Find out more about the Liberty Quarry
www.sos-hills.org
Liberty
Quarry appeal goes to Board of Supervisors Monday, Jan. 30,
Monday, Feb. 6 at Riverside Convention Center
Liberty
Quarry Final Hearing – Riverside
County Supervisors
ACTION
ALERT!!
Liberty
quarry FINAL
HEARING
RIVERSIDE
COUNTY SUPERVISORS
Monday,
January 30th and Monday, February 6th
9:00
am to 6:00 pm
RIVERSIDE
CONVENTION CENTER
3443
ORANGE ST RIVERSIDE
(directions
below)
WE NEED YOU THERE
!
PEOPLE
WILL MAKE THE DIFFERENCE
RESERVE
A FREE SEAT ON THE BUS
CALL
SUZANNE @ 760-390-5085
RAINBOW/FALLBROOK
CALL
CAROL @ 951-587-0476
TEMECULA
DIRECTIONS TO CONVENTION CENTER:
"Take
I-215 north to Martin Luther King Blvd. Turn left
(west) and go about 3 miles. (Martin Luther
King becomes
14th St.) Turn right onto Market. Go
about 6 blocks and
turn right onto 5th St. Go 2 blocks to Orange
where the
huge Convention Center garage is
located."
IF YOU WANT TO SPEAK OR GIVE
YOUR TIME:
People
who wish to speak at the meetings will be required to fill out a
form
before they address the Board of Supervisors. A copy of that
form will be
available a week before the meetings at the County Clerk
of the Board website;
http://www.rivcocob.com
<http://www.rivcocob.com>
. The form may be downloaded, filled out in advance
and presented to the Clerk's staff before the meeting begins, or
once it is in
progress. The form also will be available at the meetings but
those who wish
to comment are encouraged to download the form and fill it out
ahead of time.
Forms may NOT be mailed in to the county.
Each individual will have three minutes to address the Board of
Supervisors.
Up to two people may give their time to another individual to
extend the recipient's
total minutes to nine. Those who give up their time must be
present at the meeting
when the person receiving their time is called to speak.
Any questions, call Kathleen
951-676-6912
Jerri
760-451-2413 or jaarganda13@msn.com
Riverside
County has scheduled two dates for an appeal before the Board of
Supervisors on the proposed Liberty Quarry mining project near
Temecula.
Granite
Construction filed an appeal in late December after the
Riverside County Planning Commission finalized its denial of the
company’s proposed aggregate quarry on Dec. 7. Because a
large crowd is expected for the appeal hearings, the Riverside
Convention Center at 3443 Orange Street in downtown Riverside
has been reserved for meetings on Jan. 30 and Feb. 6. The
meetings are scheduled to begin at 9 a.m. and end at 6 p.m.
To
make the meetings available to as many people as possible, they
will be streamed live on the Internet via links that will be
available on the County’s home page, www.countyofriverside.us ,
and the County Planning Department web page, http://www.tlma.co.riverside.ca.us/planning .
People
who wish to speak at the meetings will be required to fill out a
form before they address the Board of Supervisors. A copy
of that form will be available a week before the meetings at the
County Clerk of the Board website, http://www.rivcocob.com . The form may be downloaded, filled
out in advance and presented to the Clerk’s staff before the
meeting begins, or once it is in progress. The form also
will be available at the meetings but those who wish to comment
are encouraged to download the form and fill it out ahead of
time. Forms may NOT be mailed in to the county.
As
authorized by provisions of the Brown Act and Board of
Supervisors Policy A2, people who attend and wish to comment
will be limited to one appearance only during the course of the
meetings.
Each
individual will have three minutes to address the Board of
Supervisors. Up to two people may give their time to
another individual to extend the recipient’s total minutes to
nine. Those who give up their time must be present at the
meeting when the person receiving their time is called to speak.
No one may give their time to more than one person.
The
Board is expected to break for lunch around noon during each
meeting.
Signs
or placards that might obstruct another person’s view will not
be allowed inside the meeting room, nor will signs attached to
sticks, poles or similar devices. Backpacks, other large
bags or large purses also will be prohibited. People who plan to
attend are urged to carpool in order to minimize the effects on
traffic in the downtown area and help ensure the available
parking will be adequate.
If
more than the scheduled meetings are required, the Clerk of the
Board will determine any future date, time and location.
