September 24, 2024

Yucaipa City Council

Re: Warehouses in Live Oak Canyon

It’s the same old story: out-of-town developers trying to poop in our back yards. In this case the poop is warehouses in Live Oak Canyon.

The results of the Monday night Yucaipa City Council meeting was a step in the right direction thanks to councilmembers: Justin Beaver Chris Venable, and Matt Garner. All three voted to kick the can down the road regarding the approval of the warehouse plan. That’s a first step. However, the council refused to require a 17-year-old and outdated EIR be scrapped in favor of a developing a meaningful report.

The other councilmembers need to go. A recall effort to remove Bobby Duncan and Jon Thorp should move forward. Their comments and their vote to approve warehouses are a clear indication they are in the pocket of the warehouse developers and out of touch with their constituents.

The city council meeting was a clear indication of how the residents of Yucaipa feel about warehouse development. And their neighbors in Live Oak Canyon feel the same way. In what was likely a record turnout for a council meeting with the overflow-room full and standing room only which ran over into the hallway, all but about twenty opposed the warehouses. None of the supporters were local residents. The three warehouse developers, Palmers, Robinsons, and Issa families (corporations) all brought in family members from as far away as Huntington Beach and Florida to support their warehouses. None of them are local residents and they all have nothing but financial interest in their respective developments. Mr. Issa, identified himself to the council when he spoke as living on Live Oak Canyon Road. Fact is, he lives in Miami, Florida. Then there were the union construction workers all posing in their high-visibility vests and insisting that they needed jobs to survive—jobs to build warehouses that would kill residents with the added air pollution from 700+ diesel trucks daily in addition to the hundreds of workers driving in and out. What nonsense! I’ve seen ploys by developers for over forty years to sway the vote at county and city council hearings by staging support. This one was one for the ages. Gotta hand it to you, Pacific Oaks Development, you’re good!

Nearly 200 residents and neighbors made their opposition to warehouses evident. Dozens of them spoke about, air pollution, loss of natural habitat, the end of rural Yucaipa, traffic, visual blight, etc. Nearly a half-dozen local physicians spoke to the health risks of diesel fumes, especially increased cancer rates. Two things were never properly addressed that are critical considerations: runoff and real visibility.

Visibility:

Mayor Beaver and others repeatedly mentioned that the first phase of the warehouses (Palmer Corp.) was appropriately designed to be hidden from view by tucking the massive Amazon-like warehouses into the hills of Live Oak Canyon. What Mayor Beaver and the others fail to understand is that they will not be out of view. Hikers, mountain-bike riders, and equestrians who ride the trails on the plateau atop Live Canyon on Redlands Conservancy lands will see them clearly. And all the wildlife living there will surely see them! Furthermore, the effects of the warehouse with several hundred thousand big rig trucks annually jamming our traffic all over the valley will surely be visible. And speaking of visibility, I chuckled when the city’s PowerPoint report showed us architectural renditions of the proposed warehouses themselves. The city planner commented how good the structures would look with their little barn-shaped roof detail designed to appear rural. Did he really think the people of Yucaipa would buy such nonsense? You really think a little striping detail on the side on a 50-foot-tall warehouse would lead us to believe we were still in the country? Come on! Ask the residents in Cherry Valley if their new warehouse with the wood water-tank and windmill out front makes them feel like they’re still living in the country as they drive past that monstrosity every day. Who said it, “If you put lipstick on a pig, it’s still a pig!”

Runoff:

Nobody mentioned last night anything about the catastrophic effects of the runoff from the warehouses into the Live Oak Canyon riverbed. For decades, the overbuilding in Yucaipa has steadily increased the storm runoff in the canyon resulting in significant erosion of the canyon walls. The erosion got so bad that years ago Live Oak Canyon road was rerouted away from the river to keep the road from falling into the riverbed. Residents here have for decades been hauling fill-dirt to shore up the banks of the river and secure their homes from toppling 40 feet into the riverbed as well. One housing development in particular here in the canyon relies on a 75-year-old rickety steel, one-lane bridge as their only access to their homes across the riverbed. It’s already a constant struggle to keep the bridge from washing out. Increased flow from square miles of warehouse rooftops and parking lots will surely result in losing that bridge. And because a new bridge would have to be built to modern codes, those residents would never be able to afford another bridge and forever lose access to their homes. Currently, all that land in Live Oak Canyon in its natural state absorbs most of the rainfall. Replace that soil, trees, and shrubs with concrete and you have a formula for disaster.

