Granite quarry faces opposition at open house

missing video file (.../-ERROR)

Granite Construction Incorporated came to dispense information on a proposed quarry but instead faced confrontation at an open house in Temecula.

On June 10, more than 130 people attended two public meetings – one in the morning and one in the evening –at the Temeku Hills Country Club.

Granite held the meetings to inform the public about a quarry it has proposed, according to Gary Johnson, the company’s aggregate resource manager.

A model of the site of the proposed quarry, which the company calls “Liberty Quarry,” sat in the middle of the room. Granite representatives stood around the room at tables covered with packets of information, charts and graphs.

Outside the room several members of Save Our Southwest Hills (SOS-Hills), a local group that opposes the construction of the quarry, stood passing out their own information packets.

“Quarries built in a community change the way people look at that community. The image is no longer of rolling hills and oaks, beautiful wine country and clean air; the image becomes that of an ‘industrialized area,’” read the packets.

People’s opposition to the quarry is based more on emotions rather than on the data, Johnson said at the evening meeting.

“The facts are on the side of approving the quarry. They show the overwhelming benefit,” he said. “It will provide jobs and we’re in a huge economic downturn. This is an economic development project. It provides a needed service, tax revenue and cheaper construction materials.”

Experts Granite hired to conduct research needed for a mining permit application attended the meeting. They told visitors the quarry would reduce traffic on the I-15 freeway and have little effect on the air quality and survival of local mountain lions.

Many attending the meeting were skeptical of the company’s claims.

As Johnson stood next to the model talking to reporters, a French Valley resident approached him.

“I’m impressed with your misrepresentation,” Ronald Glusac, 62, told Johnson. “You’re not actually showing where the dust is going to fall.”

“The modeling is based on meteorological data given to us by SDSU,” Johnson responded.

Glusac went on to say he had lived near a quarry near San Pedro when he contracted a breathing condition he called “miner’s disease.”

When he moved to Temecula the disease went away, he said.

Johnson and the other officials faced opposition at both sessions, he said during the evening meeting.

“We had some people here this morning who were pretty antagonistic,” he said. “They make all these statements… but they don’t point to any specific facts that are wrong.”

The quarry

If the County of Riverside gives Granite the mining permits, Liberty Quarry will sit in the hills west of the I-15 freeway just outside Temecula’s city limits and east of the Santa Margarita Ecological Reserve.

According to Granite documents, the quarry would be able to hold 38,000 acre feet of water at full build-out. It will stretch 4,000 acres long from the farthest points and span over 155 acres. Its average depth will be 700 feet with the lowest point reaching 1,000 feet deep.

If approved, the company will mine 270 million tons of granite from the site over 75 years. The quarry will provide 277 jobs.

According to a Granite “fact sheet,” trucks will have to travel less to pick up their loads due to the quarry’s location. The quarry will therefore take 16 million miles of truck travel off that part of the I-15. This will save taxpayers $5.3 million annually in highway maintenance.

The quarry would generate 2.2 million tax dollars for Riverside County and $6.1 million for the state.

After the company has finished mining the site the hole will be used as a freshwater reservoir, according to Johnson. The company will work out the specifics with a water district if and when the county approves the mining permits.

Effects on traffic

Granite plans to make improvements to the I-15 interchange with Rainbow Valley Blvd.

Before it begins to mine, the company will widen the two-lane southbound off-ramp to three lanes, Scott Sato, a principal with Urban Crossroads and a Granite representative, said at the meeting.

It will also replace stop signs with traffic signals where the freeway ramps meet the boulevard.

Granite is currently discussing installing a lane especially for Granite trucks to use when they accelerate onto the freeway.

The quarry will reduce the number of trucks that will be traveling across Riverside County on the I-15 to quarries farther north therefore improving traffic throughout the county, he said.

Effects on mountain lions

The quarry will sit in the center of an area the state calls the Santa Ana-Palomar Mountains Linkage, Jeff Tupen, Granite’s consultant on wildlife, said at the meeting.

A population of 20 mountain lions lives west of the proposed quarry site, he said, and 20 to 30 mountain lions live east of the I-15 freeway.

If the two populations are cut off from each other the one on the west side of the freeway will lack the genetic variation to survive, he said.

The quarry should have little effect on the migration of mountain lions because they mostly migrate along the bed of the Santa Margarita River.

Moreover, the impact the quarry may have on the migration of mountain lions would pale in comparison to the impact the I-15 freeway has on them, he said.

Air quality

According to Granite documents, at peak operation the quarry will emit an amount of pollution that falls within all established limits.

The project will emit 19.9 tons of air pollution per year, which is little compared to the 220 tons the I-15 freeway emits annually, the documents stated.

Because the quarry will reduce truck traffic traveling across Southwest Riverside County it will reduce pollution created by these trucks, according to the documents.

Criticism

At each table some visitors criticized the research.

A Granite official stood next to the table holding a model of rolling green hills spotted with boulders, a representation of the proposed quarry’s site.

As a Granite official explained how the project will work in phases he pulled the top off the model, revealing a gray figure-eight-shaped hole representing the first phase.

“Isn’t that a nice little pool? Wouldn’t you like that in your backyard?” asked Kathleen Hamilton, an SOS-Hills organizer, as she looked at the model. “This looks nothing like a real quarry, with all the grass and little bushes. Have you ever been to a quarry? They’re a nightmare. The pools that collect are seething with foam and stagnant water.”

Concerned residents are not alone in their opposition to the quarry’s construction. The City of Temecula is working on a plan to annex the land and turn it into an ecological reserve. The city is working on plans to turn an abandoned chateau in the annexation area into a San Diego State University research facility, according to Councilmember Maryann Edwards.

The city is now waiting for a vote by the county’s Local Agency Formation Commission. If the annexation plan is approved, Granite will need to seek permits from the city which it will likely deny.

“For the last couple of years [the Temecula City Council] has been working…on preserving the hills to our west,” Councilmember Jeff Comerchero said at a City Council meeting later that night. “They’re so beautiful when you look up at them. It looks like we’re going to have success acquiring that land.”

Granite is waiting for a vote from the county’s Board of Supervisors to get its mining permit.

After attending Granite’s open house, Sarah Barrette called a friend, Vicki Long, and decided to start an additional group to oppose the quarry along with SOS-Hills. They made their announcement later that night at the city council meeting.

“I’d like to applaud you for your efforts,” Barrette told the council. “They’ll be felt far and wide.”