Newhall Land And Farming Co

Taking a first step to implement voter-approved growth control, Ventura County and the city of Fillmore are pushing to create a large new greenbelt of protected farmland stretching 13 miles from the city limits to the Los Angeles County line. Officials said Wednesday that they hope to form this year a 40,000-acre zone where agriculture can flourish apart from urban development.

It was a sad day for the people who thrive on blood, toil, sweat and mud. But there were no tears. Indian Dunes Park near Valencia, a haven since 1970 for the people who like to ride in the dirt on motorcycles, threewheelers, autos and go-carts, closed. The demise of the 600-acre park, which was closed by its owner, Newhall Land and Farming Co., leaves its patrons no place in Los Angeles County to do their riding legally.

It has always been the California Way: Build new neighborhoods or entire new cities and have faith that water will be found for them. Until now. In a ruling that will delay and perhaps downsize Newhall Ranch, the largest housing development in Los Angeles County history, a Kern County judge has ordered that concerns over water supply and potential impact on highways, a river and a wildlife corridor be satisfied before construction starts.

Now that he is back at work in Sacramento, Gov. Pete Wilson has a large backlog of bills to sign or veto. One that merits quick approval is SB 901, meant to bring a modicum of order to the historically haphazard process by which cities and towns have expanded with little thought of where that California essential--water--would come from.

California's water wars are far from over, though the current combatants aren't as well known as some in the past. As in earlier years, the disputes are intense and do little to serve the public interest. Player No. 1 is the Castaic Lake Water Agency, a public wholesaler similar to the Metropolitan Water District. The agency delivers State Water Project supplies from the California Aqueduct to up to half of the Santa Clarita Valley's 160,000 residents.

Saying the project would put Ventura County's unemployed back to work, nearly 100 construction and trade workers packed a public hearing Thursday to support a proposed crude-oil pipeline from Santa Barbara through the Santa Clarita and San Fernando valleys to the southern Los Angeles Basin.

Arson is suspected in a $2-million fire that destroyed a hotel under construction near the Six Flags Magic Mountain amusement park Saturday night, authorities said Sunday. It was the Santa Clarita Valley's third suspicious blaze in three weeks. But any link between the fires remained undetermined. And at least one fire official doubted that the hotel blaze near Valencia was related to two brush fires earlier this month elsewhere in the valley.

A Santa Clarita city cap on campaign contributions and a reluctance to accept money from developers have kept the race for City Council a mostly low-cost affair, according to financial disclosure statements released Thursday. The reports showed that some candidates have relied heavily on small donations of less than $100 while others have taken out large personal loans to finance campaigns in the first council election since Santa Clarita incorporated in 1987.

A bill broadening the powers of the Castaic Lake Water Agency, which provides water to the fast-growing Santa Clarita Valley, was signed Wednesday by Gov. George Deukmejian, despite last-minute lobbying asking the governor to veto the measure.