In a 5-0 vote on Tuesday, Dec. 20, the Board of Supervisors approved the resolution declaring the intent to adopt a resolution of public use and necessity, which Lake County Special Districts Administrator Mark Dellinger presented to them.
The resolution relates to a lift station and force main project in the Southeast Regional Wastewater Collection and Treatment System, which serves the city of Clearlake but is under the county’s jurisdiction.
County Administrative Officer Kelly Cox told Lake County News that the board didn’t actually decide to use eminent domain at the Dec. 20 meeting.
“There’s a process they go through and this is the first step in the process,” he explained.
The affirmative vote clears the way for what Cox said is the next step -- the board holding a hearing on Tuesday, Jan. 17, at which it will consider a resolution to declare a public use and necessity.
That would allow them to move forward with acquiring easements on two Clearlake properties by eminent domain if agreements can’t be reached with the owners, Dellinger told Lake County News this week.
“Hopefully it will be worked out before that happens and it won’t even be necessary,” Cox said of the eminent domain process.
The $5 million project is needed to improve the Southeast Regional system’s capacity -- including allowing for more hookups for residential and commercial development. It also will alleviate releases of wastewater, as Lake County News has reported.
“We’re under a regulatory enforcement action by the regional (water) board,” Dellinger said in a Wednesday interview.
He added that he believes that having a wastewater collection system that has growth capacity and can avoid spills “is very important for the future of the city of Clearlake.”
Along with the work on the pipeline, Dellinger said that two pump stations are being upgraded.
Dellinger told Lake County News that project contractor Preston Pipeline Inc. has completed close to 30 percent of the pipeline installation, which stretches over 4.9 miles.
He said Preston Pipeline will continue to work on the project as long as the dry weather holds out. If storms arrive and the ground becomes saturated, he anticipated they will have to shut down for a time.
Project could stall over easement issue
Dellinger told the supervisors the project is facing a hurdle in that Special Districts needs to acquire the right-of-way for the pipeline in an “expeditious” manner, and hasn’t been able to complete that process.
The issue, Dellinger told the board on Dec. 20, is that while Special Districts has been trying to contact property owners and, in some cases, communicating with them for many months, the owners either haven’t been responsive or are asking for too much money for the easements.
Dellinger said the compensation offered is based on a fair market appraisal by an independent licensed contractor.
“We can’t afford to delay the contractor’s schedule any longer,” he said.
He therefore recommended beginning the process of pursuing eminent domain, which will take several months to complete.
Dellinger’s report to the board explained that the project can be stopped immediately if Special Districts reaches agreement with the property owners.
Supervisor Jeff Smith pointed out that one of the properties is very large, and it’s proposed that the right-of-way run along the property line.
Because they were discussing eminent domain, Smith said it was important to make clear that the county wasn’t talking about taking anyone’s house to help the project move forward.
There was no public comment offered on the resolution, which the board then voted unanimously to approve.
The resolution the board approved said the county must now mail notices to the property owners to notify them of the county’s intent to being the process of using eminent domain.
Dellinger’s report indicated that the county needs to acquire right-of-way from two couples, one in Reno, the other in San Francisco.
On one of the properties, the county is seeking 350 lineal feet that runs behind a supermarket and adjacent to existing easements for other infrastructure, where the goal was to minimize the impact on the property, Dellinger told Lake County News.
On the second property, Dellinger said the county is seeking to acquire 1,300 lineal feet, the largest acquisition in terms of pipe length, which runs along the property line.
One of the San Francisco property owners indicated in a discussion with a Special Districts staffer that the amount of money offered for the easement was low, Dellinger said.
The county so far has not disclosed the amounts offered for the easements.
Dellinger said the county follows the process laid down in law for such acquisitions, and has local appraisers do the valuations.
That same property owner from San Francisco indicated he would be at the Jan. 17 hearing, Dellinger said.
Dellinger said Special Districts has done eminent domain easement acquisitions in the past.
“Sometimes you’re forced to do those kinds of actions,” he said, explaining that usually it’s a matter of the owner disagreeing with the amount of money offered for the property, and other times property could be tied up due to a death.
Cox said the county has used eminent domain so infrequently that he can’t remember the last time it was used, and that it’s never been employed by the Lake County Redevelopment Agency.
“We don’t want to do it for obvious reasons,” he said.
E-mail Elizabeth Larson at
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