Contact:
Raymond
Smith (951)
955-1130
Matt
Straite (951)
955-6892
Sacredness
of Temecula-area quarry site adds to fight
10:00
PM PDT on Saturday, August 13, 2011
By
JEFF HORSEMAN
Staff Writer jhorseman@pe.com
Imagine
having the Garden of Eden in your backyard and watching it
disappear, one explosive blast at a time.
Leaders
of the Pechanga Band of Luiseño Indians say something similar
will happen if a proposed Temecula-area quarry is approved in
the area where they believe the world began.
"The
origin of the Luiseño people is the single most important
account in our culture," Tribal Chairman Mark Macarro said.
"Our present-day practices, beliefs and social structure
are directly related to our creation."
The
tribe has gone before the Riverside
County Planning Commission to fight Liberty Quarry, a proposed
open-pit mine just over Interstate 15 from their reservation.
Known for its casino, the tribe is backing legislation in Sacramento
that would block the project by banning aggregate mining near
American Indian reservations and sacred sites.
Not
only would the quarry desecrate hallowed land for the
1,500-member tribe, its operations would be "blowing it
up," said Paul Macarro, the tribe's cultural coordinator
and Mark Macarro's brother.
Quarry
developer Granite Construction contends that, for years, the
tribe never said the quarry site was sacred. Company executives
say the tribe's stance is inconsistent because it had no qualms
about building a casino on its reservation, nor did it object in
2009 to zoning that could have put 81 homes on the quarry site.
"In
our over 89 years of continuous operation in
California
, we have a strong history of working hand-in-hand with local
tribes," Granite's Gary
Johnson said in a news release. "So this
latest development is appalling to us."
Part
of an 8,500-page environmental study paid for by Granite and
vetted by Riverside
County
planners in 2009 concluded the quarry would not harm
"tribal archaeological resources" at the site. The
tribe disagrees with the study and said county planners ignored
their concerns.
Granite
wants to build a quarry on at least 135 acres of a 414-acre site
sandwiched between Temecula and San
Diego
County
. At its deepest point, the quarry would extend 1,020 feet into
the ground. The Empire
State Building is 1,250 feet tall.
For
75 years, Granite would use explosives to blast away a projected
270 million tons of aggregate, tiny rocks used as building
materials. Asphalt and concrete also would be made at the site.
Most of the aggregate would be carried by truck into San
Diego
County
.
Supporters
say the quarry would support high-paying jobs, generate hundreds
of millions of dollars in taxes and fees and solve an aggregate
shortage that threatens to derail economic recovery efforts.
Granite also said the quarry would be unnoticed from the outside
and improve air quality because diesel-spewing trucks wouldn't
have to travel as far for aggregate.
Critics
say the quarry would worsen truck traffic; cause air, noise and
light pollution; spoil a neighboring wilderness preserve; sever
a crucial wildlife corridor and hurt tourism.
Unless
the anti-quarry bill passes -- a vote could come before Sept. 9
-- the Riverside County Board of Supervisors will decide whether
the quarry is approved. The Planning Commission's fifth hearing
on the project is at 9 a.m. Monday at
Rancho
Community
Church
,
30300 Rancho Community Way
, Temecula. The panel eventually will vote on a series of
findings before supervisors take up the issue.
CREATION
STORY
The
tribe's history in the area pre-dates by far the city and
surrounding area.
Archaeological
records show the tribe, one of six bands of Luiseño Indians,
has been in the
Temecula
Valley
for at least 10,000 years. The word Luiseño is derived from
Mission San Luis Rey de Francia, founded by Spanish missionaries
in 1798. The mission established supporting ranchos in the
region that used Indians as forced labor.
In
1875, a posse led by the
San Diego
County
sheriff evicted the tribe from its village in what is now
Temecula. Seven years later, President Chester A. Arthur
established the Pechanga Indian Reservation, which today
occupies roughly 6,800 acres just south of the city.
The
tribe's customs and beliefs are deeply personal and until the
quarry proposal, the tribe did not discuss its creation story in
public, tribal officials said. The tribe fears its heritage
could be distorted.
In
the tribe's creation story, the world was born from the sky
father and earth
mother at "éxva Teméku" (Eck-vah tem-MEH-koo). This
place, analogous to the Garden of Eden in the Bible, is roughly
where two creeks combine to form the Santa Margarita River,
which flows near the quarry site.
