EDWARDS LAND USE OPPOSED SEWAGE PLAN 'ENCROACHMENT'.

Byline: Jim Skeen Staff Writer

LANCASTER - Local business leaders joined city officials and state Sen. W.J. ``Pete'' Knight, R-Palmdale, in opposing a proposal by Los Angeles County sanitation district officials to lease land from Edwards Air Force Base for evaporation ponds.

The Antelope Valley Chambers of Commerce - which represents business in Lancaster and Rosamond - said such a lease would make the base more susceptible to future encroachment.

The letter was triggered by discussions between Sanitation District 14 and Edwards about the possibility of using four square miles of base property to handle treated sewage.

``We believe that encroachment of any type will severely weaken the ability of EAFB to resist additional encroachment in the future,'' the organization said in a letter to Edwards' commander, Maj. Gen. Doug Pearson. ``By allowing the encroachment of District 14 onto EAFB, a part of this incomparable national asset will be compromised for a purpose that could be performed elsewhere. We strongly urge you to oppose this proposal and maintain the integrity of Edwards Air Force Base.''

Edwards spokesman Gary Hatch said the base has only agreed to discuss the possibility of such a lease and that no decisions have been made. Hatch said the base had no other comment at this time on the issue.

Los Angeles County Sanitation District 14 is facing a 2005 deadline from state water regulators to stop the overflow of treated effluent from the Lancaster sewage treatment plant onto Rosamond Dry Lake.

Sanitation representatives are talking with Air Force officials about the possibility of leasing four square miles of vacant land on the base's southwest corner.

Any such lease agreement would require approval from the Pentagon and the sanitation district's three-member board of directors.

Proponents of the lease proposal say it would be less expensive and ultimately less costly to sewage district customers than purchasing privately owned land.

Acquiring large amounts of land would likely require going to court in eminent domain proceedings to compel owners to sell, and that would be expensive, with some preliminary estimates as high as $30 million to $40 million, according to county sanitation officials.

Opponents to the project say the proposal weakens the base's ability to fend off future land grabs and that the sanitation district needs to live up to its commitments to keep effluent from coming onto base property.

Opponents include Knight, a former Edwards test pilot who once was the base's vice commander, and the city of Lancaster. Lancaster's City Council voted earlier this month to direct Mayor Frank Roberts, a member of the sanitation district board, to oppose the lease.

Roberts said he has asked Lancaster's acting director of public works, Neil Hudson, to look at possible alternative sites for effluent storage.

The occasional effluent overflows onto the dry lake bed are a symptom of a greater problem: the district's need for additional capacity to handle the region's projected growth. The Lancaster plant has the capacity to handle about 12 million gallons of sewage a day, but will need to handle 22.2 million to 25.7 million gallons per day by 2020 to deal with anticipated population growth.

District officials said the Edwards land, if they were to lease it, would not be enough, and that the ultimate solution will be a plan that includes agricultural use and municipal recycling.

Lancaster officials are working on a proposal initially to use 1.5 million gallons of recycled water to irrigate street median landscaping.

District officials also are moving ahead with an environmental impact report that looks at other options, including using the water on crops not used for human consumption, such as alfalfa, or in orchards, where the water would touch only the roots and not the fruit, or by creating more evaporation ponds around the treatment plant on Avenue D near Sierra Highway.

The problem of sewage spilling onto the lake beds dates back to 1960, shortly after the county's Lancaster Water Reclamation Plant was built at 1865 W. Ave. D.

To stop the flow, a dike was built along Avenue C in 1961. The water stopped by the dike formed what is now known as Piute Ponds. Over the years, marshlike habitat formed around the ponds and waterfowl began using the area.

Piute Ponds originally provided sufficient storage and evaporative capacity to keep the wastewater from going onto the dry lake bed about a half-mile away.