January 7, 2004 - Top Stories
About two dozen families who were made homeless by the Paradise fire will eventually be settled at Rancho Corrido campground in Pauma Valley.
About a dozen are there already, according to the campground’s general manager, M “Glen” Crowder.
Heading up the effort of finding trailers and places to put the trailers for up to 30 fire survivors is Terry Van Koughnett, who has been working with a collaborative effort made up of Interfaith Community Services, VC Fire Relief, Migrant Education, FEMA and St. Francis Episcopal Church.
A few days before Christmas the first family, Joaquin and Juana Rizo, received the keys to their trailer.
Commenting on why his park was selected for the relocations, Crowder told The Roadrunner, “There’s only so many trailer parks and so many RV parks in the area. I think that one of their donors came down to our campground and inspected our campground and said ‘There’s else nothing like this around.”
Rancho Corrido’s 33 acre campground was recently remodeled. It includes a catch and release lake, walking paths, lots of trees.
“We’re sitting here with a brand new park with new septics and boxes and suddenly this need arises. We had to make a decision to change our marketing plan, because we are set up as a campground. But sometimes you have to choose people over profits,” said Crowder.
The Interfaith council provided the trailers and paid the first month’s rent. The relocated families will be given the trailers after nine months and will be responsible for their own rent in February.
On Friday Interfaith Community Services, a non-profit, non-sectarian social service agency headquartered in North County, held a Paradise Fire Collaboration Update Meeting at the VC Library.
Many hundreds of families in VC were made homeless by the fire. Many are from the Rincon and San Pasqual reservations, which were both particularly hard hit by the blaze.
The Collaboration Project goal is to provide 30 housing units (towable trailers or 5th wheels) for families affected by the fire, and to provide initial financial assistance for rent and utilities. There are actually 42 families on the list. They eventually hope to find funding for them also.
Over $300,000 has been earmarked for the effort with $200,000 coming from the San Diego Foundation and $100,000 from a private donor.
Sometime this year the water district will probably decide whether to stay at its current location and buy additional acres, or move to another, possibly more centrally located parcel.
At its November meeting the VC Municipal Water District board was presented with the results of a corporate facility master plan study done by Gillis and Associates.
The study came to two conclusions:
1. That to continue to provide service at its current location, the district needs to buy two additional acres, mainly for storage.
2. Developing facilities on a completely new site would cost less and provide more efficient operation than adding more property and building on the current site. This assumes that the resale value of the existing site is equal or worth more than the cost of the new site.
At Monday’s water board meeting Gen. Mgr. Gary Arant told the board that the results of the study leaves staff with some tasks that it needs to complete.
One is to acquire a consultant who could provide expertise in going about applying for a major use permit on an as yet undetermined piece of property.
There’s a shortage of suitable parcels zoned commercial or light industrial. That means the district would at some point have to ask for a zoning change.
Another is to complete an appraisal of adjacent properties to the current site.
Arant asked for and was granted a budget of $40,000, which would break down to be $4,500 for update of draft appraisal, $2,500 for land engineering, survey and mapping to finalize and update appraisal, $16,000 to appraise the existing property, $8,500 per site to appraise a new site, and $8,500 for land use issues.
The appraisal of the existing site is so expensive, said Arant, “because it’s a unique piece of property.”
A land use consultant would be able to look at two otherwise identical properties and estimate which would be easier to apply for the necessary changes.
Director Merle Aleshire said he had spoken to land use consultant Jim Chagala, who used to be a senior planner with the county Dept. of Planning and Land Use. He was told that the district would only need to apply for a major use permit and get an environmental impact report done.
Where the district might look for land is up in the air, however Arant noted that the exact center of the district’s operational area is on Lilac Road.
The request to go forward with the process was approved.
“I think we need to move ahead because if we need to get this two acres we should get it and not worry about it down the road,” Board President Gary Broomell asked.
Although it might take the better part of a decade to actually get to the point where the new facility is built, Arant said he wants the studies completed by June of this year.
“I think a prudent move, and I’ve seen a lot of water districts do this, is to purchase property, secure it and then worry about the building of the facility,” said Arant.
