Carbon Canyon Road Update from CalTrans

CalTrans District 8 has issued some recent updates concerning the major rehabilitation work ongoing on Carbon Canyon Road (State Route 142) from the Orange/San Bernardino counties line to the 71 Freeway.

One is the construction of a retaining wall at the east end of Sleepy Hollow next to the apartments that were recently red-flagged as unsuitable for occupancy.  After cutting into the hill side, rocks encased in steel mesh have been placed there before the finish work is completed to shore up the hillside. Obviously, CalTrans is concerned that water runoff, despite the drainage channel that runs adjacent to that area, has been a potential hazard to the highway.

The latest advisory, issued last night, concerns a change in hours for work being conducted on Carbon Canyon at Feldspar, one of the two entrances into the Summit Ranch community.  This two-day occurrence involves the closure of one of the two lanes of the highway and will be overnight from 8 p.m. to 5 a.m. starting tonight and going through Friday.  The start time is a few hours than was stated for the project as a whole, so those driving through the area the next couple of nights should expect delays.

Otherwise, there have been plastic reflectors as well as signs with arrows placed at curved areas, such as the S-curve at the summit along the state highway as part of the early stages of the project.  More major updates will be posted as they are issued.

New Tres Hermanos Ranch Lawsuit Filed

As reported Friday by Jason Henry of the San Gabriel Valley Tribune, the City of Industry has filed a new lawsuit against San Gabriel Valley Water and Power, the firm hired by the City's previous administration to develop a solar farm on Tres Hermanos Ranch.

With the ranch recently turned over to a new joint powers authority after Industry sold interests in the nearly 2,500-acre parcel, which is the last large undeveloped property in our area, to the cities of Chino Hills and Diamond Bar, legal battles continue between Industry and SGVWP.

Specifically, Industry is seeking the return of $20 million advanced to SGVWP for the project, alleging the funds were secured through false pretenses and stating that the firm has not forwarded evidence of any efforts expended for the project.

A portion of Tres Hermanos Ranch looking southwest from Chino Hills, 25 March 2019.

The City also claims that the utility company is concealing material that would show money was used for the benefit of the firm and contractors it hired, not for required reports and studies.  It added that invoices were sent to the City, even after the lease was terminated, for work that was actually never done or, if finished, was done so at excessive rates.

Moreover, the suit alleges that SGVWP used funds from the Industry lease on other projects and for personal expenditures of principal William Barkett, who, for instance, owned money to family members and also paid his personal asistant $6,000 a month for filing, bookkeeping and other routine office tasks unrelated to the solar farm project.  The City also claims some of that money is being used by the company in legal fights against it.

It has been about three years since a lease arrangement was made between the two parties for a 450-megawatt solar facility, but the City ended the arrangement and those officials who worked on the deal are no longer working in Industry.  The new partnership with Chino Hills and Diamond Bar included a media event on the ranch to publicly launch the joint powers authority tasked with the management of Tres Hermanos.

More on this issue as it develops and is reported.

Tres Hermanos Ranch History Presentation on 6 May

In light of recent developments involving the nearly 2,500-acre Tres Hermanos Ranch, the last major undevelopment parcel in this area, and a new collaboration between the cities of Chino Hills, Diamond Bar and Industry concerning the future of the ranch, the Chino Hills Historical Society has just issued a press release about an upcoming presentation on the history of Tres Hermanos.

The PowerPoint-illustrated talk will take place on Monday, 6 March at 7 p.m. and be held at the Chino Hills Community Center at 14250 Peyton Drive, across from Ayala High School.  The presentation will talk about the land's use as public land during the pre-American period and then as part of cattle raising by a variety of owners in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

In the 1910s, the tres hermanos, or "three brothers" who were actually good friends, William B. Scott, William R. Rowland, and Harry Chandler acquired a portion of a larger property and named it Tres Hermanos Ranch.  A house was built and these powerful figures in oil, real estate and media used the ranch as a rural vacation spot.

Rowland and Scott died by the early 1930s and Chandler and his descendants continued to own the ranch until it was sold to the City of Industry in 1978.  While there were proposals for a reservoir or a solar farm at Tres Hermanos, the recent agreement between the tres ciudades, or "three cities," including the launch of a new joint powers authority introduces a new chapter in the long-running story of the ranch.

For mre information about this presentation and about the Chino Hills Historical Society, call 909.597.6449 or email chhistory@aol.com.