In November 2023, the Orange County Planning Commission approved a Conditional Use Permit (CUP) for an industrial truck storage facility on leased land in unincorporated Brea Canyon. The site lies within the City of Brea’s sphere of influence, and the city has expressed concerns about the project. Despite the fact that natural lands surround the site, the County approved the Project with no environmental review. Hills For Everyone (HFE), founders of Chino Hills State Park and advocates for the Puente–Chino Hills Wildlife Corridor, filed an appeal to the O.C. Board of Supervisors.

HFE, the appellant, stated it believed the truck storage project would harm wildlife and be fundamentally incompatible with surrounding sensitive habitats. The United States Fish and Wildlife Service designated this area as a Critical Habitat for the endangered California Gnatcatcher, which is known to exist nearby.  The land is also documented as a mountain lion habitat. Cougars are protected while they are being considered for listing as a California Endangered Species. HFE identified that the Project is also inconsistent with the conservation values of the Tonner Hills Conservation Easement lands adjacent to the project site. This easement, ironically, was secured by the County itself.

The project also carries the risk of wildfire since it is situated in a Cal Fire-designated Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zone. Since 2016, seven documented wildfires have been along the adjacent 57 Freeway corridor.

Finally, HFE contended that the County’s approval of the Project would violate the law since the County designated this area as a “Wildlife Habitat Area” and did not conduct an environmental review.

In its comments, HFE suggested conditions of approval to make the project less impactful and a better neighbor to the wildlands next door. One suggestion was to limit the hours of operation rather than the approved 24/7 activity. Another was creating a work site where lighting doesn’t spread into the wildlands. Abating the noise during nesting season for the endangered California Gnatcatcher was still another.

The hearing was held on February 27. After testimony by both sides, Supervisor Doug Chaffee, in whose district the project lies, moved to deny the appeal. Supervisors Katrina Foley and Vicente Sarmiento asked numerous questions. Each attempted to diminish the impacts of the project. Among other things, Sarmiento suggested changing it to a Temporary Use Permit so the impacts would not last so long and to do some accounting and monitoring of the various chemicals that are on the site. Supervisor Foley also suggested adding some of the conditions of approval suggested by HFE to make the project less impactful and shorten the CUP. She was particularly concerned that the City of Brea staff had come to the hearing and indicated the City was still feeling ignored by its sister agency, the County.

In the end, Supervisor Chaffee would not accept any changes to his motion to deny the appeal. Thus, the appeal was denied on a 3-2 vote, with Supervisor Do and Supervisor Wagner joining Chaffee. 

During the discussion, Chaffee stated he hoped that the truck storage facility’s use of this site would forestall any housing development on the site so that the land could eventually be saved. However, the County of Orange currently lists the site as an “opportunity site” for its 2023 Housing Element Update. The County has allocated 1,857 housing units there.