Escondido Approves a 782-Unit Housing Project on 3-2 Vote

A 782-unit residential project on the northeast side of Escondido was approved by the Escondido City Council after the developer promised that most of the homes will not be visible from the neighboring Escondido Country Club neighborhood.

The approval came in a 3-2 vote by the Escondido City Council on Wednesday night, after previous approval by the city’s Planning Commission.

The project, proposed by Prima Development Corp. of San Diego, is spread out over 980 acres of rolling hills, but most of the housing will be concentrated on a mesa and will be unseen from off the property, project planner Jeanette Waltz said.

The development calls for 726 units--duplexes and single-family homes--to be built on 42-foot-by-100-foot lots, she said. The other 56 homes will be on estate-size lots of at least two acres.

Project Scaled Down

The proposed project previously had planned for 510 units with a golf course, and later for more than 800 homes. The golf course was dropped because of the amount of hillside excavation and water it would have required, and the project was scaled down after objections from Escondido Country Club residents, city officials said.

Councilwoman Doris Thurston, who along with Councilman Jerry Harmon opposed the project, complained that the majority of the council “portrayed an insensitivity to the desires of the citizens of Escondido” by approving a project as large as this one, given concerns about school overcrowding, traffic congestion and fire protection in the remote area.

Mayor Jim Rady, on the other hand, said the project was acceptable because “the hillsides around the area will be left pristine” and because street improvements to handle increased traffic in the area will be made before the project is built.

“The alternative to the project was fewer homes--in which case they would have land-banked the land and, at some later time, a project would have been proposed with even greater density, which a different City Council would have approved,” Rady said. “For this project, we looked for quality, and that’s what we’ve got.”

Meets Zoning Code

Rady noted that the city’s current zoning allows for the project since it will average less than one home per acre. But Thurston countered that 80% of the land is undevelopable because of the hilly terrain.

“It wasn’t altruism on the developer’s part,” she said. “He wanted to squeeze in as many homes as he could” on the remaining buildable land, “irrespective of the impacts on growth.”

The project area is bounded by Richland Road, El Norte Parkway and the Escondido Country Club development. The project will be served by two access roads: Bougher Road onto El Norte Parkway on the south, and the frontage road alongside Interstate 15 to the north.

Construction is at least a year off and the project will be constructed in phases over about 10 years, Waltz said.

Escondido Fire Chief Bob Watts recommended that the homes have interior fire sprinklers because of the distance between the project and the nearest fire station, but Primo objected because of the cost and the council took no action on the suggestion.