New Wildomar Housing Development Hits Road Blocks

Wildomar City Council was set to vote Wednesday night on whether to approve a residential and commercial development off Bundy Canyon Road, but concerns -- including unease over storm water runoff and sewer service -- prompted a continuance to April 23.

The Oak Creek Canyon project calls for 275 single-family homes and a five-acre commercial center to be constructed near The Farm community on Wildomar’s northeast side. The developer on the project is Sunbelt Communities.

Project consultant Larry Markham, who is representing Sunbelt, told council members his client wanted the continuance in order to address the recent project concerns, including one from the Santa Ana Regional Quality Control Board.

In a March 27 email to the city from the Board’s Senior Environmental Scientist, the agency claims it was not made aware of the draft environmental impact report.

“As an oversight, apparently the City’s, the DEIR had not been circulated to this office for review and comments, a fact that Staff became aware of yesterday,” the letter read.

The EIR was finalized in February.

The Board is concerned about impacts on water quality caused by the Oak Creek Canyon project as well as proposed improvements on Bundy Canyon Road, according to a March 26 letter to the city from the Board’s chief of Regional Planning Programs, Mark G. Adelson.

“These combined projects will have cumulative impacts on the beneficial uses of waters of the state that may not have been adequately disclosed or analyzed,” Adelson’s letter reads.

Temecula-based attorney Ray Johnson represents plaintiff environmental groups, and he also expressed concerns about the project via written correspondence dated March 27. He argues that, based on the EIR, the project would cause “immense environmental harm” with “minimal economic benefits.”

Under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), such a project would be subject to a “Statement of Overriding Considerations.” Johnson claims there would not be enough evidence to support a statement given the “minimal benefits compared to the project’s enormous environmental effects.”

Among the long list of concerns Johnson cited in his letter, he writes that the EIR determined the project would alter existing storm water drainage and “may impact storm water runoff rates and volumes compared to existing conditions.”

Yet the EIR determined the impact to be insignificant, Johnson criticized.

Attorney Christopher Nelson of Hemet-based Thompson & Associates was on hand for Wednesday night’s meeting. He represents the Umbrell family who live adjacent to the north boundary of the Oak Creek Canyon project. He said his clients are in favor of the project but they object to the impact the development would have on storm water runoff. According to Nelson, storm water already runs through the Umbrell property. He argued that, because the project calls for increasing the size of culverts under Bundy Canyon Road, there would be increased water on the Umbrell property, as well as other downstream parcels.

“Both the draft EIR and the final EIR seem unable to grasp (or intentionally conceal) the concept that larger flows in one location will cause flooding in downstream locations …,” Nelson wrote in a March 27 letter to the city.

In response to such concerns, Markham and his hired consultants reiterated that due diligence has been properly performed on the project. However, Markham said his team wanted to spend time researching the most recent concerns, including those from The Farm residents.

Jan MacKenzie is one of them. She expressed concerns about The Farm Mutual Water Company’s ability to serve the 275 residences proposed for Oak Creek Canyon, and she worried that the sewer line proposed for the project may not be adequate.

The Farm Mutual Water Company currently provides water and sewer services for the nearly 1,200 existing homes in The Farm. The small company would also provide water service for Oak Creek Canyon. Elsinore Valley Municipal Water District would provide sewer services for the proposed new development provided the developer lay needed pipe.  

The Farm Mutual Water Company is a small entity, and hence its technologies are not the most advanced. The company treats sewage onsite and utilizes a vacant field off Bundy Canyon to spray waste generated by The Farm residents. If The Farm community were to hook into the proposed sewer pipe instead, all residents in the area would be spared foul odors that are particularly bad during summer months, MacKenzie said.

The Farm Mutual Water Company has a monopoly in her neighborhood, MacKenzie continued, adding that she prefers to give the business to EVMWD instead.

“I would like to connect to a monopoly that is working in the 21st century,” she said.

The Farm resident George Taylor said he supports the Oak Creek Canyon project, but he expressed concerns about the sewer pipe, which is proposed to be 10 inches in diameter. He wanted written assurances that the pipe is large enough to handle sewage from the new development, as well as waste from any other tracts or properties along Bundy Canyon that choose to hook into the system.

“Is it going to be large enough to support the effort?” he asked.

Council members were generally quiet Wednesday night, although Councilman Bob Cashman expressed several concerns. Speaking via conference call from Hawaii, Cashman said he worried the Oak Creek Canyon development may not be economically viable for Wildomar. A five-acre commercial center is proposed in the development, which would bring sales tax revenues to the city. But if the center did not come to fruition, Cashman wondered whether the development made economic sense given the city has to provide public services, such as police and fire, to the new community.

Mayor Tim Walker countered that development is needed in the city.

“It’s a win-win for all of us,” he said.