OAK VIEW : Plan for Water Tank Angers Residents

Angry Oak View residents are asking the Casitas Municipal Water District why they were not told of a plan to build a large water storage tank in their back yards.

District officials met Thursday with 18 residents from the Spring Street neighborhood, where the water company proposes to build the 2-million-gallon storage tank as part of a proposed $25-million water-treatment system.

The district released a draft environmental study last December that identified a site on Olivas Mesa near the south end of Spring Street as the best and most economical location for a tank. A final study released last month recommends partly burying the 25-foot-tall tank and screening it with trees.

But the residents, who are united against the tank, said they had not heard a word about it until the company sent them letters last week inviting them to the meeting.

The tank site would require less than an acre of land, but the neighbors voiced fears the reservoir would lower their property values and could endanger their safety. Several mothers said construction traffic lasting up to eight months could endanger their children. Others feared the tank could collapse and flood the neighborhood.

“We all invested in that area as a future. To us, that tank destroys our dreams,” resident Lille Greder said.

Richard Hajas, assistant district manager, said the exact site hasn’t been chosen but that the district could condemn private property for the public welfare. Resident Mark Whelan demanded to know how the water company has the right to “steal” private property.

District board member Al Aviles, elected to represent the Oak View area, hotly defended the company. He said the treatment plant is needed to bring Lake Casitas water up to new state and federal drinking water standards, and the holding tanks are necessary to provide greater fire protection and pumping force.