The Property
Whispering Hills is building Whispering Hills Estates, a 356 acre development consisting of a gated planned community of 155 single family homes and a high school site, located in the southeastern portion of the City of San Juan Capistrano (City). SDG&E owns land in a transmission corridor that bisects the proposed development. SDG&E power lines (138kV and 12 kV) are located on the transmission corridor. According to SDG&E, Whispering Hills needs to have the power lines relocated to accommodate its development by providing room for building homes and the high school.
In order to accommodate the needs of Whispering Hills, SDG&E proposes to temporarily relocate its power lines, allowing Whispering Hills to grade a street.1 After the street is graded, SDG&E's lines would then be relocated to a permanent location, in part undergrounded in the new street.
In addition to the physical relocation of the power lines, SDG&E proposes to sell approximately 14 acres of land to Whispering Hills, and receive back from Whispering Hills easements for access to its power lines.2
Before us today is the proposed sale of SDG&E land to Whispering Hills. In exchange for the land, SDG&E would receive easements for its power lines, plus a monetary payment of $287,967 that would flow to both ratepayers and shareholders pursuant to D.05-04-007. Whispering Hills is to pay the entire cost of relocating SDG&E's transmission and distribution lines. Unfortunately, we have determined that the transaction as presented by SDG&E fails to accomplish this, and in fact burdens SDG&E ratepayers and shareholders with part of the relocation cost.
1 We granted the request to allow grading in D.05-04-007.
2 A map is attached as Attachment A. (From SDG&E's 9/2/05 Motion, Tab 2.) While the record has some minor variations in the numbers, the attached map shows SDG&E selling 13.82 acres of land and receiving 13.52 acres in easements.