YEAR IN REVIEW
We continue our review of 2003, the year when so many disasters came together to challenge and temper the people of Valley Center.
But disasters were actually a very small part of the warp and weave and VC life. The normal activities of community affairs continued as before, although with the occasional bump in the road.
* * *
APRIL
The Polito family farm was the first farm in VC to complete the Mexfly protocol mandated by the California Dept. of Food and Agriculture, and therefore the first to ship their fruit since the quarantine was imposed.
At the same time another chicken ranch in VC was quarantined for Exotic Newcastle Disease.
Lori Heck, representing Calvary Chapel Valley Center was one of the first announced candidates for Honorary Mayor, announcing, “I felt it was time to interject a little religion into politics!”
* * *
Public service was Richard Godwin’s passion. That and flying airplanes.
The community said goodbye to Godwin, who died at the age of 72. He was a VC resident for 50 years and well-known for his strong voice in community affairs.
* * *
A pursuit on a Saturday night of an armed robber from the parking lot of Pechanga Casino in Temecula ended at the entrance to Harrah’s with one man wounded, two dead, including a security guard shot in the head, and the robber, who committed suicide.
* * *
The County authorized a preliminary engineering study of widening Valley Center Road from Cole Grade down to the San Luis Rey River Bridge, a quarter mile before Harrah’s Rincon Casino and Resort.
* * *
Chuck Matteson, the beloved superintendent of the VC cemetery, a man who could look at just about every tombstone in the VC Cemetery and tell you a story behind it, died at the age of 57, just shortly after retiring for health reasons.
* * *
The Board of Supervisors held the first of what promised to be several hearings on General Plan 2020. The VC planning group had been spending many months hammering out its responses to the first county maps showing proposed density and land use changes.
* * *
Tom Williams became the next candidate for Honorary Mayor, albeit a reluctant one.
“I was drafted without my knowledge,” said Williams.
He missed a meeting of the Kiwanis Club and the next thing that he knew he was the club’s candidate for Honorary Mayor.
MAY
Robert Freeman, a renowned artist based on the Rincon Reservation, was announced as Grand marshall of the 2003 Western Days Parade.
* * *
Mark Vierow was named VC Firefighter of the Year for 2003.
* * *
Exotic Newcastle Disease might be on the wane, officials with the state and federal task force that is working to eradicate the deadly poultry plague, reported in middle of May. They made the statement after the first infected chicken ranch in the area received a clean bill of health.
* * *
The VC Planning Group at its May meeting voted to endorse keeping a road open between Valley Center and Hidden Meadows.
* * *
Valley Center celebrated yet another successful Western Days festival, complete with parade, food, music and dancing at the community center
* * *
JUNE
Developers of a proposed shopping center next to the post office asked the water district to approve the use of a waste disposal system, new to this county, with elements of a sewer and a septic system.
Supporters of the Village Square at Valley Center turned out to a water board meeting to give moral support to the idea of the water district eventually owning and operating what is called a “subsurface wastewater treatment system.”
* * *
The Valley Center History Museum, whose proudest possession is a 100-year old mounted California Grizzly Bear, opened its doors to the public.
* * *
Officials began releasing sterile Mexican fruit flies to combat the infestation first noted here least winter.
Efforts to eradicate a Mexican fruit fly infestation in Valley Center had progressed successfully to date, allowing officials to cease aerial treatments of the approved organic pesticide Naturalyte and begin releasing sterile Mexican fruit flies.
* * *
Retiring Sheriff’s Lt. Maury Freitas passed the command for the VC substation to Lt. Dave Herbert.
* * *
A study by the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture showing that Hass avocados don’t appear to serve as hosts for the Mexican fruit fly allowed 40 growers in the quarantine’s core to pick and market their crops.
To be continued . . .
After nearly two decades as one of the Valley’s premier fund-raisers and community get-togethers, the annual Just Say No dinner dance won’t be held this year.
