BERMITE CLEANUP MAY START CITY CONSIDERING FIRM FOR EFFORTS AT FACTORY.

Byline: Heather MacDonald Staff Writer

SANTA CLARITA - If the City Council finalizes a proposed agreement with a North Carolina firm to clean up and develop the site of the defunct Bermite munitions factory, the fate of 996 polluted acres in the center of the city will once again be in the hands of a private company.

While some city leaders say their investigation of Cherokee Investment Partners has convinced them that the company can get the job done quickly and effectively, others say the city's experience with Remediation Financial Inc. should make Santa Clarita wary of relying on a private firm to clean up the Saugus Aquifer, the city's backup water supply.

``It is so clear that Cherokee is the polar opposite of RFI,'' said Councilman Frank Ferry. ``RFI never stepped up even in a minimal way, and Cherokee has done everything that RFI promised to do.''

This week, the Santa Clarita City Council will consider signing an agreement with Cherokee that would could launch a two-year effort to redesign RFI's Porta Bella plan that called for 2,911 homes to be built on hilly land near the Santa Clarita Metrolink Station on Soledad Canyon Road.

``The jury is still out on Cherokee,'' said Glo Donnelly, a member of the citizens advisory group that is keeping tabs on the cleanup effort. ``I just don't want to get into the same situation as we were in with RFI.''

Decades of munitions manufacturing for the U.S. military has left Bermite polluted with several dozen toxic chemicals and littered with unexploded ordnance waste. Five wells have been shut down by the discovery of toxic levels of perchlorate, a byproduct of rocket fuel that has been linked to thyroid disorders.

Phoenix-based RFI's plan to clean up and develop the site fell apart in 2001 when the City Council refused to allow the property to be developed in phases, as each section was certified as clean by state officials. Soon after, the firm's local development company ran out of money, work stopped and RFI put the 996-acre site up for sale.

RFI, which has sued the city for failing to comply with the site's development agreement, claims its plans were stymied by local politics. Gary Brown, RFI's director of development, has said the company spent $25 million in a good faith effort to study and clean the site.

Cherokee has pledged to hold off on construction until all of the site's soil has been cleaned up, according to company officials.

That promise gives Connie Worden Roberts, chairwoman of the Citizens Advisory Group, a sense of guarded optimism, she said.

``Cherokee appears to be bona fide,'' said Worden Roberts, who was a frequent critic of RFI.

City officials said last week that their experience with RFI has made them more savvy in their dealings with Cherokee.

``I'm a little more shrewd now than I was, a little less naive,'' Ferry said. ``We have to seize this opportunity to get our water cleaned.''

City officials are confident that Cherokee has the financial wherewithal to pay for the cleanup, which company officials estimate will cost $65 million and take three to four years.

Some members of the advisory group have questioned that estimate, saying it appears to be too low because the water cleanup is expected to take decades.

``What is not picked up by the culprit and our proposed white knight - Cherokee - will come out of the pockets of the citizens and the ratepayers,'' said group member Valerie Thomas. ``That needs to be minimized.''

Giving Cherokee the lead role in the cleanup has not been endorsed by all of the council members.

At a council meeting in February, Councilwoman Laurene Weste voiced concerns about partnering with another company that would want to build thousands of homes on the polluted land.

Instead, Weste has repeatedly urged city officials to force Whittaker Corp., which operated the site until 1987, to pay for the cleanup, perhaps through long-dormant insurance policies, and preserve the land as open space.

However, Ferry, along with Councilman Bob Kellar, said the agreement with Cherokee is necessary because they do not believe Simi Valley-based Whittaker will willingly spend the tens of millions of dollars necessary to clean up the site.

While Whittaker has agreed to comply with a cleanup order issued by the state Department of Toxic Substances Control, the company has missed a series of deadlines and been warned by the state agency that Whittaker could face action by the Attorney General's Office if it does not begin to comply with the agency's time line.

``If Cherokee does not buy this property then we'll be stuck with Whittaker, and that is a known negative,'' said Planning Director Jeff Lambert.