More housing is expected to come to Trabuco Canyon after county leaders said there’s nothing they could do to stop the development.
Residents in and around South Orange County’s canyons have been ringing alarm bells that the area already has a high fire risk and building additional homes will only make the area more dangerous.
They’ve argued that adding the 181 planned units to the canyon will only congest El Toro Road if they need to evacuate; El Toro Road is a two-lane street that leads to many of the nearby canyon neighborhoods with one road heading in and one road heading out.
[Read: Orange County Residents Protest Planned Residential Development in Trabuco Canyon]
But Orange County Supervisors argued there’s not much they can do.
The site for the project, referred to as the Saddleback Meadows project, was originally zoned in 1980. In 1988, a tract map outlined a plan to construct 705 residential lots.
Over the next few decades, the project received legal challenges from several environmental groups that ended up reducing the scope of the development down to its current size of 181 residential lots. Settlements from that litigation reduced the total developable space in order to preserve sensitive environmental areas.
During the Board of Supervisors meeting on May 5, county officials denied an appeal that was challenging the project. Supervisors denied the appeal in a 4-0 vote, with Supervisor Vicente Sarmiento abstaining from the vote.
That means the project is still slated to move forward.
It comes after a previous meeting last summer when the board considered and approved the final tract map for the project in another 4-0 vote, with Sarmiento also abstaining.
Supervisor Don Wagner, who represents the district that includes the site for Saddleback Meadows, said former Supervisor Todd Spitzer is to blame.
“The rest of this project, for better or worse, got approved under Todd Spitzer the first time he was here,” Wagner said at the meeting. “And if you don’t like it, you got Todd to blame, because this was approved back in his first term.”
“And, as you heard, it was over 700 homes back then,” Wagner continued. “The project, in response to public input and concern, in response to legal challenges — challenges from the neighbors — has been whittled back quite substantially.”
He said he’s had multiple conversations with the Orange County Fire Authority, who have repeatedly confirmed the project is in compliance with local fire ordinances.
“OCFA and I talked about this just on Friday,” he said. “They promised to re-look at the thing yesterday morning. They looked at it as late as yesterday morning and stand by the analysis that there are no concerns they have with respect to fire danger to change their opinion that this project is a safe one to do.”
Felicia Bryant, fire marshall with OCFA, spoke at the meeting to drive that point home.
“When we reviewed the project in 2022, we were held to the California Fire Code as well as the local ordinances,” Bryant told supervisors. “In our review, we made sure that the submittal met the requirements as required by the state and the local ordinance.”
Sarmiento acknowledged the area is already dangerous before abstaining from the vote.
“As was described by some of the residents, even a small, negligible development could affect things, and it is already a dangerous condition for folks who live there,” he said.
Wagner said it’s also important to approve projects like this to ensure more housing gets built and to avoid any legal repercussions if they were to try and stop the development.
“There are 3,000 homes out there right now, and those residents are saying, ‘Don’t give us 180 more,’” Wagner said. “We need the housing in the state of California. We need the housing in Orange County. No, there’s no affordable component to this, but if we build this housing, it frees up affordable housing.”
According to Orange County’s housing element, state leaders expect the county to create plans to construct 10,406 housing units in unincorporated areas by 2029.
As of December 2025, the county has only zoned for 1,545 units — under 15% — so far.
“It is only a drop in the bucket with respect to what we need,” Wagner said, referring to the 181 units expected for Saddleback Meadows.
The county planning commission approved the project’s use permit to establish some development design standards in January.
Residents groups known as the Saddleback Canyons Conservancy and the Rural Canyons Conservation Fund filed an appeal in February challenging that commission vote.
But the approval stands after supervisors denied the appeal.
“Because we face a legal challenge if we don’t approve it,” Wagner said, “ultimately, there is no real discretion on the part of the Board of Supervisors. That ship sailed.”
Residents also voiced concerns about the project’s environmental review, which was originally completed in 2002 and had two more recent additions since then.
While some residents have called for an updated environmental impact report, leaders say that’s not needed because the project has only gotten smaller since the original review was completed.
“I’ve seen, over the years, this has gone from 705 [units] possibly to 181,” Supervisor Doug Chaffee said at the meeting. “When you deal with impacts, the CEQA [California Environmental Quality Act] approvals were for larger than 181. As you reduce the number of units, the impact goes down, too.”
Gail Mona, a canyon resident who lives in the nearby Portola Hills neighborhood, said she and her neighbors are alarmed at the Board of Supervisors meeting on Tuesday.
“Why are we alarmed?” Mona at the meeting. “Because Trabuco Canyon is now rated an extreme fire hazard severity zone, yet the 24-year-old EIR and more recent addendum does not address this new, extremely hazardous and threatening fire issue.”
She asked county leaders to conduct a new environmental review that takes into account everything that’s changed over the years.
“I hate to say this, but by not approving our appeal and by not requiring an updated or supplemented EIR, the County of Orange, unfortunately, will be setting itself up to host great liability — not if, but when the next canyon wildfire occurs,” Mona said.
“Please keep our canyons safe.”
Environmentalists Protest End to ‘Roadless Rule’ For Orange County Canyons
The Saddleback Meadows debate comes at the same time as residents are protesting against the federal government’s attempt to end the “Roadless Rule” in the Cleveland National Forest’s Trabuco District.
The Roadless Rule was established in 2001 and protects nearly 60 million acres of undeveloped National Forest System land from most road construction and timber harvesting.
That includes portions of the San Mateo Canyon Wilderness located within the 138,000-acre Cleveland National Forest Trabuco District. This district straddles the Orange County and Riverside County line and touches northern San Diego County.
Last year, the federal government began the process to rescind the Roadless Area Conservation Rule.
Environmental advocates say that, without these protections, the San Mateo Canyon Wilderness will likely face increased fires from additional roads, negative impacts to water quality due to erosion, and loss of habitat communities and wildlife.
Representatives from Orange County Coastkeeper, Hills For Everyone, the Sierra Club and Orange County’s chapter of the California Native Plant Society are joining forces to protest the threatened ending of the Roadless Rule.
Angelina Hicks is the Voice of OC Collegiate News Service Editor. Contact her at ahicks@voiceofoc.org or on Twitter @angelinahicks13.
