What started as a single RV parked off Otay Valley Road back in February has turned into something much bigger, and residents in the area say the city isn’t moving fast enough to deal with it. Jerry Allen, who lives in the nearby Vista Pacifica neighborhood, has been pushing San Diego officials since the winter to clean up the site, and six months later the situation has only expanded.
We’re not just talking about a couple of extra vehicles pulling in either. According to neighbors who spoke to NBC 7 San Diego, the original RV and boat combo has grown into two RVs, complete with an added on living space and a Mercedes Benz parked out back. If you’re the kind of person who appreciates a well kept garage or a driveway that looks like it belongs on a car show, this one probably makes you wince a little.
The location adds a wrinkle that makes this trickier than your average code enforcement issue. The encampment sits almost exactly on the jurisdictional line between San Diego and Chula Vista, which means requests to fix it keep getting bounced between two different city governments. Allen says he has filed complaints through San Diego’s Get It Done app, only to have them forwarded over to Chula Vista instead.
For a neighborhood watching a housing situation turn into a de facto settlement, the frustration makes sense. Allen isn’t just worried about the way it looks. He’s worried about what could happen if something goes wrong.
A Fire Risk Nobody Wants to Test
Allen’s biggest concern isn’t really about curb appeal, it’s about safety. The encampment sits right at the base of a hill, and he says if a fire ever broke out there, it could climb that hillside fast, potentially trapping residents before fire crews could even respond.
That’s not a small worry in Southern California, where dry brush and steep terrain have turned small sparks into serious problems before.
Two Cities, One Headache
The border location means this isn’t a simple fix. San Diego and Chula Vista each have their own enforcement processes, and when an encampment happens to land on the seam between them, it can fall into a gap where nobody’s quite sure who’s supposed to act first.
Allen says Chula Vista has actually sent crews out to clear RVs from their side of the line. San Diego, according to him, has not done the same on theirs.
The Growth Nobody Asked For
Perhaps the most telling detail is how quickly this thing has expanded. One RV in February turned into a small cluster within months, and Allen says the original setup appears to have encouraged two more RVs to move in down the street. Whether that’s a coincidence or a pattern, it’s clearly not the direction anyone in the neighborhood wanted things to go.
For now, Allen says he just wants to see some accountability, from either city, before this grows any further.