Santa Clarita Valley Sanitation District officials are extending the comment period for a controversial deep well plan by three weeks, officials said Monday.
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The move was made in response to a community outcry from officials such as Assemblyman Scott Wilk, R-Santa Clarita, and county Supervisor Michael Antonovich, who sits on the SCV Sanitation District board.
More than a 100 turned out to complain about the plan at the second of two public hearings on the proposed project changes.
Wilk pointed to the community pushback and calls to his office about recent changes to the chloride project as an “epic failure” by those responsible for outreach.
A third public hearing on the environmental report for the well project was added to the outreach effort in response.
The meeting is set to take place March 9, at the Santa Clarita Activities Center, 20880 Centre Pointe Parkway. The hearing will begin at 7:00 p.m. with doors opening at 6:30 p.m.
The district, which has been tasked by the state with creating a chloride-removal project to lower the amount of chloride, or salt, sent downstream to Ventura County, released a report on a plan to drill wells and place excess brine in the wells.
Based on the recommendations of staff, the Sanitation District governing board approved deep-well injection, which cost $130 million, and is expected to gradually raise rates and connection fees.
The most recent concern is over the location of the wells, which were moved 800 feet north in response to a conservation easement on the original site.
Area homeowners and business owners joined a chorus of voices decrying the new site as practically on the 16th hole of the Valencia TPC golf course.
Santa Clarita City Councilwoman Laurene Weste wanted the extension to get information out there, but had concerns because “we’re very late in the process.”
The federal government, through the EPA, and the state, through the Regional Water Quality Control Board, have oversight on the project, Weste said, and the latter agency has threatened fines that could reach into the millions if the board fails to act on the chloride-compliance concerns.
She also was concerned about some of the information that’s being circulated with respect to the proposal, she said.
“It’s a lot to understand but basically to put it in simple terms, we’re taking the already clean water that goes into the (Santa Clara) River and refining the salt out of it, and that salty brine would go into a pipeline down 9,000 or 13,000 feet, so it can’t reach any of the water we drink,” she said, explaining the project and refuting claims there would be any “sewage” or any other illegal dumping.
In a statement by district officials, SCVSD staffers also addressed concerns the well project involved “fracking,” noting there is no fracking involved.
“The newly proposed site for injection of this non-hazardous salty water produced by the required advanced treatment is the only feasible location that can accommodate the project given the constraints of federal and state laws,” said Steve Highter, spokesman for the Sanitation District, in an email. “The deep well injection site was selected after geological and technical review.”
Sanitation District engineers plan to construct a test well by next year — assuming the project is approved and underway by then — which will enable them to better assess the long-term viability of such a project, according to Highter in a previous email.
“We’ve worked very strongly to meet the criteria for the river water and to make sure what’s going into the ground is safe,” Weste said.
The Sanitation District is able to approve, delay or deny projects but, ultimately, the ratepayers in the Sanitation District could face fines if there’s inaction, she said.
“It’s the homeowners who pay the fines,” Weste said, adding the district is trying to satisfy state and federal demands in the most cost effective way possible, “and we need to comply.”
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