The council mentioned serval times the need for future town hall meetings to get feedback from their constituents. Are you kidding? Haven’t you heard enough? You received nearly a thousand letters and emails prior to the council meeting opposing warehouses. You heard from your residents and neighbors last night in force voicing their opposition. You heard from a number of local organizations: two Yucaipa citizen groups, the Save Live Oak Canyon group, the Friends of Live Oak Canyon non-profit homeowners organization. the Redlands Conservancy, etc. What more do you need to hear? Are you hard-of-hearing? When I hear the council say they need more feedback, I know it’s a signal that they’re trying again to kick the can further down the road. I know that you are just trying to stretch out the process and wear down your constituents until you can quietly pass the warehouses proposal when they aren’t looking?

By the way, all that talk last night, including a roll-call testimony by each council member, about how they took input from all their stakeholders. You know that’s not true! None of the groups that spoke last night, including the two Live Oak Canyon homeowner groups were ever consulted. If you had, you would have received a copy of the “Bixler report” to document the natural resources of the factual Live Oak Canyon you propose to destroy.

EIR:

Your EIR is outdated and will assuredly be tossed out if litigation becomes necessary on this matter. You should have never approved it last night! Not only is it seriously dated, it’s seriously flawed because it failed to include any site specific (onsite) survey of the biotic resources of Live Oak Canyon. Only one study of the biotic resources of Live Oak Canyon has ever been conducted, Survey of the Biotic Resources of Live Oak Canyon by nationally renowned environmental biologist, Professor David Bixler. (If you had contacted the Friend of Live Oak Canyon, I would have supplied you with a copy.) Bixler’s conclusions included a recommendation that in order to preserve the many rare and endangered species of plants and animals, development be restricted to no more that 1 home per 5 acres. That specific ratio is what Redlands has traditionally adhered to. And that brings up my final point. You must consider Live Oak Canyon in its entirety. Our canyon stretches out for approximately 4 miles. Within that span of road between I-10 and San Timoteo Canyon, lies 5 jurisdictions: 2 counties and 3 cities. To complicate the matter the jurisdictions are not simply contiguous, but checker-boarded. Consequently, whatever you do in the Yucaipa portion of Live Oak Canyon, directly affects our residents in all the other jurisdictions.

To the citizens of Yucaipa, I say we are with you and support your efforts to stop warehouses in Live Oak Canyon. Not just slow them down, stop them! None—zero warehouses in Live Oak Canyon! Whether you can see them or not, they are there and we will all live with the side effects for the rest of our lives. Last night, the city asserted that those red areas on their development map required warehouses. But, the woman who spoke during public comment refuted that. She should know. She was a member of the city’s committee that developed that map. She insisted that those red areas for warehouses were actually intended for light-industry, “like a Costco or Trader Joes.” So, that gives the city council some wiggle-room to re-think those areas entirely.

Several of the city council members took a step in the right direction last night, including Mayor Beaver, by voting down the warehouse proposal and sending it back for reconsideration and redevelopment. Three steps are necessary to move the warehouse proposal forward:

1. For the first time to listen to all your constituents and neighbors here in Live Oak Canyon. We are most affected by your actions.
2. Arrange for a new EIR.
3. Move forward on the recall of Councilmembers Jon Thorp and Bobby Duncan, especially Jon Thorp.

Respectfully,

David Matuszak, president

Friends of Live Oak Canyon

and coordinator,

Friends of Live Oak Canyon Firewise Community