TREATED SEWAGE TO IRRIGATE FIELDS DESIGNS FOR PIPELINE NEAR COMPLETION.

Byline: Charles F. Bostwick Staff Writer

LANCASTER - The city is getting ready to spend $2.2 million so that water recycled from Lancaster's sewage can irrigate new ballfields at the former Antelope Valley Fairgrounds, and later go to lawns and landscaping elsewhere.

Designs are being finished for a 16-inch diameter pipeline that would run 4.5 miles down Division Street from a sewage treatment plant pipeline to storm-water catch basins that would serve as holding basins before the treated, disinfected effluent is pumped into its own special irrigation lines.

``It's an essential resource,'' Mayor Frank Roberts said of the treated effluent, which now flows out of the Lancaster sewage plant and onto Edwards Air Force Base's Rosamond Dry Lake to evaporate, irritating the Air Force.

The Division Street line is intended as the first segment of an eventual citywide network to irrigate parks, school fields and landscaping.

As part of a controversial $200 million effort to stop the overflows onto Edwards, Lancaster's sewage plant is getting new equipment called a membrane bioreactor that would be coupled with disinfection by ultraviolet light or chlorine, officials said. The treated water would meet state standards as clean enough to swim in.

The Division Street line initially will run from a sewage plant pipeline now being installed in Avenue E down to basins off Avenue H and Milling Street.

Colored a distinctive purple so nobody mistakes it for a drinkable water main, the Division Street pipeline should start construction in October and be carrying water by February or March, Lancaster Public Works Director Randy Williams said.

Meanwhile, a consultant is preparing a citywide master plan that calls for recycled water mains to run down 30th Street West and 30th Street East, from where the water could be sent to irrigate turf at the Lancaster National Soccer Center, Lancaster City Park, schools and street landscaping.

The master plan is scheduled to be completed within two months.

``We're making good progress,'' Williams said.

``Purple pipe'' landscaping irrigation lines are already installed in Avenue G, which the city this year finished widening to six lanes leading from the Antelope Valley Fairgrounds to Fox Airfield.

Up to $10 million in federal aid to help pay for the backbone network was authorized last month by the House of Representatives at the request of U.S. Rep. Bill Thomas, R-Bakersfield, whose congressional district includes part of Lancaster. The Senate is now considering the request, which is part of the $10 billion Water Resources Development Act.

The $10 million is to be added to $14.5 million in federal aid authorized in 1992 and which is to be used for installing 7 1/2 miles of large conventional water mains along east Avenue H, west Avenue H and west Avenue K.

Thomas and U.S. Rep. Howard ``Buck'' McKeon, R-Santa Clarita, so far have obtained $4.5 million of the authorized money for specific water lines.

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is expected to start construction this fall of the first two-mile segment of water main along Avenue H west of 20th Street East.

``The rapid growth projected in the area makes increasing the authorization imperative,'' Thomas said in an announcement of the House passage of the water bill.

Under orders from state water regulators, Lancaster's sewage treatment plant has three years to stop effluent from spilling onto Rosamond Dry Lake. Air Force officials say the water attracts birds that are a hazard to low-flying jets, and blocks the lake bed from being used as an emergency landing field.

To have some place to put the effluent, sanitation district officials are buying thousands of acres of farmland and desert in east Lancaster.

The land is to be planted with alfalfa that would be irrigated with treated, disinfected effluent. After opposition from residents of the sparsely populated area, officials agreed to go beyond minimum state standards for disinfecting farm irrigation water.

Lancaster's network is intended to take disinfected water that would otherwise go to the eastside farmland.

Charles F. Bostwick, [phone]

chuck.bostwick(at)dailynews.com