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OPTION 1

To: nora.vargas@sdcounty.ca.gov, terra.lawson-remer@sdcounty.ca.gov, joel.anderson@sdcounty.ca.gov, monica.montgomerysteppe@sdcounty.ca.gov, Jim.Desmond@sdcounty.ca.gov, MaykentL.Salazar@sdcounty.ca.gov, Gregory.Kazmer@sdcounty.ca.gov, Jeffrey.Yuen@sdcounty.ca.gov, Eric.Henson@sdcounty.ca.gov, Hunter.McDonald@sdcounty.ca.gov, Rebecca.Smith2@sdcounty.ca.gov, Dahvia.Lynch@sdcounty.ca.gov, amy.harbert@sdcounty.ca.gov, Mark.Slovick@sdcounty.ca.gov, efhgtc@gmail.com, Bianca.Lorenzana@sdcounty.ca.gov, Montagne@rsf-fire.org, mcquead@rsf-fire.org

Subject: Don't let past supervisors' mistakes dictate the safety of our fire-prone community. 

Message: 

Honorable Supervisors and Fire District:

The previous Board of Supervisors voted to approve HGVS project despite the clear guidance from independent experts that this would make evacuation extremely dangerous. The country roads in Elfin Forest, Harmony Grove, and Eden Valley are beautiful but also narrow, winding two-lane roads lined with dense vegetation and chaparral. Adding the traffic from HGVS would make evacuation during a wildfire practically impossible.

The Cocos Fire of 2014 really scared those of us who were around at the time. People were stuck in standstill traffic on both ends of the valley, with some barely making it out before the fire reached their neighborhoods. Since then, the Harmony Grove Village project was built (which was supported by the community on the condition that this would be the last large project to limit our evacuation hazard and wildfire risks). If the HGV South project is approved there will be six times more cars evacuating but no new road capacity. Something like 3500 vehicles will pack onto two-lane roads trying to escape a fire. It would take 7 hours to evacuate everyone. Hopefully, a nearby fire would overwhelm the community in less than 2 hours.

What you may not know is that this community has weathered dozens of major wildfires, on average every four years since the 1980s. We’ve lost many homes over the years and even a neighbor who was killed trying to escape the Harmony Grove fire. It’s hard to understand how this project could move forward without adequate fire safety measures in place, such as a secondary evacuation route and expanded road capacity.

The County and Fire District supported this project, despite it requiring a waiver of fire safety standards (secondary egress requirement), feels like a betrayal.  We’re already at risk given the growth we’ve seen in the past decade (more than double the housing).  Approving HGVS would push us over the edge. It risks turning our community into the next Maui or Paradise, where evacuating isn’t even an option because of the overwhelming number of vehicles and insufficient infrastructure.

Please, the last Board got it wrong. I urge you to vote no on this dangerous project, or at the very least require a thorough new fire safety analysis and demand a secondary egress. Our lives depend on it.

Sincerely,

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OPTION 2

To: nora.vargas@sdcounty.ca.gov, terra.lawson-remer@sdcounty.ca.gov, joel.anderson@sdcounty.ca.gov, monica.montgomerysteppe@sdcounty.ca.gov, Jim.Desmond@sdcounty.ca.gov, MaykentL.Salazar@sdcounty.ca.gov, Gregory.Kazmer@sdcounty.ca.gov, Jeffrey.Yuen@sdcounty.ca.gov, Eric.Henson@sdcounty.ca.gov, Hunter.McDonald@sdcounty.ca.gov, Rebecca.Smith2@sdcounty.ca.gov, Dahvia.Lynch@sdcounty.ca.gov, amy.harbert@sdcounty.ca.gov, Mark.Slovick@sdcounty.ca.gov, efhgtc@gmail.com, Bianca.Lorenzana@sdcounty.ca.gov, Montagne@rsf-fire.org, mcquead@rsf-fire.org

Subject: Harmony Grove Village South is a firetrap. You have the power to fix it. 

Message: 

Dear Supervisors and Fire District,

This project was approved by the last Board of Supervisors and staff in 2018. After the community and environmental groups sued the County and the developer, it was rescinded and the new board wisely chose not to appeal. Since then, much has changed. The wildfire landscape in California has gotten dramatically worse. The County issued new guidelines and a new Climate Action Plan that specifically avoids development in Very High Fire Severity Zones. This project violates all of that.

The state Attorney General weighed in on similar projects, questioning the wisdom of placing more homes in the “wildland urban interface.”  The AG also issued new guidelines. All of these things would negate the project. However, the County seems intent on moving forward.  

 

Wildfires have become far more intense and frequent, and this year we’ve already crossed the million-acre mark. CalFire has even reclassified our entire area, including the proposed development, as a Very High Fire Severity Zone. It’s clear that our valley is in more danger than ever, and yet this project doesn’t account for those growing risks.

Our community has put together a wildfire evacuation plan, and it’s clear that any new development would need to incorporate it into their planning. But HGV South seems to completely ignore that.  The fact that the County already rejected Lilac Hills Ranch in Valley Center because of inadequate evacuation routes should be telling. That project had multiple ways out—this one only has one. 

We understand that housing is needed and our community has dutifully accepted a more than doubling of housing in our community via the HGV project which we all supported. We testified in support of that project because the County promised us that this would be our contribution and that that would be it. Now, in retrospect, it seems as if HGVS was already foreseen despite the promised to the contrary. 

Please do the right thing and vote against this project. The risks are too high for all of us.

Sincerely,