Redding landowner upset over squatters, litter, gets fined: 'We’ll be here again in 2 years'

Redding officials are giving the owner of a notorious large open space of land until next month to clean it up or face steep fines that could total $65,000.

But Mike Thomason, the Fresno-based developer who owns the property off Oasis Road and Cascade Boulevard, predicted with confidence that he will be back.

“I’ll clean it again and we’ll be here again in two years,” Thomason told the Record Searchlight after Wednesday’s Administrative Hearings Board meeting.

Thomason Development was fined $1,000 and has until April 19 to, among other things, remove all abandoned vehicles on its property, remove junk, trash, debris and evict people who’ve been illegally camping there.

Failure to comply by then will result in fines of $100 per day, starting April 22, of up to $65,000.

The company’s 160-acre property is west of Interstate 5 in the area of Oasis and Cascade. Thomason owns the property under the name Oasis Land Company LP.

For more than an hour Wednesday, Thomason went back and forth with the three Administrative Hearings Board members, and police and firefighters who were called to testify.

'We are not the police force'

An exasperated Thomason told officials that he can’t arrest people for trespassing or illegally living on his property nor can the security he’s hired in the past to patrol it.

Thomason also reminded the advisory board that this isn’t the first time he’s come before code enforcement.

He was able to clean up the property and get it secured in February 2022 after doing things like creating dirt berms and putting up boulders at various access points.

“I guess since then, they (illegal campers) have diverted the road system, they have broken down the earthen berms,” Thomason said.

Thomason said creating breaks to mitigate fire risk runs counter to keeping the property secure because it clears obstacles that had prevented people from accessing the land.

“We have spent hundreds of thousands in Shasta County trying to keep people off the property. But we are not the police force. I had a security company that honestly is afraid to go out, for two reasons, this time of year they get stuck (in the mud from rains) and the interaction they’ve had” with people living on the property, Thomason told the advisory board.

Thomason said he’s at a lost on how to secure his property from nefarious acts “but if I had the police powers and I had the ability to enforce, I would be able to handle this. But if they never get arrested, if they never get cited and arrested for trespassing, vandalizing, damaging the environment … I don’t know what it is the city expects us to do.”

Fire risk is high

Shasta Lake City Manager Jessaca Lugo told the advisory board that her city has met with other agencies such as Caltrans, Cal Fire and state Fish and Game about quality-of-life issues for his residents and the Thomason property has come up in recent years.

“For us, we have Windsor Estates (subdivision) that abuts this property, we have critical infrastructure, including our wastewater treatment plant,” Lugo said.

Lugo said the risk of fire on the property is great.

A fire “that gets away, it’s going to take out a good portion of our city,” she said.

Lugo said the environmental damage being done on the property due to unlawful activity also is “an immediate concern.”

“So, what I’m looking for today and just requesting is let’s come up with a plan to try to remove the threat first and foremost, and that’s the occupants on that property and then (come up) with a cleanup plan,” she said.

Agreeing with Thomason, Lugo said fencing the property will not work because someone will just cut through it.

“At the end of the day, you’re going to have get eyeballs on the property, unfortunately. You’re going to have to have a caretaker,” Lugo said.

David Anderson, who lives on Baier Road near the Thomason property, called Thomason an irresponsible landowner and asked the city to take the property using eminent domain.

“He thinks it’s the responsibility of the police department to maintain his property,” Anderson said.

Thomason said he has signed a consent to enforce order with the city so police can make arrests.

Police want to support landowner

Redding Police Lt. Jon Sheldon told the advisory board that the city has successfully cleaned up "four or five" large properties within the last year.

"That requires a partnership with the landowner, and I've offered that to Mr. Thomason, that we do want to support him, we do want to be his partner. I think he confuses what the consent to enforce means. I think he thinks it means that we're his private security is my assessment of it," Sheldon said.

Redding police Cpt. Michael Caldwell, who leads the department’s community work program, said he has talked to Thomason about what police can do to help clean up the property.

But Caldwell said there is a process to getting homeless people off a property “starting with going out there and offering them resources, connecting those resources so that they voluntarily leave the property.”

If they don’t leave, then police would let the person know he or she is trespassing before finally “moving into the enforcement phase,” Caldwell said.

“We start giving them tickets and making arrests, if need be,” the police corporal added.

David Benda covers business, development and anything else that comes up for the USA TODAY Network in Redding. He also writes the weekly "Buzz on the Street" column. He’s part of a team of dedicated reporters that investigate wrongdoing, cover breaking news and tell other stories about your community. Reach him on X, formerly Twitter @DavidBenda_RS or by phone at 530-338-8323. To support and sustain this work, please subscribe today.

This article originally appeared on Redding Record Searchlight: Redding landowner fined $1,000 for litter left behind by squatters