The San Diego chapter of the Sierra Club has filed a lawsuit challenging San Diego County’s approval of the Greenhills Ranch sprawl project, a proposed development in fire-prone rural Lakeside. The lawsuit was filed July 3.
The East County area has been designated by CalFire as a very high fire danger zone and is located far from public transportation and amenities that would pose a danger to residents and wildlife.
David Hogan, chair of the San Diego Chapter’s Legal Committee, issued the following statement:
“Greenhills Ranch is a textbook example of wasteful sprawl on open space in a fire-prone area. The Sierra Club supports genuine infill projects that are close to transportation services and provide affordable housing. This project offers neither.”
Sierra Club attorney Josh Chatten-Brown believes the county made a mistake in using the term “infill,” which is typically reserved for climate- and land-friendly developments to justify approval.
“Far from an infill project, this is a sparsely populated, car-dependent development that will only lead to traffic congestion, air pollution and expose residents to unnecessary risk from wildfires.”
In addition, the lawsuit, filed under the California Environmental Quality Act, alleges that the project poses a threat to several species of rare wildlife in the core Lake Jennings/Wildcat Canyon biological resource area, including the coastal cactus wren and the California gnatcatcher.
Chapter President Lisa Ross stated:
“San Diego is a national biodiversity hotspot. The Sierra Club supports development that respects the county’s widely accepted conservation goals. Greenhills Ranch would violate not only the spirit but also the law that protects San Diego’s unique habitat.”
About the Sierra Club:
The San Diego Chapter of the Sierra Club is San Diego’s oldest and largest grassroots environmental organization. It covers San Diego and Imperial counties and has more than 13,000 members. Founded in 1948, the San Diego Chapter seeks to preserve the special nature of the San Diego and Imperial Valley areas through grassroots activism, public education, lobbying, and legal action. The Sierra Club is America’s largest and most influential grassroots environmental organization, with more than 3 million members and supporters in all 50 states and Puerto Rico.