The
first people, known as "Káamalam" (KAH-mah-lum),
lived in "Káamalam Pomkí" (poam-KEY), which is in
the hills above Temecula and includes the quarry site. Among the
Káamalam was "Wuyóot" (We-YOUT).
Wuyóot
was gifted with special knowledge and learned to make the first
food to feed the Káamalam. But he was poisoned and died,
marking the first time death ever visited the new world. The
rocks cried in mourning.
Wuyóot
was cremated at Káamalam Pomkí. Many tribal burial
customs, including songs and the burning of clothes, arose from
this funeral, Mark Macarro said.
After
Wuyóot's death, the Káamalam gathered in a Grand Council at Káamalam
Pomkí. It was decided then that some Káamalam would become
stars, rocks and other parts of the natural world. After that,
the first people dispersed from Temecula to all points of
creation.
'ON
THE FRONT END'
Tribal
officials say they are battling the Liberty Quarry for an
important reason.
They've
already lost too much sacred land to development, including the
exact spot where Wuyóot was poisoned -- now home to the
Granite-run Rosemary's Mountain Quarry in the
San Diego
County
community of Fallbrook.
"We're
in a position where we got involved in this project on the front
end, rather than decades behind," Mark Macarro said.
The
permitting process for Rosemary's began 20 years ago and the
tribe at the time "was not equipped as a tribe" to
object, he said.
While
the tribe struggled to get by for generations, that began to
change with its first casino in 1995 and the modern
casino/resort's opening in 2002. Members now receive annual
payments, health insurance and other benefits.
The
tribe also enjoys considerable political sway. In 2010 alone,
the tribe contributed more than $875,000 to state and local
political causes and candidates, state records show.
As
to why the tribe had never before sought protection for what
became the Liberty Quarry site, Mark Macarro pointed out that it
lies outside the reservation boundaries imposed on the tribe in
1882.
Land
far beyond the Temecula area once belonged to his people, Mark
Macarro said. So many acres were taken from the tribe that it
would be impossible to reclaim and protect them all, he said.
Also, tribal officials added, they didn't move to preserve the
sacred spot because no one ever envisioned a project like the
quarry would be proposed there.
FIRST
OBJECTIONS
When
Granite pitched the quarry project in 2005, company officials
met with the tribe, said Johnson
, then Granite's
Southern California
resource manager. The tribe never mentioned the site was sacred
until 2009, Johnson said.
Mark
Macarro called the meeting an informal
"meet-and-greet" session with the tribe at the behest
of local lawmakers. Under state law,
Riverside
County
, not Granite, is the proper authority with which to share
sensitive cultural information, he said.
Tribal
officials said they informed county officials and others about
the site's importance and sacredness as early as August 2005 and
again throughout the years. The environmental study, which found
the quarry wouldn't harm cultural resources, ignores the tribe's
concerns, they say.
County
officials, in written responses to a letter from a lawyer
representing the tribe, maintained the tribe was repeatedly
consulted as the study was written and that quarry site surveys
were done with tribal monitors present.
If
the quarry is approved, Granite must have tribal and
archeological monitors present during any grading or excavating,
according to proposed conditions of the project. Other
conditions include "cultural resource sensitivity"
training for quarry employees prior to the project's
construction and operation.
Granite
also contends that when Temecula tried to annex the quarry site
in 2009, it proposed zoning that would have allowed up to 81
homes there. The tribe supported the annexation, Granite
spokeswoman Karie Reuther said.
Tribal
public affairs representative Jacob Mejia said the site's
existing zoning already permits housing. There was never a plan
to build homes and there likely never will be due to the site's
remote, hilltop location, tribal officials said.
'VERY
EMOTIONAL'
Reuther
and Johnson also question why the tribe would find it acceptable
to build a 200,000-square-foot casino, 522-room hotel and
18-hole golf course on its land but oppose the quarry.
Paul
Macarro said the tribe's development was planned to respect
sacred or significant landmarks. There's a difference, tribal
officials say, between culturally important sites and sacred
land such as the proposed quarry site.
Mark
Macarro said the tribe is not anti-development or even
anti-mine.
"We
are pro-balanced development," he said, calling the quarry
the wrong project in the wrong location.
Tribal
leaders said it's their duty to protect their culture now that
they have the organization and resources to do so.
"This
is on our watch that we may lose this most cornerstone aspect of
our culture," Paul Macarro said. "It's very
emotional."
