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Alpine residents want answers
about SRPL underground project
By Susan Hogoboom
The Alpine Sun
ALPINE — More than 400 residents filled
the Alpine Community Center last Thursday night, Jan. 14, to
take part in a town hall meeting hosted by Second District
Supervisor Dianne Jacob. The purpose; to discuss the impending
San Diego Gas & Electric Sunrise Powerlink project and
specifically the underground portion that will run through the
heart of Alpine.
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Hundreds of residents filled the community center
for the Town Hall meeting. Below, mom Michelle
Steinbuch asks about safety and property values in
Alpine; Milton Cyphert, co-founder of the East
County Community Action Coalition speaks at the
meeting. Bottom, Supervisor Dianne Jacob and county
staff listen to the concerns and questions from
local residents. |
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The proposed Sunrise Powerlink project would run from the
Imperial Valley, through Jacumba, Boulevard, Campo, Desanso,
Alpine, Lakeside, and Sycamore Canyon. Approximately 6.1 miles
of 230-volt lines would run underground along Alpine Boulevard.
There would be two trenches, approximately 3.5 feet wide and six
feet deep, running down either side of the boulevard from Star
Valley Road to Peutz Valley. SDG&E expects the under-grounding
project to take 2 years.
Staff from the Department of Planning and Land Use were
on hand to discuss the county’s role and authority regarding the
project, and representatives from SDG&E also attended to address
concerns from local business owners and residents. During the
meeting, SDG&E project managers Laura McDonald, Jose Lopez, and
Alan Colton, helped answer questions from those demanding
answers.
An informal “hands-up” count at the beginning of the
meeting showed the vast majority of the audience opposing the
project, a handful supporting it, and some who were yet
undecided on the topic. Emotions ran high, but only one person
was removed from the room by one of the several uniformed
sheriff deputies that were on hand.
Eric Gibson, Director of Planning and Land Use,
provided an overview of the proposed project, providing some
disturbing images via PowerPoint presentation of the potential
impact to Alpine Boulevard. He reminded people that although the
county can weigh in on specific permitting and legal issues, it
lacks authority over the project as a whole.
“Our goal is to review and comment on a number of legal
documents associated with the project,” he said. The California
Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) has ultimate authority over
the project.
The Bureau of Land Management and the CPUC have already
approved the project, and approval by the United States Forest
Service is pending.
The CPUC has requested that SDG&E submit a more
detailed report regarding the chosen route. Gibson said his
department wants the CPUC to more specifically address issues
such as traffic circulation, mitigation, emergency response
time, water availability, danger to wildlife, and the overall
impact on the community. That document was supposed to be
finalized on Friday, Jan. 15.
“I’m here as a mom concerned about the environment and
my family,” said Michelle Steinbuch, an Alpine parent of three
children; aged three, five and 15. She grilled McDonald and
Lopez on several aspects of the project, ranging from traffic
related issues, to safety, to health, to property value issues.
Steinbuch recalled the wildfires of 2003 and 2007 and
the traffic mishaps that resulted from the myriad of people
using the boulevard as the only route for evacuation.
“When we were evacuating the fire, we waited a whole
hour to get onto Alpine Boulevard,” she said. “If we shut our
lanes down to one road, how are we going to be able to escape
quickly and safely in case of a fire? How are people going to be
able to get gas to fill their vehicles to be able to leave
safely? How do we mitigate something like that?”
She also wanted assurance from the power company that
the open trenches would be covered during an emergency and
during periods of inactivity in construction.
Steinbuch raised concerns about property values in an
area of the county that has already been hit hard with
foreclosures.
“Tell me we’re going to be able to sell our homes, or
there’s going to be any value left in the property out here,”
she said. “Who’s going to want to move to Alpine and put their
kids in school when they are going to be located maybe 40 to 50
feet from a high voltage electric line? … We are going to build
a new high school to raise property values. We’re going to drop
those property values below what they were before we had a high
school.”
“There are trench plates that we put down when we do
underground projects. We do cover the trenches with plates so at
night, when we are done working, anyone can drive on the roads,”
Lopez assured Steinbuch.
Steinbuch worries
about the possible relationship between electric magnetic fields
(EMF) and health problems.
“There’s no known answer, but there’s enough evidence
to support that they aren’t sure,” she said.
Douglas Norman owns and operates a local sporting goods
store. He, like Steinbuch, is worried about EMFs.
“EMF is still an unsaid science but in toxicology,
there is dose and time, and the longer you’re emerged with
whatever substance, whether it is water or whatever else, that
can be harmful to the body,” he said.
SDG&E maintains that the portion of the SRPL that will
be buried adjacent to the schools will exceed the EMF safety
distances established by the CPUC. In addition, SDG&E says the
driveways to the school will be accessible at all times, and
according to Kenneth Brazell, a project manager with the
Department of Public Works, SDG&E is working with school
officials to ensure the vaults will not obstruct the driveways
to the school and to explore the possibility of working in front
of the school during summer vacation.
Several local business owners along the Boulevard
attended the meeting to find out how SDG&E is going to mitigate
the affects the two-year construction is going to have on their
livelihoods.
“This Powerlink thing has become a nightmare for me,”
said Kris. “They’re bringing it right over my son’s bus stop in
Japatul, I work at Alpine Rentals, and my son goes to school at
Alpine Elementary.”
“How are we going to do business when there’s trenches
in an already small two-lane road?” he asked. “Is SDG&E going to
pay my salary when they’re putting these in front of my
business?”
“I don’t think you guys realize what kind of impact
this is going to have on our city,” he said. “People want to
come up to Alpine because it’s a beautiful place — nobody’s
going to want to come and see that.”
Lopez said that businesses that are adversely affected
by the project can go through SDG&E’s claims department.
“If we disturb businesses, then we go through our
claims department. That’s how we resolve those issues,” he said.
“What makes a corporation think they can take down a
whole town without our permission?” asked Nina Gould, local
parent and chairman of the Roads and Infrastructure subcommittee
of Dianne Jacob’s Alpine Revitalization Steering Committee. She
wants to see an enhanced streetscape along the boulevard,
featuring cafes, pedestrian walkways, and other pedestrian
friendly features and sees the potential project as a set back.
In a region already affected by a drought, Japatul
resident, Rick Slaughter, raised concerns regarding the
availability of water.
“I can’t imagine the amount of well water that’s going
to be necessary to create this path,” he said.
Colton said they were to meet with the county this week
to analyze options to resolve this concern, such as the use of
reclaimed water.
“We will be exploring avenues with the county on how we
can use other sources and what other sources may be available,”
he said.
One resident asked McDonald what amount of renewable
energy that is guaranteed to the PUC to be renewable would be
transmitted on the SRPL line.
“We have said, and it’s a matter of public record, that
the SRPL is a thousand megawatt line, and we will have contracts
signed for a thousand megawatts of renewable energy coming from
the Imperial Valley,” said McDonald. She admitted that there is
no guarantee.
Discussion regarding the Sunrise Powerlink and the
underground project will continue in the coming months. SDG&E
expects to begin the project in May or June this year, depending
on the outcome of lawsuits, agency approvals and the completion
of required studies and reports.
On Feb. 15 at 6 p.m., a Sunrise Powerlink Community
Council meeting will be held at the Alpine Women’s Club. The
meeting is open to the public.
Check online at www.thealpinesun.com to see documents,
read part stories and find out more about the Sunrise Powerlink
project.
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