MILITARY ASKS ARNOLD TO INTERCEDE CENTENNIAL HOUSING PROJECT CITED AS THREAT TO READINESS.

Byline: Staff and Wire Services

GORMAN - A top Defense Department official wants Governor-elect Arnold Schwarzenegger to intervene in a 28,000-home community planned on Tejon Ranch, claiming it will end low-level military training flights and jeopardize the nation's military readiness.

Navy Rear Adm. J.L. Betancourt, writing on behalf of military services in California, said the proposed 60,000-inhabitant Centennial project will interfere with the training of Navy, Marine and Air Force combat pilots. Federal regulations prohibit military flights lower than 1,000 feet over populated areas.

Military officials suggested Centennial be moved from the Tehachapi Mountains to the southern San Joaquin Valley.

``The proposed Centennial development underlies a number of military training routes crucial to maintaining highly perishable pilot skills necessary for safe execution of one of the most demanding phases of a combat mission,'' Betancourt said Tuesday in an e-mail to Schwarzenegger.

Among the military flight paths is one just south of Centennial's boundaries that is traveled by low-flying cruise missiles fired by Navy ships and submarines off the California coast, aviation maps show.

Accompanied by planes whose crews can take control of them, the missiles use the corridor to reach targets at China Lake Naval Weapons Center and in Nevada, records show.

The cruise missiles cross the California coast west of Santa Barbara, fly east over the Los Padres National Forest and cross Interstate 5 north of Castaic. Then they turn north across the far western Antelope Valley toward the Tehachapi Mountains before joining the test ranges used by Edwards Air Force Base planes.

The admiral requested that Schwarzenegger's statewide planning office devise a regional strategy to consider Centennial and two other projects planned on sprawling Tejon Ranch along Interstate 5 in Kern and Los Angeles counties.

A new law gives that office expanded powers in resolving development disputes related to the military.

``The transition team does have the admiral's letter, and they've briefed Arnold. But he has no response at this point,'' said David Myerson of Environment Now, a Santa Monica nonprofit group that is advising Schwarzenegger.

The Centennial project is now before Los Angeles County planners, and preliminary community meetings on its environmental effects are set for November.