3. Environmental Review

Because a signal on a fiber optic strand must be amplified, or boosted, approximately every 40 miles and reconstructed, or "cleaned up," every 140 to 200 miles, Williams plans to install the five regenerators at locations in Palmdale, Herald, Claremont, Tulare and Ontario. Earlier, Williams had planned a site in Fontana, but by its amended application filed on June 29, 2001, it substituted the Ontario site for the Fontana one.

A regenerator station houses the electrical equipment that reconstructs and boosts the optical signal. Typical stations consist of three to eight 12x30-foot precast concrete buildings lined up side by side on a concrete pad. Each building comes from the manufacturer equipped with heating, ventilation and air conditioning units to maintain steady temperature for the electronic equipment.

Four of the buildings will be located within fenced areas. Each building will be unstaffed and locked, and will have an overhead security light and a small light over the door. A diesel generator will be installed for emergency back-up power. The Ontario facility will be installed inside an existing commercial building in a strip mall.

When required, each project site individually received a discretionary permit from the appropriate local agencies. When approving a permit, each agency evaluated the regeneration site and its applicability to CEQA. The Herald and Palmdale sites were approved with a CEQA negative declaration by the local agencies. The Tulare and Claremont sites were deemed exempt from CEQA by the local agencies. The Ontario site does not require a discretionary permit from the City of Ontario since it is located entirely within an existing building.

Because the Commission must issue a Certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity for all five sites, we have decided to combine the development of all five stations as one project and reissue a CEQA document integrating all actions together. This review incorporates the previous CEQA reviews and the requirements for conditional use permits imposed by the local agencies.

Based on its assessment of the application, the Commission staff prepared a draft negative declaration generally describing the project and the potential environmental effects. The draft negative declaration was sent to various city and county planning agencies, and public notice of the draft was circulated widely. The draft also was submitted to the Governor's Office of Planning and Research where it was circulated to affected state agencies for review and comment.

Public comments on the draft declaration were reviewed and answered, as necessary. The Commission staff then finalized the negative declaration. The final negative declaration is attached to this decision as Attachment A.