CEMEX, CITY AGREE TO TALK DEAL GRAVEL MINING GIANT PUTS PLANS ON HOLD.

Byline: JUDY O'ROURKE Staff Writer

SANTA CLARITA -- Santa Clarita has agreed to lay low in its aggressive $8 million battle against gravel mining giant Cemex, a fight that included a bitter annexation struggle of a neighborhood near the company's proposed quarry in Soledad Canyon.

In this first sign of some sort of compromise, residents and activists who have led the impassioned fight are upbeat.

``I'm optimistically cautious,'' said Andy Fried, founder and president of Safe Action For the Environment, a nonprofit corporation formed eight years ago to oppose the mine. Fried declined to say more because the group hasn't met since Cemex announced Tuesday the mine is on hold.

SAFE has spent roughly $120,000, hiring an expert in air quality and health issues whose studies contradicted results found in county and federal environmental reports. Fried, an Agua Dulce resident, says the group would accept mining at ``historic levels'' of 300,000 tons a year, as would the city.

Under federal contracts spanning about 20 years, Cemex planned to mine 2 million tons a year in the first decade, ramping up to 4 million to 5 million tons a year over the next decade.

Cemex officials announced Tuesday that they called off plans to open the 56.1 million-ton mine next year and want to negotiate a compromise with the city instead. The city has bankrolled a roughly $8 million campaign to scale down or block the mine, planned for a hilly area outside city bounds between Canyon Country and Agua Dulce. Details of the compromise were not given.

The Sulphur Springs Union School District abuts the mine property, and school officials worried mine operations could snarl traffic and pose a health risk for kids at the district's eight schools. The district partnered with the city in opposing the project.

``I'm happy they sort of postponed it,'' said Kerry Clegg, who has served on the school board for about 17 years. ``The mining (operations) would have generated a lot of dust, and we're downwind from it. We're concerned about indoor air quality problems for kids.''

The district had planned to monitor indoor air and take action if it deteriorated. Clegg, a semi-retired research molecular biologist, said many were concerned pollution from increased truck traffic might kindle childhood asthma cases.

Clegg lives in one of the Stonecrest neighborhoods that were annexed in July after after a sometimes heated battle that saw city officials pushing for jurisdiction over the community -- which provided a landbridge to acreage it owns at the mine. Clegg favored annexation, noting the city is better positioned than the county to fight the mine.

County supervisors granted the mining permit under a consent decree in 2004.

City activists honed their sparring moves decades ago battling BKK Corp.'s plan to site the world's largest trash dump in Elsmere Canyon -- in the Angeles National Forest -- with the county's blessing. Santa Clarita Mayor Marsha McLean, then a civilian who founded the SCV Canyons Preservation Committee, dug in until federal legislation enacted in 1995 protected the area.

``No matter what we did or said, proponents of the dump would not come to the table and talk about alternatives,'' she said. ``This ... is an entirely different situation.''

City officials have drawn some parallels, noting both were multiyear battles to retain the community's character and quality of life. McLean said there's a notable difference.

``Cemex, however, at this point is willing to come to the table to try and come to an equitable solution,'' she said. ``We are sitting at the table, and we have almost a year to discuss what will or will not happen on that site.''

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Photo:

Rick Shapiro, Cemex vice president of public affairs, left, shakes the hand of Santa Clarita City Councilwoman Laurene Weste after a news conference to announce that the mining company and the city will work together over the next year to reach an agreement on the proposed quarry in Soledad Canyon.

David Crane/Staff Photographer