NORTHLAKE WORK BEGINS GRADING STARTS FOR CAMPUS DELAYED 10 YEARS BY DEVELOPER STALLS.

Byline: Naush Boghossian Staff Writer

SANTA CLARITA - After nearly 10 years, grading has begun on the Castaic school district's NorthLake campus - a delay district officials say was a product of its ties to a stalled housing development.

``It's taken a long time because there have been four owners of the property and each developer has had a new agenda or plan, and we've had to deal with that,'' said Beverly Silsbee, superintendent of the Castaic Union School District. ``Because of having four owners and the complexity of the property, we've had to regroup constantly.''

Finally, officials say the fourth owner - who also was the original owner - is working with them to get the much-needed school built even though no homes are being built in the development. Looking back on the 10-year delay, Silsbee believes that the NorthLake school took extraordinarily long, but said nearly all new schools in the Santa Clarita Valley are similarly tied to outside projects.

``They each have complications, whether a developer does it or you do it on your own,'' Silsbee said.

In the case of NorthLake, with so many owners changing hands, each owner's vision seemed to clash with the next one's, causing further delays.

For example, the previous owner of the development wanted to move the gas line, Silsbee said, and after undergoing time-consuming negotiations with the utility, a new owner took over and decided not to move the line after all.

``Once people understand these complexities, they're less critical,'' Silsbee said.

Some Castaic residents have been grumbling for years about the delays, criticizing the school board for choosing to hold onto NorthLake as the next school's site, rather than exploring other options.

``If you're in a hard time, you've got to find another way. At some point, they should have realized they have to find another project,'' said Castaic resident Robert Stauffer, who lost his bid for a seat on the school board last year. He is thrilled that the school is finally going to be built.

``It's not an easy task to build a school, and our district was unable to find a way to get it done until now.''

After finding a site in Sloan Canyon that was not tied to a development unsuitable for a campus, the district now says it will build there.

``A Sloan school could have been built and done and kids would be in it now if that was considered a legitimate option,'' Stauffer said.

William McDermott, assistant superintendent, explained that in the past, other sites were considered more appropriate for their locations, for their cost, for ease of access and for safety.

But the district encountered difficulties with those sites, especially with residents who objected to a school near their homes.

``Community members have a say in where the school is built,'' McDermott said. ``The bottom line is, they say, yes, we have a need for a school, but they say not in my back yard.''

And now, although they plan to go ahead with the Sloan Canyon site, from the preliminary tests it appears that it will be more expensive to build a school at that site, McDermott said.

The school must provide three-quarters of a mile of road, water and sewer lines and other infrastructure for the site, because it is not tied to a development where those amenities would be included.

``Obviously, this was one of many reasons the other sites appeared to be more appropriate,'' he said.

All valley school districts have had and continue to have their share of difficulties with building new schools that are tied to developers.

``A lot depends upon the size of the development and the mentality of the community spirit of the developer,'' said Bob Lee, superintendent of the William S. Hart Union High School District.

According to Lee, stand-alone sites in most cases are more difficult to build than development-linked schools, because developers pay more - and pay it sooner - to build schools. On the other hand, he touted the success of Golden Valley High, which is independent of a developer.

``It varies project to project,'' Lee said. ``Most smaller developers are not big enough in size and - quite frankly, (not) community-minded enough - to where the needs of a high school even play into their planning.''

Lee cited larger developers who provide more school funding than the law requires.

``The economics are there,'' Lee said. ``You have a greater opportunity economically to make things happen sooner.''

The only negative aspect to building a school as part of a development is that the landowner determines where the school will be.

And local developers say that the state and its guidelines for new schools and funding can also delay projects.

Developer fees, state money and local money all contribute to building a school, but in recent years, developer fees have been funding new schools because there has been very little local and state money available.

Marlee Lauffer from The Newhall Land and Farming Company said that since developers don't actually build the schools - they just fund the cost of development and provide the land - state guidelines can slow up the process.

``They are built by the school district under state standards,'' Lauffer said. ``Bridgeport Elementary was about a year delayed because the state of California had to come certify the site.''

After the 10-year delay, McDermott said the district faces a tight schedule to open in September 2003.

McDermott believes that the community should be proud of the district's record of building schools - Castaic Middle School in 1996, Castaic Elementary in 1997 and Live Oak in 1989.

``For a district that's 113 years old, all three of the sites that exist, not one is over 13 years old,'' he said. ``The district has been building schools and has been working very hard on that. We want to build schools in appropriate places and to benefit the students and members of the community. That's all we want to do.''