Sacred
Sites: Help the Pechanga Pray for Ancestral Landscape
Riverside
County
supervisors: Donations won't impact quarry vote
11:03
PM PDT on Saturday, June 18, 2011
By
JEFF HORSEMAN
The Press-Enterprise
Since
2001, the company proposing a quarry near Temecula has donated
more than $59,000 to political candidates in
Riverside
County
-- including at least $38,000 to county supervisors who will
decide if the project gets built.
Campaign
finance records show that Granite Construction gave to all five
supervisors and local lawmakers, including state assemblymen and
city council members outside Temecula. One donation went to a
Moreno
Valley
councilwoman who serves as Supervisor Marion Ashley's chief of
staff.
As
plans for Liberty Quarry get closer to consideration by the
supervisors -- a vote on the 6-year-old proposal could come by
year's end -- Granite has directed a greater share of its
contributions to county politicians. Granite didn't give to
anyone in the county in 2000, but by 2010, one of every four
Granite campaign dollars was donated locally.
Supervisors
said Granite's donations would not influence their vote on the
quarry being sought for a 414-acre site between Temecula and
San Diego
County
. Some said they also take donations from quarry opponents. For
example, Ashley said those opposed to the quarry gave him nearly
quadruple what he's received from Granite.
"Regardless
of how I vote on this project, some of my supporters will not be
happy, but that goes with the job," Ashley wrote in an
email.
In
an emailed statement, Granite spokeswoman Karie Reuther wrote
that, "One of Granite's core values is citizenship, and
that includes being engaged members of the communities where we
live and work."
She
noted that besides the quarry, Granite is working on 15
construction projects in the county. Granite also runs a quarry
in
Indio
.
Bob
Stern, president of the Los Angeles-based, nonpartisan Center
for Governmental Studies, said Granite's actions are typical for
a large corporation.
"It's
building goodwill," Stern said. "Certainly the
supervisors will return their phone calls, and the supervisors
will be very polite to them."
A
multibillion-dollar corporation based in
Central California
, Granite needs the county's permission to build the open-pit
quarry. Plans call for using explosives to blast away 270
million tons of aggregate, a common building material, over a
75-year period. The quarry also would contain facilities to make
concrete and asphalt.
Granite
and its supporters, including business groups and trade unions,
say the quarry would provide an economic boost, support hundreds
of jobs and generate millions of tax dollars. They contend it
would reduce truck trips in the county and improve air quality
because diesel trucks wouldn't have to drive as far to get
aggregate.
Opponents,
including the city of
Temecula
and a grassroots citizens' network, argue that the quarry would
boost truck traffic in their communities while harming the
public health by sending microscopic silicate dust particles
into the air.
They
say the quarry would hurt local tourism, spoil a neighboring
ecological reserve and desecrate a sacred site for the Pechanga
Band of Luiseño Indians.
MERIT,
NOT MONEY
Since
2001, Granite has donated at least $38,316 to supervisors
Ashley, John Benoit, Bob Buster, John Tavaglione and Jeff Stone,
according to the
California
secretary of state's online campaign finance records. The money
includes contributions to Benoit's state assembly campaign fund
and Stone's unsuccessful state Senate run.
Supervisors
stressed that Granite's dollars won't influence their votes.
Buster, whose district includes the quarry site, said he
objected to a plan in the 1990s that would have restricted
non-toll lanes on Highway 91. Granite stood to benefit from that
plan, he said.
While
he declined to say how he'd vote on the quarry, Buster in 2009
called the quarry the "introduction of a huge new use in
one of the most fragile areas we've got."
At
the time, Buster served on a boundary-setting panel that denied
Temecula's attempt to annex the quarry site. Buster and
Tavaglione voted in favor of the city's proposal.
Benoit,
who came to the board in 2009 after his time in
Sacramento
, received $11,406 in Granite money from 2001 to 2010, according
to records. Benoit's supervisorial district includes Granite's
Indio
quarry.
"Part
of the reason they gave to me is they knew me as a responsible
member of the community," Benoit said. "It has nothing
to do with the quarry."
Granite
also contributed $200 to the campaign of Benoit's son, Ben, who
won a seat last November on the Wildomar City Council.
Altogether,
the donations represent a tiny fraction of what supervisors
raise annually. Ashley, for example, raised a little more than
$155,000 in 2010 alone, according to his campaign statement
filed with the county clerk.
