Community's Argument Against Secure Self Storage Facility Fell On Deaf Ears

On April 9, 2025, three members of the Board of Supervisors "listened" as resident after resident gave one valid argument after another why the Supervisors should throw out the Secure Self Storage plan. I wrote about the meeting in detail the day after the event in "Supervisors Support Developer Over Bonita Residents."

Sweetwater Community Planning Group Chair Felix Felix provided me with the following presentation to share with you all. It was presented to the Board of Supervisors by SCPG members Michael Garrod, Felix Felix and John Taylor.

Please click on the Title Page (first image) to enlarge it and then you can read through the entire presentation by just tapping on the right arrow.

Slide 2 lays out the required findings that are vital for the Board of Supervisors to follow. They did not. The harmony aspect was completely ignored. The scale could best be represented by looking at the length and width of four football fields.

As far as density, the Secure Self Storage (189,873SF) dwarfs both the Bonita Golf Course (30,000SF) and the County Animal Shelter (25,000SF). The Secure Self Storage is in reality three times (3X) the size of those two amenities together.

The County Staff was disingenuous in stating the Secure Self Storage project covered only 40% of the property. The truth is that it will cover 87% of the land and that is against the County's own rules.

The Secure Self Storage suits were not truthful in saying all the Bonita residents "loved and wanted" the storage facility. All? Let's try NONE. We have 35 storage buildings in a 5-mile radius of Bonita. I feel safe in saying that our community will not be using this new one. Tim Karp (InSite Manager, paid to find location sites) had a slip of the tongue and told us the storage was primarily for the use of the Spring Valley Swap Meet vendors, not Bonita residents.

No enhancement going on here. Just the destruction of a peaceful, four-home rural neighborhood.

This Secure Self Storage project violates the Sweetwater Community Plan, written by San Diego County into its General Plan. With the size and scope of the Secure Self Storage project, as it definitely falls into the INDUSTRIAL category.

Page 10 of the General Plan reads "INDUSTRIAL GOAL DEVELOPMENT OF SITES FOR INDUSTRIAL OR MANUFACTURING USES SHALL BE STRONGLY DISCOURAGED BECAUSE OF THE ADVERSE IMPACTS OF SUCH USES ON THE RURAL RESIDENTIAL NATURE OF THE SWEETWATER VALLEY | FINDINGS: No industrial or manufacturing exists currently in the CPA and no land has been set aside for industrial uses | POLICIES AND RECOMMENDATIONS: Requests for industrial plan designations shall be strongly discouraged."

Even though this fact was pointed out to the Board of Supervisors again and again, they conveniently chose to ignore it.

The Sweetwater Community Planning Group unanimously voted to DENY this Secure Self Storage project and unanimously voted to APPEAL this project after the San Diego Planning Commission approved it.

After Spring Valley Community Planning Group wrote their letter of support to DENY the project, the Board of Supervisors basically turned a deaf ear to TWO SAN DIEGO COUNTY PLANNING GROUPS representing over 50,000 residents.

With all its recreational amenities, Bonita is affectionally known as "the Balboa Park of the South Bay". This project effectively cuts off a crucial existing leg of horse trail that connects to a main trail. Secure Self Storage staff bragged about its "saving of the horse trail" but no equestrian in their right mind would attempt to ride their horse through that long, blind corridor along a 3-story building. Not one.

The Sweetwater Community Planning Group asked for a few considerations on Slide 8. They were tossed away as quickly as the speed in which the vote was taken. There was no pondering of the facts, no contemplation and certainly no deliberation. It was as if someone or something had convinced them of the certainty of their votes before the discussion even began.

These are the three Supervisors in chambers and presiding that gloomy day.

Please remember their names and their faces as these were the "custodial gatekeepers" who threw open those gates for future Industrial Development in our formerly bucolic community of Bonita.

I doubt that they even gave it a second thought . . . or to the four rural-residential, single-family homes whose neighborhood they destroyed, forever.

Return to Main Page