PERCHLORATE VANDALISM? TOXIC LEVELS ODDLY HIGH AT DEVELOPMENT SITE.

Byline: Kerry Cavanaugh Staff Writer

WEST HILLS - The developer of a 151-home community says highly concentrated perchlorate could not have flowed naturally from the nearby Santa Susana Field Lab to his property, and he suspects the rocket-fuel byproduct was placed there deliberately.

Centex Homes officials analyzed 82 samples of soil and foliage taken from the property on Roscoe Boulevard, east of Valley Circle. They say the levels of perchlorate were too high, too sporadic and too recent to have flowed down Dayton Canyon Creek from the field lab.

``It seems like it was so overdone. There's just no way for 62,000 parts per million (of perchlorate) to land on this spot through any mechanism other than being placed there,'' said Richard Scott, an analyst with Allwest Remediation, which was hired by Centex to test the site.

Officials with the California Department of Toxic Substances Control concur that perchlorate was dumped on the site. They have assigned experts from their Glendale office to oversee the cleanup of the chemical rather than specialists in Sacramento who are handling the field lab decontamination.

``Right now we do not see a connection so we are handling both separate,'' said Jeanne Garcia, a DTSC spokeswoman.

But longtime critics of the field laboratory said regulators are prematurely ruling out Rocketdyne, which used perchlorate in its rocket-engine testing. The chemical was found in storm water leaving the hilltop, triggering a massive cleanup effort at the lab, located less than two miles uphill from the Centex site.

``What surprises me is that every time perchlorate is found in the area - like at Ahmanson Ranch, Runkle Canyon, Simi Valley - they say it's not coming from the most logical source in the area,'' said Dan Hirsch, with the Committee to Bridge the Gap.

Hirsch and Ali Tabidian, a geological sciences professor at California State University, Northridge, have speculated that perchlorate could have flowed down the steep canyon in water that pooled in the flatlands.

When the water evaporated, it left behind high concentrations of perchlorate, which can cause thyroid problems.

But Boeing Co., which owns the lab, disputes that theory.

``We don't see anything that suggests that. There is no evidence that connects our site with the Centex development,'' spokesman John Mitchell said.

Independent experts said the spotty occurrence and extremely high levels are very unusual and confound easy explanation.

To get such high readings would take pure perchlorate on the soil or, perhaps, concentrated perchlorate recently released into the creek from uphill, said Thomas Young, an associate professor of civil and environmental engineering at University of California, Davis.

``Perchlorate in the surface soil isn't likely to persist. It's either going to get washed off or infiltrated,'' said Young, who was not familiar with the specifics of the case.

Allwest took a handful of random soil samples on May 26 - three days after the Daily News reported on community concern about the lack of environmental testing of the property.

Expecting to find nothing, Scott was shocked when all five samples showed very high levels of perchlorate - from 320 to 62,000 ppm.

That's up to 850 times more potent than perchlorate found at the field lab and nearly 8,000 times the level allowed for residential development.

Allwest then tested the soil in different areas of the property and dug into the ground, testing up to three feet deep. In all, there were 82 samples and 23 showed perchlorate above the 7.8 ppm limit.

The highest concentrations were clustered along Dayton Canyon Creek, and the perchlorate decreased significantly the deeper geologists dug. They found perchlorate on the surface of leaves, but not beneath rocks and a log - causing Scott to believe the chemical was sprayed or sprinkled on the surface.

Samples taken a few feet away found no perchlorate, and tests taken up the creek, closer to the field lab, also showed no contamination.

That led Scott and DTSC officials to rule out Rocketdyne as the source.

Centex has committed to cleaning up all the contamination prior to construction. The company is now developing a cleanup plan and decontamination will be supervised by the DTSC.

``To think you might be a victim of vandalism, it's been a concern,'' said Jon Fitzpatrick, project manager with Centex Los Angeles and Ventura Division. ``We're confident science proves it, but explaining it to the public is another thing.''

Kerry Cavanaugh, [phone]

kerry.cavanaugh(at)dailynews.com

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