In
his email, Ashley wrote that, as always, his vote would be based
on the project's merits and residents' best interests.
"Sometimes that means I vote with supporters and sometimes
that means I vote against them," he wrote.
Ashley
wrote he has taken in $51,000 from anti-quarry interests,
including the Pechanga tribe and The Rancon Group, a
Murrieta-based collection of development-related companies whose
founder, Dan Stephenson, opposes the quarry.
Verne
Lauritzen, Stone's chief of staff, said Stone wants to hear what
people have to say during public hearings on the quarry. Stone's
district includes Temecula.
Tavaglione
did not respond to a request for comment.
Temecula
City Councilman Jeff Comerchero, who is on the council's Liberty
Quarry subcommittee, said the donations to supervisors don't
surprise him.
CITY
TO CITY
Since
2000, Granite has donated more than $3 million to candidates and
ballot measures throughout
California
. Recipients include former governors Gray Davis and Arnold
Schwarzenegger and current Gov. Jerry Brown.
None
of Granite's dollars were contributed in
Riverside
County
in 2000. But in 2009 and 2010, more than $27,000 -- 23.85
percent of Granite's total
California
donations -- were donated in the county.
In
her email, Reuther of Granite wrote her company's presence in
the county has grown in the past 20 years.
Today,
Granite employs more than 250 people in the county, she wrote,
adding that besides political donations, Granite has donated
roughly $425,000 to local groups such as the Boy Scouts and
Habitat for Humanity.
Granite
also has given thousands to city council members with no
jurisdiction over the quarry. These include Lake Elsinore
council members Melissa Melendez ($500) and Bob Magee ($1,000);
Menifee Councilman John Denver ($250); Wildomar Mayor Marsha
Swanson ($200); Corona Councilmen Eugene Montanez ($198) and
Steve Nolan ($500) and Riverside Mayor Ron Loveridge ($125).
Other
local recipients are Assemblymen Kevin Jeffries, R-Lake
Elsinore, ($2,000) and Jeff Miller, R-Corona, ($1,000).
No
donations went to Temecula council members.
MORENO
MONEY
A
$250 donation went to Moreno Valley Councilwoman Robin Hastings,
who is Ashley's chief of staff. In May,
Moreno
Valley
joined councils in Eastvale, Banning and
Beaumont
in passing a pro-quarry resolution.
Hastings
was quoted in a Granite news release praising the project.
Hastings
did not make or second the resolution, which passed unanimously,
according to the
Moreno
Valley
city clerk's office. In an email,
Hastings
wrote that she assumed the contribution was "because they
support me in my position as an elected official."
Hastings
added she hasn't spoken to Ashley about the quarry.
Comerchero,
the Temecula councilman, said he's confident the county board
won't be swayed by Granite's money.
"(The
supervisors) are capable of taking campaign contributions and
looking objectively at any project," he said.
Reach
Jeff Horseman at 951-375-3727 or jhorseman@PE.com
HUNNEMAN:
A proud day for Temecula
By
JOHN HUNNEMAN
North
County
Times | Posted: Thursday, June 23, 2011 5:00 pm
At
a meeting Wednesday, I had to resist the urge to jump on my
chair and exult at the top of my lungs: "Ich
bin ein Temeculan."
For
hour after hour that day, experts hired by the city of Temecula
---- along with others from San Diego State University and the
Pechanga tribe ---- took turns blasting holes in the 6,800-page
environmental impact report prepared by Granite Construction,
which wants to dig a giant quarry just south of the city.
This
was the third, and probably next-to-last, meeting of the
Riverside County Planning Commission on the proposed Liberty
Quarry. The meetings, held at
Rancho
Community
Church
in Temecula, have drawn large crowds, with most attendees
opposed to the project.
On
Wednesday, an audience of around 500 heard experts use words and
phrases such as deception, misrepresentation, manipulating,
insulting, purposely dishonest, patently untrue, illogical and
intellectual garbage to describe many of the findings in the
report, which was paid for by Granite and signed off on by the
county's planning staff.
"Facts,"
President John Adams once said, "are stubborn things."
So
stubborn, in fact, that several experts testified that when
facts were presented to the report's preparers that didn't
support Granite's desired conclusions, they simply left them
out.
