MERIDIAN — A group of Meridian residents opposed to the construction of a proposed housing development on the city’s north side have submitted a pair of petitions dedicated to their cause to city, county and state officials.
Donna Held of the SpurWing Heights neighborhood was a key organizer in collecting more than 600 signatures in opposition to Ibaia, a subdivision concept by Brighton Corporation that, if annexed, would for the first time extend Meridian’s borders to the Boise River.
One of Held’s petitions demands additional environmental and infrastructure review, traffic analysis and federal agency involvement before further action is taken. The other asks that fire department access through Joplin and Duck Alley roads be a condition of any future development.
“I knew the area would grow, but the area has changed so rapidly,” Held said. “I never imagined the city of Meridian would build as dense and as aggressively as it has.”
Both petitions were dropped off with the Ada County Highway District, Idaho Transportation Department and Meridian Planning & Zoning on Tuesday evening.
Brighton seeks to develop what is currently agricultural land northeast of Chinden Boulevard and Highway 16 into a nearly 600-acre subdivision that, in its first phase, would see the construction of 471 homes on half its space.
Though the other half of the land, located directly south of the Boise River, now falls within the city of Star’s area of impact, the plan is for it to be annexed fully into Meridian. The development would also include a 60-acre riverside park named after Margaret Aldape, the matriarch of the family who previously farmed the land.
“On May 14, Brighton had its mandatory meeting with the neighborhood to describe the project. It was then that we became aware of what their plans were, which was 471 homes,” SpurWing resident Victor Miller said. “Then there was another 850 homes that they were going to plan to build on approximately 300 acres, in the Star area of impact.”
Like SpurWing Heights and other surrounding neighborhoods, the Ibaia development would be zoned low-density residential, which allows for an average density of no more than three dwelling units per acre.
Miller, a cohost of the “Here We Have Idaho” radio show and former Ada County GOP official, co-founded the “Rethink Brighton Basque Ranch” advocacy group and Facebook page in opposition to the development. Basque Ranch was initially Brighton’s name for the proposal before it was changed to Ibaia, which translates to “river” in Basque.
“When you look at the 471 homes that Brighton wants to put in, 152 of those are going to be on less than 0.1 acres, off a small two-lane collector road that was never developed to absorb this much incremental traffic,” Miller said. “The only two roads that access it are Jayker Way, which comes off Chinden, and Black Cat, which the major way to access it is also off Chinden.”
He said that to only have two access points for a subdivision containing nearly 500 homes was “pretty unreasonable.”
Held and fellow petition organizers’ signature collection efforts included tabling at two food truck events at SpurWing Park, one in late August and the other over the Labor Day weekend.
“The safety of these commuters should be first at hand,” resident Terri Frohmeyer said at the Aug. 24 event. “Our road is about three-quarters of a mile away, and we’re impacted by all the traffic by (Rockharbor) Church and Costco. I can’t imagine what it’ll be like when we have 1,300 homes coming through here.”
Brighton’s application materials say that they as the developer will foot the cost of any public infrastructure extension, and that they are in talks with the West Ada School District about balancing construction with staggered enrollment. A requisite traffic impact study has yet to take place. Brighton did not respond to an Idaho Press request for comment.
The city of Meridian said that the Ibaia application was currently in the review process with its Planning and Zoning Commission, and that a public hearing for it was not yet scheduled.