The Peaks Subdivision Appeal
Redding City Council will hear an appeal of a decision by the Redding Planning Commission to approve a subdivision off Quartz Hill Road. The hearing will be held on Thursday, December 4, at 5:30 PM, at Redding City Council Chambers.
The commissioners approved a 122-home subdivision that the City of Redding is developing, with a grant from HUD, called The Peaks, west of where residents currently live. Area residents’ primary concern is fire safety. There was great difficulty in evacuating the neighborhood during Carr Fire due to massive, long traffic jams. They are also concerned about the changes that a new subdivision will bring to their neighborhood from so many more homes in a natural area, including increased noise, and urbanization.
Shasta Chapter CNPS objected to the project because the required California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) protocols for protected plants and animals were not followed in the biological surveys. As is far too common in Shasta County, and especially in the City of Redding, plant surveys are often conducted when the protected plants are not blooming. The City Planning Division frequently states that plant surveys will be done before construction. This does not follow CEQA; surveys should be done before projects are approved. If surveys are done after approval, they will be hidden from the public and will leave a certain pressure on the consultant to not find any protected species that would delay the project or require mitigation. The plant survey for The Peaks project also did not list many common wetland plant species, indicating further that the biologists were not looking for the protected species.
A previous survey of the area used to support the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) document stated that the project site has no habitat for monarch butterflies, and that the on-site streams are ephemeral streams (a stream that only runs during a rain storm or for a few days afterwards). In October, I found standing pools of water in the stream and many wetland plants thriving. A walk of the area turned up several hundred showy milkweeds (Asclepias speciosa), the host plant for the monarch butterfly. The City may have completed a revised NEPA study to address the glaring errors, but I have not been able to obtain it.
While the Shasta Chapter CNPS and I are listed as interested parties with the Planning Department, and I gave written and oral comments at the hearing, we were given no notice of this appeal. You can make written comments to the City Council here: cityclerk@cityofredding.org or go to the City Clerk website and comment directly to each council member. Mention “The Peaks Subdivision | S-2025-00613/APPL-2025-01438,” or just “The Peaks Subdivision Appeal.”
~David Ledger, Conservation Chair