"A
textbook case for how not to do (an environmental impact
report)," said attorney Courtney Coyle, who represented the
Pechanga tribe.
The
speakers ---- economists, traffic engineers, air-quality
experts, geologists ---- all had impeccable credentials.
Each
received a rousing ovation after speaking, which I'm guessing
doesn't happen much in the world of geology and economics.
Many
shook their heads at the flawed science Granite used to try to
convince the commission that blowing a large hole in an
environmentally sensitive area ---- land sacred to the Pechanga
and located next to a world-class environmental research center
---- that would spew dust and other pollutants into the 40-mph
winds that blow each afternoon from the Pacific, making
Temecula's Wine Country possible, and into the lungs of several
hundred thousand people for as long as 75 years ---- was a dandy
idea.
Six
years ago, I predicted Granite would not build Liberty Quarry in
San Diego County ---- where, by their own admission, 70 percent
of the mine's aggregate would be needed ---- because the people
and politicians there would not allow it.
"So
let's creep just over the line into
Riverside
County
, (Granite) must figure, where the bumpkins and the meth users
won't mind," I wrote in August 2005.
That's
exactly what Granite has tried to do.
On
Wednesday, thanks to the city of
Temecula
, SDSU and the Pechanga, Granite was shown that truth trumps all
the propaganda and publicity money can buy.
Contact
columnist John Hunneman at
j
hunneman@californian.com
.
TEMECULA:
Opponents criticize quarry's environmental report
By
AARON CLAVERIE aclaverie@californian.com North
County Times | Posted: Wednesday, June 22, 2011 12:24 pm
Temecula
City Manager Shawn Nelson makes a passionate speech Wednesday
against the proposed Liberty Quarry during a Riverside County
Planning Commission hearing at
Rancho
Community
Church
in Temecula. JAMIE SCOTT LYTLE | jlytle@californian.com
Technical
experts employed by the city of
Temecula
, scientists with
San Diego
State
University
and Pechanga tribal officials criticized
Riverside
County
's environmental review of Granite Construction's Liberty
Quarry project during a hearing conducted Wednesday by the
county
Planning
Commission.
San
Diego
State
University
runs a research field station west of the quarry site in the
Santa Margarita Ecological Reserve; the city borders the
quarry site to the north and the Pechanga Band of Luiseno
Indians reservation sits to the east.
The
hearing, held at
Rancho
Community
Church
in Temecula, was the third in a series of hearings being
conducted on the project. If needed, a fourth meeting, which
will allow Granite to provide a rebuttal and its own expert
testimony, will be held June 29.
The
audience for Wednesday's hearing appeared to number 500 to 600
people, many of whom were wearing orange T-shirts or hats
denoting opposition to the quarry. After a dinner break, the
commission took more comments from Pechanga representatives
and members of the public who had signed up to speak.
As
of 10:30 p.m., the commission still had about 30 requests to
speak remaining.
According
to the representatives of the three potential neighbors of the
proposed project, the county did not meet the state's legal
requirements for review of the quarry. In some cases, the
speakers said, the engineers who put together the studies that
were used in the review omitted information about Pechanga
sacred sites and the migratory paths of animals, manipulated
air quality data to help meet state and federal standards, and
failed to use industry standards during the assembly of other
types of data.
"A
textbook case for how not to do an EIR (environmental impact
report)," said Courtney Coyle, an attorney representing
the Pechanga tribe.
County
planning officials defended their work and the report
repeatedly Wednesday, saying it was completed in accordance
with all rules and regulations.
Granite,
a Northern California-based company, has proposed operating
the mine within a 400-acre property that sits between the
San Diego
County
line and Temecula's southern border. At full capacity, the
135-acre quarry is expected to generate 5 million tons of
aggregate rock per year at the site.
According
to Granite's projections, about 70 percent of the aggregate
generated at Liberty Quarry would be headed south to
San Diego
County
.
That
projection has been used by the Riverside County Planning
Department to state that the project is "environmentally
superior" to not digging a mine, in part, because trucks
that had been streaming through Southwest Riverside County
from quarries in Corona and other points north of Temecula
will be removed from the region's roads, improving regional
air quality.
Opponents
speak
Other
tribal representatives said the county ignored the
significance of their sacred sites, which includes the
potential quarry site, as a "historical resource."
Responding
to a question posed by Commissioner John Petty, county
archaeologist Leslie Mouriquand said there were no tangible
artifacts found on the site, which is part of the Pechanga
creation story.
