Letter to the Editor: Build Communities, Not Warehouses

On May 12, 2025, at 6:30 p.m., the March Joint Powers Commission will vote on a proposal to build a complex of industrial warehouses in Riverside’s Orangecrest and Mission Grove neighborhoods. The West Campus Upper Plateau project, which the developer has attempted to rebrand as the “March Innovation Hub,” would sit on land formerly owned by the March Air Force Base—the site of munitions bunkers that housed nuclear and conventional weapons. The proposed project, which would be adjacent to the Grove Community Church and surrounded on more than three sides by homes, has been almost unanimously opposed by residents over the past three years.

This is not the first time the project has come to a vote. On June 12, 2024, over five hundred residents gathered for the public hearing on the project. Dozens of speakers laid out what was at stake: increased air pollution from cancer-causing diesel particulate matter, noise and light pollution, truck traffic, the potential disturbance of contaminants in the soil, threats to rare plants and wildlife, and a decreased quality of life. Under intense public pressure, the March Joint Powers Authority (JPA) Commission voted to table the project.

On March 5, 2025, after the applicant claimed to have made significant changes, the March JPA agreed to untable the project and vote on a modified version. The “new” project, rebranded as the “March Innovation Hub,” added a few acres of conservation and fleshed out more funding for a local park. However, it did not touch the three mega-warehouses at the heart of the project. Every inch of the industrial warehouses remains.

Since the untabling, the project developer has blitzed the community with propaganda. They’ve employed paid canvassers, sent texts and mailers, and called residents, attempting to gain support for the “March Innovation Hub.” In their marketing material, they talk about every part of the proposal except the millions of square feet of warehouses they intend to build—presumably because they realize that if they told the truth about what they were building, they would never gain community support. Privately, the developer confessed to R-NOW that they would never consider other land uses for the West Campus Upper Plateau because million-square-foot warehouses maximize their profits.

That is the bottom line. On May 12, 2025, the March JPA Commission chooses whether to maximize a multi-billion-dollar company’s profits or prioritize the health of a community.

On Monday, May 12, at 6:30 p.m. at the Riverside County Administrative Center on 4080 Lemon Street, the community will make its final stand before the March JPA Commission vote. Our sincere hope is that the March JPA Commission will choose to build communities, not warehouses.

Jennifer Larratt-Smith
Chair, Riverside Neighbors Opposing Warehouses (R-NOW)