Annexation of Gypsum Canyon OKd

The City Council on Tuesday quietly passed the final motion that will make the city’s annexation of Gypsum Canyon official.

Passed unanimously by a voice vote, the resolution formally set the terms of the 2,340-acre annexation, which city officials and the Irvine Co.--the canyon’s owners--hope will eventually be the site of an 8,000-home development.

The council’s vote will be official in the next few days, after the Local Agency Formation Commission--the county agency which oversees annexations--receives a copy of the resolution.

The annexation will all but close Anaheim’s battle with the Orange County Board of Supervisors over the canyon. The county wanted the site for a new jail, but that proposal ran into trouble in May when county voters overwhelmingly rejected a measure that would have imposed a half-cent sales tax to finance its construction.

The supervisors officially abandoned the jail plan last month, after spending $7.3 million in the past four years trying to get the site.

The supervisors could still try to turn the canyon into a landfill, but a county lawsuit challenging the housing development has stalled and the board has indicated it will eventually drop the landfill plans.

A lawsuit filed by the Fullerton-based Friends of the Tecate Cypress and other environmental groups remains unsettled. The groups charge that the development would harm native plants and animals.

The Irvine Co. says it will take five to 10 years to complete construction of the development.