Mel Schuler, a past-chairman of the event, who serves on the executive board, told The Roadrunner, “I think we’ll continue to look at the program, but this particular year with the fires and all of the fund raisers going on in the community and the needs of the community, we thought we should give it a rest. There is funding for the program and that doesn’t mean we won’t need future funding.”
The Just Say No dinner dance, which was limited to 200 tickets, with the possibility of winning a $5000 prize, was always one of the most exciting events of the year, with VC’s movers and shakers putting on their best finery and gathering at locations such as the U.S. Grant Hotel and the Center for the Arts, Escondido. It has been organized each year by a different service club.
By DAVID ROSS
Will Cougar Pass, which has connected Valley Center and Hidden Meadows for decades, stay closed forever?
A water district board vote on Monday makes that scenario look more likely.
The VC Municipal Water district board Monday authorized staff to begin negotiations with John Braman, owner of property on Cougar Pass where the district has road easements.
Braman last March put up locked gates on the longtime road easement used officially by the water district, and unofficially by hundreds of residents for many years. Recently he proposed that the water district quitclaim its specific road easement and the blanket road easement granted it in the 1970s.
In exchange, Braman would grant the district a road easement in an alignment acceptable to the district and equivalent rights over a new private road that he plans to build.
Braman told the district that he plans to install remotely operated gates so the road can continue to be operated by water district employees and others that he grants access to.
The proposal was brought to the board from Braman via director Merle Aleshire, who represents the area near Cougar Pass.
“Mr. Braman’s objective is to get a reasonably unemcumbered piece of property that he might be able to have some building on,” said Aleshire. “He and some of his neighbors support to paving it but keeping it locked except for those who have paid for the road.”
Such an arrangement would get the district out from under a large political hot potato that has smoldered for years.
What the district has now is an easement that it can reconvey to others, making VCMWD subject to continuing pressure for and against conveying those rights. Many immediate neighbors of Cougar Pass, which is at the end of Betsworth, oppose keeping it open because of increased traffic and dust.
However, dozens of parents in Hidden Meadows used the road to take their children to Valley Center schools.
A similar effort to close the road, called by many “the bunny trail,” in 1999 failed, partially because the water district took such a strong position against it.
However, district counsel later advised that the district didn’t have a strong case to keep the easement open. It could maintain its easement rights, but had no way to force Braman not to install gates.
The district was later one of several parties, including Braman and the San Diego County Water Authority, unsuccessfully sued by the Open Cougar Pass Coalition to reopen the pass. The Authority closed its own section of the easement to the public in 2002 to prevent the public from dumping trash on the road.
If the district’s accepts Braman’s offer, it would have no effect on an irrevocable offer of dedication of a road easement made by a previous owner of Braman’s property to the County of San Diego.
However, it would clear up one of the easements that Aleshire said is making it harder for Braman to build.
“The end result will be for Braman to get a buildable piece of property without a multitude of easements,” he said.
The County has looked at building a link between the two communities, but so far has done nothing beyond that.
During the Paradise fire the vulnerability of Hidden Meadows to being isolated by natural disaster was highlighted, and, in fact, for several days during that fire Cougar Pass was opened by the authorities.
The water district continues to use the road a couple of times a months to inspect pipelines that traverse the area.
Brandon Cesmat, a spokesman for the Open Cougar Pass Coalition, told The Roadrunner Tuesday, “I’d like to say how helpful that road was to everyone during the fire when they shut down three of the grades to Valley Center during the fire. I’m hoping the water district would not do something that would compromise public safety. Should there be another disaster I imagine the fire department, the water district and the deputies wold make use of it again. It would be too bad if it were not available to us.”
Last year the VC Planning Group voted to ask the County to do what it could to keep Cougar Pass open.
Planning Chairman Larry Glavinic told The Roadrunner, “My thoughts revolve around public safety. And having a bunch of dead end roads really doesn’t make sense. Nobody wants a road through their place but you need some.”
He added, “The real issue is we need another east west road. When is the County going to get off its posterior and do it? That’s what really needs to happen. There’s better solutions to that road.”
The Valley Roadrunner
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Tel. 760.749.1112 Fax 760.749.1688
Website: www.valleycenter.com
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