LEMON GROVE, Calif. (KGTV) – A chain link fence cordons off a piece of land in Lemon Grove at the corner of Troy Street and Sweetwater Road. It could soon go from dried grass to something else entirely.
“It is a non-congregate place for folks to live who have previously been homeless,” San Diego County Board Supervisor Monica Montgomery Steppe of District 4 said.
San Diego County’s Board of Supervisors on Tuesday approved staff to start negotiating to buy the piece of Cal Trans property on Troy Street and Sweetwater Road in Lemon Grove. It’ll be used for 60 tiny cabins for the unhoused.
“These are homes that give some level of security and some level of privacy for people who are in their last stages before really being able to get permanent housing,” Montgomery Steppe said.
The site is in Montgomery Steppe’s district. Her office said it could cost $2 million to buy the site from Cal Trans. But this site wasn’t the first location.
ABC 10News has previously reported on the tiny homes and the pushback on the project.
It faced backlash over its original placement in Spring Valley, which led to the Board of Supervisors voting to no longer place the project in that area. The project’s current location was proposed with that vote, and it was later decided to place the project in Lemon Grove.
“Our county staff has gone to Lemon Grove City Council, a public meeting, and ironed out the plans for this tiny home project. We also had a virtual sort of design meeting with the community,” Montgomery Steppe said. “We took in a lot of input there that we were able to incorporate it into what the drawings look like now. And so, we have not shied away from this. We have been up front and center with community members about this.”
That community pushed back as well.
“The community's upset we don't want it here,” Ken King, a Lemon Grove resident, said.
ABC 10News spoke to King on Friday, and in our previous coverage, about some in the community opposing the idea of the Troy Street tiny homes.
He’s not surprised the county’s moving forward with trying to purchase the land. But he still feels the tiny homes should be elsewhere in Lemon Grove, and specifically for Lemon Grove’s homeless.
"Any other location other than that, it's next to an elementary school. Chula Vista has, you know, it in their camp in an industrial area. We asked them to move it in an industrial area,” King said. “They don't want to listen to us. They don't want to hear anything we have to say, even though we constantly email them, show up to meetings. It’s in one ear and out the other.”
County staff will come back to the board later this year for a deal to buy the land, which the supervisors have to approve.
ABC 10news asked Montgomery Steppe if there’s any shot at this project moving again.
“The only way that this project will not happen is if the federal or state government prohibit us from doing this. That’s the only way. It will not be a county action, not at least on my behalf,” Montgomery Steppe said.
The goal is to have shovels in the ground in the summer of 2026, with the tiny homes being open the following year in 2027.
