Residents raise concerns over proposed Elsinore Heights Industrial Project

Lake Elsinore residents packed the July 28 City Council meeting to voice concerns about the proposed Elsinore Heights Industrial Project.

Public comments focused on one development option under the proposed project that includes a data center, though city officials said no project has been approved and the proposal remains under environmental review.

Advertisement

The proposed Elsinore Heights Industrial Project would redevelop about 61.02 acres near Camino Del Norte and Second Street. According to the city’s Notice of Preparation for an Environmental Impact Report, the proposal includes two development options on approximately 47.7 acres of the site.

One option would include four warehouse buildings totaling about 555,060 square feet. The other would replace one warehouse with a data center while keeping the same overall building square footage. The proposal also includes roadway, drainage and utility improvements, as well as land reserved for up to 61 future homes. Before any development could move forward, the project would require several city approvals, including a General Plan amendment, rezoning and other land use entitlements. 

Nicole Dailey, speaking on behalf of the Elsinore Heights Project Team, said the project is still in the early stages of environmental review and that a data center is only one of the options being studied. 

“To be clear, no data center project has been proposed,” Daily said. “Rather, the potential data center use was included in our notice as a secondary option to typical industrial uses. We did this to disclose it openly and early so that potential impacts could be looked at as part of our EIR process.”

Residents who spoke during the public comment said they were concerned about the amount of electricity and water a data center could require, along with potential noise, environmental impacts and effects on surrounding neighborhoods.

“Large warehouses and data centers throughout our hillsides should not, in my opinion, be the vision that the city has for the city of Lake Elsinore,” resident Eulene Greenwood said. “Data centers use millions of gallons of water per year, increasing demand on local water supplies and ultimately increasing the cost of our water.”

“I understand that it’s not necessarily coming, but we all fear that it’s coming,” resident Jennifer Hamm said. “I hope that you can stick to the promise that you made to dream extreme and your responsibility to care for this community.”

Lake Elsinore Valley Chamber of Commerce President and CEO Kim Davidson spoke in support of the project applicant V22 Investments, saying the company has met regularly with the chamber over the past four years to discuss community priorities.

“Our discussions have focused on community benefits, infrastructure, economic development, and the long-term welfare of our city,” Davidson said. “The project is still in the environmental review and evaluation phase, with specialists carefully assessing its feasibility and appropriateness for Lake Elsinore.”

Councilmember Steve Manos later addressed many of the concerns raised during public comment.

“This is not a city project,” Manos said. “This is not an initiative that the city asked for or brought to the city. This is a property owner who wants to do something with the property.”

Manos said the city is required to accept a complete application and hire independent professionals, paid for by the applicant, to study the project’s potential impacts before the Planning Commission and City Council consider the project.

Manos also explained that council members cannot publicly take a position on a project while it is pending because they serve in a quasi-judicial role.

“We’re not allowed to come out and say whether we’re for or against something, especially as a pending application here within the city,” he said.

Manos said the city has not been approached by a specific company seeking to build a data center at the site and that no end user has been identified.

“Quite frankly, as far as I know, there’s no end user,” Manos said. “No data center is in the region. Nobody has approached the city in terms of putting a data center here. This is a property owner who does not intend to build anything, entitling a project, trying to go ahead and prepare it to sell it to somebody to go ahead and build something.”

Mayor Bob Magee reminded residents there will be additional opportunities to comment once the draft Environmental Impact Report is released for public review.

“It’s very important, once that comes out, you have 45 days to respond in writing to all of your concerns about the project,” Magee said. “The applicant is then required to address every single comment.”