Noting
that there are maps, field notes and recorded oral histories
that back up the importance of the land to the Pechanga, Petty
asked, "Are we that linear that we have to go find
something on the site?" The crowd, which included
numerous tribe members, applauded him vigorously.
Tribal
officials are scheduled to meet Thursday with county officials
in
Riverside
to continue discussing this issue.
During
SDSU's presentation, Matt Rahn, director of the reserve's
field station program, underscored the uniqueness and
importance of the reserve and how it can't be reproduced or
replaced.
"The
quarry is incompatible with the existing sensitive uses in the
station," he said.
Answering
questions from the commissioners on exactly how the quarry
might affect the station's science and the environment inside
the reserve, Rahn said there's no way to know without actually
digging a quarry to study those effects.
Half-jokingly,
he said that if the quarry were approved, the station might be
used for just that purpose.
Researchers'
concerns
Kelcey
Stricker and John Graham, researchers at the reserve, later
explained how the quarry's noise, light and proposed location
would affect their work, which involves tracking the migration
of mountain lions and other animals and studying the behavior
and specific vocal signatures of birds.
In
response to a question from Commissioner James Porras about
whether animals that live near the quarry site would adapt to
live with the project, Stricker said some species, especially
mountain lions, will leave the area instead of adapting or
learning to live with the noise and light.
The
firsthand experiences of Stricker and Graham prompted numerous
questions from Petty, who wanted to know how the mine would
affect the animals' behavior.
Petty
asked, "Have the impacts been adequately addressed?"
Stricker's
reply was succinct: "Uh, no."
Temecula's
roster of speakers included an economist, a geologist, an air
quality expert, a traffic engineer, City Manager Shawn Nelson
and attorneys who said the county's environmental report falls
short of the state's legal requirements for environmental
review, which mandate that any findings in a review need to be
backed up by facts.
"There
are substantial gaps in the most elementary analysis of the
evidence," said Peter Thorson, Temecula's city attorney.
On
the claim of reduced truck traffic, which is one of the main
benefits of the project that supporters cite, traffic engineer
Chris Gray of Fehr & Peers of
Walnut Creek
said the traffic counts conducted by Granite and Urban
Crossroads did not adequately explain where the trucks were
coming from and where they were going. He added that the
numbers, and the extrapolation that shows a reduction in 16
million truck miles, were based on assumptions made in 2005
that do not match up with more recent counts taken in 2009.
Traffic
concerns
According
to Granite and Urban Crossroads, 1,200 trucks were projected
to be rolling through the Temecula area each day on Interstate
15 in the mid-2000s, a figure that was arrived at by making an
estimate based on counts taken in 2004 and 2005.
Gray
said a count taken in 2009 shows only 449 trucks per day, and
he said that the data included in the environmental report
should not be relied upon or cited.
"Instead
of collecting new data along the way, they simply relied on
assumptions," Gray said. "If this issue was so
important, why was it not studied in detail? Why didn't the
study compare the Liberty Quarry site against other sites in
San Diego
County
? Instead, they just adjusted the count upward when new counts
could have been taken."
Heidi
Rous, an air quality expert, followed Gray. She called the
idea that the project would be "environmentally
superior" to not digging a quarry "patently
untrue."
"It
is illogical," she said.
Earlier
in her presentation, she said the engineer who put together
the studies that show pollution levels wouldn't exceed state
and federal levels manipulated the data. She said the engineer
used information to measure the background air pollution from
a monitoring station that routinely registers better air
quality than that shown by neighboring stations.
Economic
concerns
During
other parts of the morning session, an economist countered a
study that was prepared for Granite by showing that the costs
to the area ---- lower property values and a decline in
tourism ---- would far outweigh, by millions of dollars, the
benefits: payment of fees and royalties, sales tax, jobs
created, etc.
The
geologist, Kerry Cato, said there is no shortage of aggregate
rock in
Riverside
County
, and that it would be more efficient to consider sites closer
to the targeted market area, since most of the aggregate is
expected to be shipped to
San Diego
County
.
Cato
also criticized the way
Riverside
County
reviewed how the project could affect the area's groundwater.
As summarized by Commissioner Petty, "They're saying it's
a rock bowl that's not going to leak. You're saying there is
all sorts of potential for leaking."
