City Council Supports Pact to Build College Campus

PALMDALE —  The City Council has approved a non-binding agreement supporting the construction of a new community college campus on a 100-acre site just east of the city.

In a unanimous vote late Wednesday, the council resolved to expedite the land annexation and the processing of plans to construct the college, along with an adjacent housing and commercial development.

City officials said it is too early to determine the traffic impact and increased demand for city services a college campus might create. But several council members said a college would enhance the quality of life in the city.

“I’m very supportive of having a junior college in Palmdale,” Mayor James Ledford said. “It’s a plum.”

“I completely and totally support” the agreement, Councilman David Myers added.

The other parties in the pact are Lancaster-based Antelope Valley College, which would operate the new campus, and businessman David P. Bushnell, who has offered to donate 100 acres for the campus if his adjacent development project is approved.

Bushnell, founder of the binocular company that bears his name, owns 540 acres in an unincorporated area near the southwest corner of 47th Street East and Barrel Springs Road. Bushnell has proposed the construction of a golf course, 1,080 residential units, a small commercial center, parks and trails, all adjacent to the college campus.

Allan Kurki, president of Antelope Valley College, said he needed a show of support from the city before he travels to Sacramento on May 12 to ask state college officials to approve early plans for the Palmdale campus.

He said the school, which would be expected to accommodate 10,000 students by the year 2010, is needed because enrollment at the existing campus in Lancaster will reach capacity within 10 years.

Kurki said the city must complete an environmental impact review and issue a planning permit before Feb. 1, 1995, to allow him to apply for state funds to begin building roads, sewers and other infrastructure for the new campus. If that deadline is missed, local officials will have to wait another year to apply for the money, he said.

At Wednesday’s meeting, Richard Heuser, a social worker who lives near the proposed campus, was the only speaker to criticize the plan. Heuser said he fears the college will generate traffic congestion and disrupt the rural lifestyle he enjoys.