would have to be only new-unit sales, not resales! A Realtor’s dream, but not reality.

And where would all these potential sales come from? It has been suggested that a good portion would come from the San Fernando Valley. It would be the old cycle of abandoning existing neighborhoods and their expensive infrastructure to move to virgin lands where we taxpayers will incur new expensive infrastructure needs. And what about the San Fernando Valley’s economic base? Is this a viable long-term strategy for a healthy Los Angeles? We think San Fernando Valley residents would be very concerned about this proposal.

MICHAEL KOTCH, President,

Santa Clarita Organization for

Planning the Environment

Castaic