Proctor Valley

JUDGE BLOCKS OTAY RANCH DEVELOPMENT, ORDERS COUNTY TO REVERSE APPROVAL DUE TO WILDFIRE DANGERS

By Miriam Raftery, East County Magazine

October 7, 2021 (Proctor Valley) – A San Diego Superior Court judge today ordered the County of San Diego to vacate its 2019 approval of portions of the Otay Ranch Village 14 and Planning Areas 16/19 in Proctor Valley south of Jamul near Chula Vista, due to the danger of wildfires in an area that has already had many severe fires.

Judge Richard S. Whitney found that the County’s environmental impact report failed to assess the increase wildfire risk, nor offer any mitigation to reduce those increased risks if the controversial master-planned community were built. 

California Attorney General Rob Bonta intervened on behalf of the people of California to support a lawsuit filed by environmental groups challenging the project.  Bonta praised the decision, stating, “Today’s ruling by the Superior Court affirms a critical fact: Local governments have a responsibility to address wildfire risks associated with development projects at the front end. Doing so will save dollars—and lives—down the line.”


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LAWSUITS FILED CHALLENGE COUNTY’S APPROVAL OF MASSIVE HOUSING PROJECT IN PROCTOR VALLEY ON FIRE DANGER, ENVIRONMENTAL THREATS

By Miriam Raftery

July 27, 2019 (Proctor Valley) – Last week, San Diego County Supervisors approved the controversial Otay Ranch Village 14 master-planned community in Proctor Valley near Jamul, which passed by a 3-2 vote. 

Now environmental groups have filed lawsuits, hoping a judge will cast the deciding vote to block the project, based on fire danger to residents and threats to wildlife.  A press release issued by the plaintiffs, Center for Biological Diversity, Endangered Habitat League, Sierra Club, California Chaparral Institute, Preserve Wild Santee, and California Native Plant Society, calls the project “a sprawl development that will pave over hundreds of acres of habitat for golden eagles and other imperiled wildlife and build new homes in one of California’s most dangerously fire-prone areas.”


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COUNTY APPROVES CONTROVERSIAL MASTER-PLANNED COMMUNITY IN OTAY RANCH

Ths project site burned in the 2007 Harris wildfire. State Route 94 through Jamul, the main access route, is rated by Cal Fire in the most dangerous 1%  of areas in the state for evacuation during a major fire.
 
By Kendra Sitton
 
June 27, 2019 (Jamul) – San Diego County Supervisors have voted 3-2 to approve a Master Planned Community outside of Otay along Proctor Valley within the Jamul area, known as Village 14 and Planning Areas 16/19. Supervisor Dianne Jacob, who represents Jamul, voted against the plan alongside the only Democrat on the board, Nathan Fletcher during the Wednesday, June 26 meeting.

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READER’S EDITORIAL: SAN DIEGO SUPERVISORS SHOULD JUST SAY NO TO FIRE-TRAP DEVELOPMENTS



By Peter A. Andersen, PhD, and Daniel H. Silver, MD

Photos by Miriam Raftery:  State Route 94, the primary evacuation route for Proctor Valley and communities from Jamul south to Barrett Junction, has been previously shut down for hours or even days by the Harris Wildfire, flooding, and serious accidents.  A Border Patrol station, casino and high school along the highway (not shown) all add to traffic back-ups and congestion at peak times, drawing frequent complaints from residents in recent years.

May 23, 2019 (Jamul/Proctor Valley) -- Deadly fires scorched California in 2017 and 2018, destroying thousands of homes and killing 44 people in wine country and 86 in Paradise. Emergency warning and evacuation systems failed. People burned in their cars trying to escape the flames. Homes built to new fire-safe building codes burned anyway in the intense heat. Rapidly moving fires overwhelmed safety systems and careful planning.

The County Board of Supervisors will vote in June whether to approve a major housing development in Jamul, a community already ranked in the bottom 1% of hard-to-evacuate locations in the state. What will convince the Board to apply the lessons of the massive northern California fires to local land-use decisions? At what point does willful ignorance of the risks become negligence?


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JAMUL-DULZURA PLANNING GROUP WORRIED ABOUT TRAFFIC, SEWER LINES AS COUNTY PROPOSES MAJOR HOUSING PROJECT IN PROCTOR VALLEY

 

By Kendra Sitton

March 29, 2018 (Jamul) -- The latest Jamul-Dulzura Planning Meeting on Tues., March 27 was dominated with discussion about a proposed development on Village 14, Planning Areas 15 and 19. The proposal would bring over a thousand new homes into an unincorporated area of 6,163 people, as of the last census.


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Support community news in the public interest! As nonprofit news, we rely on donations from the public to fund our reporting -- not special interests. Please donate to sustain East County Magazine's local reporting and/or wildfire alerts at https://www.eastcountymedia.org/donate to help us keep people safe and informed across our region.