It could be called the Battle of Ethanac: A series of lawsuits fired back and forth between the City of Menifee and City of Perris over development along Ethanac Road – a border that separates the two cities.
The City of Perris has filed three lawsuits against the City of Menifee since 2023, claiming that warehouse-industrial projects approved by Menifee violate environmental standards. And the City of Menifee has filed two lawsuits against Perris since 2022, claiming violations in proposed development north of Ethanac.
Both cities have designated Economic Development Corridors in the area; Perris has existing and planned housing; and Menifee has existing rural housing. Further court dates have been set in three of those lawsuits for the next two months.
Attorneys for the City of Menifee are scheduled to be in court on Friday to defend the city in a lawsuit filed by the City of Perris in November 2025, protesting a planned warehouse project on the border of the cities.
Perris is challenging the validity of an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) approved by the Menifee City Council in November 2024, according to court records. The lawsuit alleges that Menifee failed to follow the procedures of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). The petitioner also alleges that mitigation measures approved by the City of Menifee for the EIR are “legally inadequate”.
The project in question is known as the CADO Menifee Industrial Warehouse Project, to be located north of Corsica Lane, south of Kuffel Road, east of Wheat Street and west of Byers Road. This location is just south of Ethanac Road in Menifee’s Economic Development Corridor and “is currently bordered by a scattering of existing rural residential properties (1-5 acres) and vacant land,” according to City of Menifee documents.
According to those documents, the project proposes “a 700,037-square-foot warehouse/industrial building with 10,000 square feet of office space and 690,037 square feet of warehouse space on a 36.8 net acre (40.03 gross acre) site. There will be three points of access on Byers Road and two points of access on Wheat Street.”
Since April 2024, the City of Perris has submitted written objections to the project, stating the EIR “did not adequately address the potential environmental impacts related to air quality, project alternatives, energy, greenhouse gas emissions, land use, noise, and transportation,” according to court records. Perris filed an appeal of the project, but that appeal was denied by the Menifee City Council in November 2024.
The lawsuit alleges that “the EIR is inadequate, incomplete, evasive, and nonresponsive to public comments, and fails to meet CEQA and the Guidelines’ content requirements and standards of adequacy.” Court documents refer to comments from several public agencies.
In December 2025, Perris filed another lawsuit against the City of Menifee in opposition to the proposed Northern Gateway Logistics Center, which was approved by the Menifee City Council in July 2025, again rejecting an appeal by Perris.
A Case Management Conference to address that lawsuit is scheduled for April 8.
On the other side, the City of Menifee in October 2025 filed a lawsuit against the City of Perris, opposing Perris’ approval of the Ethanac Travel Center, a “large-scale, high-intensity truck stop project” proposed for Ethanac Road. According to Menifee’s complaint, “The project will generate, among other effects, 1,792 truck trips per day. Yet the project’s environmental impact report and associated approvals do not meaningfully consider this significant environmental effect with respect to Perris’s already ‘badly deteriorated’ public infrastructure and safety services for fire and emergency response.”
The next court date in that lawsuit is March 6.
All this took place after Perris filed a lawsuit against Menifee in July 2023, opposing a Menifee project to be located near Ethanac and Barnett Roads. That legal action ended with the judge ruling in favor of Perris, but only regarding the traffic impact. According to court documents, the cities continue negotiations on the remainder of that project.
In July 2022, the City of Menifee filed suit against the City of Perris, accusing Perris of “hasty, ill-considered, and unlawful actions” in re-routing a truck route on part of Ethanac Road. The City of Menifee claimed that the action failed to comply with CEQA standards. There was an action to consolidate this case with another case Menifee had filed against Perris. That case was discussed in closed session by Menifee City Council before the last several meetings, according to agendas.
