Supervisors OK Plan for Builder to Tap Into Aqueduct

Responding to criticism from public agencies and residents that new wells compete for precious water in the Antelope Valley, a major builder has agreed to connect a development of almost 2,000 houses to the state aqueduct instead.

The agreement was unanimously approved by Los Angeles County supervisors Tuesday. It had already been agreed to by the aqueduct’s local vendor, the Antelope Valley East-Kern Water Agency, said Gary Hartley, assistant deputy director of waterworks and sewer maintenance for the county.

It calls for the development firm Kaufman & Broad to construct a major trunk line to an aqueduct water treatment plant about six miles from the company’s project, which is planned to include 1,975 houses, a school and a golf course.

Hartley said the system would open up western Palmdale to development far beyond that of the Kaufman & Broad development because it will provide water supplies that other builders will be able to tap into.

Although the State Water Project has called for cutbacks in aqueduct water supplies this year because of the drought, it is hoped that by the time the project is completed several years in the future the drought will be over and the project’s supplies will fall within the local agency’s allotment, Hartley said.

In 1989, residents and representatives of local water companies expressed alarm that the developer was proposing drilling a 1,200-foot-deep well to serve the area, known as City Ranch.

They said that the new well could dry up their existing wells and that a proposed ground-water recharge basin could pollute their water with pesticides and other toxins.

Hartley said an independent hydrologist hired by the county concluded that the proposed new well would only slightly lessen the flow in surrounding wells. But the specialist also determined that such a well would not produce much water, he said, leading the county to urge the developer to rely on the aqueduct instead.

But even though the system now planned would provide water primarily from the aqueduct, Hartley said, it would allow the development to tap into water from existing wells near Lancaster during the summer.

“The big thing we were concerned about was them taking our water,” said John Sidwell, a director of the Palmdale Water District. “Even though they’re using the aqueduct as their primary source, they’re still using the other as a backup and that’s still coming out of our ground-water basin.”

In all, the water main will cost nearly $4 million, county engineers estimated, which will be paid through development fees of $1,791 per house on the Kaufman & Broad project.