Cato
agreed and said additional studies were needed to determine
how the project could affect the area's water supply. He said
there should be some discussion about the possibility of a
quarry lake sitting just west of the freeway.
Kicking
off Temecula's presentation, City Manager Nelson provided a
preview of the city's bullet points, a collection of criticism
that, he said, points to a fundamental flaw in how the project
has been pitched by Granite.
"What
they have done can be defined in one word: deception," he
said.
Roth
said Granite is tentatively slated to be allowed to present
rebuttal testimony at the next hearing, which will be held, if
needed, on June 29.
City
Attorney Thorson said Granite might claim that Temecula's
criticism amounts to "nit-picking," and that a
disagreement among experts is not a reason to invalidate the
environmental impact report.
"Not
true," he said. "These impacts are not
theoretical."
Call
staff writer Aaron Claverie at 951-676-4315, ext. 2624
TEMECULA:
County leaders get quarry hearing moved to Temecula
Riverside
Convention Center was announced as the site earlier this week
The venue for
the highly anticipated hearing on Granite Construction's Liberty Quarry
project is moving south.
Riverside
County Supervisor Jeff Stone said Friday that the meeting will be
conducted at Rancho Community Church on Temecula Parkway.
"My
feeling is we need to always make it as convenient as possible for our
constituents," Stone said during a telephone interview.
Earlier in the
week, the county's Planning Department announced that the hearing would
be conducted April 27 and, in a posting on the department's website,
listed the site as the Riverside Convention Center. That location was
selected, in part, because the crowd for the hearing is expected to
exceed the capacity of the County Administrative Center.
During a
hearing staged by the county's Local Agency Formation Commission in the
summer of 2009, more than 500 people showed up to the center to weigh in
on the city's application to add 5,000 acres of land on its southwestern
border, a swath that included the proposed site of the quarry. That
application was eventually denied, but a follow-up application ----
4,500 acres that did not include the quarry site ---- was later
approved.
On Friday,
which saw county offices dark because of budget considerations, the
website still listed the convention center as the site for the meeting.
Ray Smith, a
spokesman for the county, confirmed Saturday that the venue for the
meeting had been changed.
Shortly after
the convention center was announced as the location for the hearing,
Stone and Supervisor Bob Buster started working behind the scenes to get
the venue shifted to Temecula.
"I don't
think people in downtown Riverside are going to care about what
transpires in Southwest County," Stone said, adding that the vast
majority of the people who are interested in the project live in the
Temecula-Murrieta-French Valley area.
Dave Stahovich,
Buster's chief of staff, said it makes sense on a number of levels to
bring the hearing to Temecula.
"Whether
they are for or against it, why add all those cars to the road?" he
asked, referring to the hundreds of people expected to attend the
meeting.
The quarry,
proposed for 400 acres near the community of Rainbow on the city of
Temecula's southern border, has been a flashpoint for debate for years.
Opponents
claim it will affect air quality in the area, drive down property values
and cause a host of other environmental ills. Supporters contend it will
bring high-paying jobs to the area and improve the environment by
removing pollution-emitting trucks from the stretch of Interstate 15
that runs through Murrieta and Temecula.
Temecula Mayor
Ron Roberts said he supports the move south, provided the venue has all
the necessary audiovisual equipment.
"It would
be great for the people in Temecula," he said.
Temecula City
Manager Shawn Nelson said the city never received a formal request to
use a city facility for the hearing, but he said he definitely thinks
the council would support having the hearing conducted locally.
He added that
when the city was working to annex the quarry site, it made a similar
request to move the Local Agency Formation Commission hearing on that
application to Temecula.
The hearing
was eventually held in the County Administrative Center and, due to the
large crowd, some residents of Temecula and De Luz who had driven north
to offer testimony had to stand in the lobby and wait for a seat to open
up. Those who didn't want to wait turned around and left.
Granite
spokeswoman Karie Reuther said Thursday that it was her understanding,
based on what Granite officials had been told earlier in the week, that
there wasn't a venue with enough seating in Temecula.
Asked if
Granite has a preference as to where the hearing is conducted, she said,
"Wherever the county wants to have it, we're fine with."
If the
hearing, scheduled to start at 4 p.m., is not wrapped up on April 27,
the commission is scheduled to reconvene May 4 to complete the
proceedings.
Call staff
writer Aaron Claverie at 951-676-4315, ext. 2624.
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