By Mary-Justine Lanyon
Arrowhead Villas Mutual Service Co. provides a number of services to the homeowners in the community, each of whom has one share in the company. Those services include providing drinking water, trash collection, snow plowing and road maintenance.
AVMSC gets its water from four wells as well as purchasing some from CLAWA. They have been storing the water in a 300,000-gallon water tank which was built 45 years ago in 1981.
Every three to five years, divers have gone down into that tank to check it for leaks. “They have told us,” said Larry Fehrenbach, president of the AVMSC board, “that it is structurally sound but it needs to be taken offline, cleaned and recored (relined).”
Across the street from the big green tank there were two smaller tanks which had been built in the 1920s or 30s. Those old tanks were demolished to make room for two new tanks.
Fehrenbach said they have been trying to get those new tanks built. They had their conditional use permit and were ready to move forward when the pandemic hit. Then everything stopped.
AVMSC is once again ready to move forward. The plan is to put two 170,000-gallon tanks on the site. They have a $200,000 loan in place and the fabricator, Superior Tank, has guaranteed they will finance the rest of the estimated $800,000 project.
Operations Manager Michael Carrillo said they are waiting for the new CUP – the old paperwork expired – and then their building permit. They are scheduled to be on the San Bernardino County Board of Supervisors agenda on Jan. 14, 2027.
“We had to get the process started all over again,” Fehrenbach said. “We’ve done everything with the Land Use Services department. We just need the blessing from the board of supervisors.”
Carrillo and Fehrenbach agreed that there are advantages to the two smaller tanks. They will be easier to control and, should something happen to one, there is a backup.
Fehrenbach added that the additional water will be good if needed for fire protection. “It’s a safety measure,” he said.
AVMSC has a GoFundMe to raise money to help cover the cost of the new tanks: www.gofundme.com/f/support-new-water-tanks-for-arrowhead-villas.
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