RANCH CALLED SAFE FOR MINICITY SOS SCOFFS AT DEVELOPER'S REPORT.

Byline: Cecilia Chan Staff Writer

The developer of a controversial minicity said an environmental engineering firm hired to test soil and surface water has given the Ahmanson Ranch project a clean bill of health.

Opponents, however, still insist the site of the 3,050-home development proposed in southeastern Ventura County is contaminated with chemicals from the Rocketdyne Santa Susana Field Laboratory.

``We stand behind the scientific results of their research,'' said Adrian Rodriguez, spokesman for Washington Mutual, the parent company of the Ahmanson Ranch project. ``Kleinfelder, which is the group contracted to do the report, has an absolutely sterling reputation for the work they do.''

The director of the environmental group Save Open Space said an independent agency should survey the area.

``That is like letting the fox into the hen house,'' Mary Wiesbrock, director of SOS, said about the study by Kleinfelder Inc. of Diamond Bar.

``It's bogus. What is appalling is that public health and safety is at risk here,'' she said. ``An state independent agency should come in and do it. You don't let a firm working for Ahmanson Land Co. do it. It's a joke and it's not acceptable.''

Rodriguez said the report will be circulated to Ventura County officials and federal and state agencies.

Wiesbrock said limited testing by Santa Paula-based FGL Environmental in 1998 indicated there could be toxic chemicals from Rocketdyne in the surface water of Las Virgenes Creek. Westlake Village attorney Edward Masry, who commissioned the FGL report, has called for further environmental studies.

For the Ahmanson project, Kleinfelder tested six soil samples and three surface water samples, taken from streams in July, for more than 200 elements or compounds.

The Kleinfelder report concludes that the proposed minicity site, three miles south of Rocketdyne, is not contaminated with chemicals or radiation.

The soil samples were collected from drainage areas most likely to intercept anything carried from the Rocketdyne direction, and the water samples were taken from East Las Virgenes Creek and Las Virgenes Creek, according to the report.

The chemical and radiological traces were below risk thresholds identified by federal and state governments and ``do not pose a potential threat to public health, welfare or the environment at the Ahmanson Ranch Project site,'' the report says.

``The net result is we found nothing indicative (of problems) from the Santa Susana site,'' said Peter Hayden, manager of environmental services at Kleinfelder. ``It's as clean as my backyard. I have no problem with a community being there.''

Hayden said groundwater from the Rocketdyne site flows east, away from the Ahmanson land.

Rodriguez said the Kleinfelder study reinforces the conclusion of a 1998 investigation that found no chemical or radionuclide contamination problem in Bell Canyon, which lies directly between the Ahmanson site and Rocketdyne.

Map: Ahmanson Ranch

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