By David Benda, Record Searchlight

Anderson officials are working with Roseburg Forest Products to pre-zone nearly 400 acres that would create the largest industrial park in the city.

The pre-zoning application was approved last month by the Anderson Planning Commission and will go before the City Council on Aug. 20, Development Services Director Kristen Maze said.

Ultimately, Shasta County’s Local Agency Formation Commission would have to approve the annexation after reviewing the application.

The 385 acres is on the southeast side of the city. Most of the land, about 215 acres, is owned by Roseburg Forest Products, which operated a sawmill there for years until the early 1990s. The property has power, water wells, gas lines and
railroad tracks running through it.

“Of course people are sensitive to any type of conversion of agriculture and natural land, but this parcel was used as a mill since the turn of the (20th) century,” Arne Hultgren of Roseburg Forest Products said.

Roseburg closed its mill there after the last logs were salvaged from the Fountain Fire in 1993 and the property has sat idle ever since, Hultgren said.

“There is no real strategic use for the property in that (logging) regard,” Hultgren said. “We see it in some way filling an unmet need in Shasta County for a heavy industrial location.”

The 385 acres is either industrial or existing residential with the exception of 60 acres that is designated commercial.

Roseburg officials met with Anderson, Shasta County and Economic Development Corp. of Shasta officials several months ago to pitch the industrial park idea.

Maze said immediate development of the property is not expected but the annexation would set the stage for future commercial and industrial development.

“We have not really discussed what the ultimate intent is for the property, other than developing it as industrial park,” Maze said.

At 385 acres, the industrial park would be a little more than half the size of Stillwater Business Park in Redding. Stillwater opened three years ago and is still waiting for its first tenant.

Hultgren said Roseburg’s industrial park would be different because all the risk would be taken on by a private company and not taxpayers.

“This is more pure business; it is how things should be,” Hultgren said.

The former Roseburg mill sits next to the former Shasta Paper Co. mill, which closed in 2001 and sits idle today.

The annexation proposal does not include the Shasta Paper Co. property.