StopCactus Club

Panorama Heights · Joshua Tree, California

Stop the club.
Not the growth.

Joshua Tree welcomes growth that serves it: local places, open to everyone and built to fit the desert. The Cactus Club Hotel would put two restaurants, a café, a wine bar and a spa for registered guests only on open desert beside Panorama Heights. The Planning Commission approved it in 29 minutes without the full picture: no one from Joshua Tree could comment remotely, and the record put the site 8 miles from the National Park. It's about one.

The approval is on hold. Neighbors and two conservation groups appealed on Oct 16, 2026. The Board of Supervisors decides next. Hearing date: not yet set.

Write to Supervisor Rowe Watch the 1-minute video
“Hotel guest amenities … shall be limited to use by registered hotel guests and shall not be independently operated or made available to the general public.”
Condition added by the Planning Commission, Oct 8, 2026

The case in a minute

Watch, then write

What was approved, why it can't stand as written, and what Supervisor Rowe can do about it.

Write to Supervisor Rowe
Scenes and narration are AI-generated illustrations. Every fact is sourced on this page.

Growth that serves Joshua Tree

Joshua Tree already said what it wants

Joshua Tree is the gateway to a national park that belongs to every American. It isn't against growth: its favorite places are small, open to everyone and built to fit the desert. Residents wrote that down in a Community Action Guide, which the Board of Supervisors accepted in 2020, and County policy LU-4.5 says new development should fit it. This hotel is the opposite on nearly every line.

Joshua Tree's guide asks forThe Cactus Club Hotel
More “affordable overnight lodging,” even “a percentage of low-cost rooms at new or existing hotels”Tied by state records to Fieldtrip, whose Joshua Tree rentals go for a median $645 a night before fees
Businesses that are “locally owned and operated” and “serve the needs of the community”LLCs whose state filings list a Los Angeles County address, with every amenity closed to the community
A downtown with “more restaurants, cafes, bakeries, craft shops, galleries”Two restaurants and a café about five miles east of downtown, for guests only
Protecting “dark skies and the natural desert”Five acres of native desert cleared and built on, about a mile from the National Park
Growth “in a measured and sustainable way”Approved in 29 minutes, on one wildlife survey done in winter

Who is this for?

$645median nightly rate at Fieldtrip's Joshua Tree rentals, before fees and taxes

Fieldtrip's rentals go for about twice the area's average nightly rate. The County's documents put the hotel's jobs at anywhere from 9 to about 18 per shift. We want more of what Joshua Tree's guide asks for: restaurants and cafés downtown, lodging people can afford, and businesses owned by people who live here. A guests-only resort on the highway isn't that.

Fieldtrip rates quoted from its booking system on Oct 28, 2026, for two guests and two nights on six dates from November to March. Area average from AirDNA.

The assurances

Promises nobody can enforce

An approval is only as good as what the County can enforce, and the same rules should apply to everyone. The important promises in this one are vague, put off until after approval, or missing from the conditions altogether.

What the County was promisedWhy it can't be enforced
Desert tortoise surveys done to the species protocolThe adopted mitigation program says the surveys “should” follow protocol, not “shall,” and they come after approval.
Restaurants, wine bar and spa for registered hotel guests onlyThe condition never defines a registered guest. Outside spa bookings, private events, day visitors and the guests of nearby rentals are all left open.
Bird-safe glass, raven-proof trash, no rodenticides, lighting limits, no amplified soundPromised in the County's responses to public comments, but not clearly written into the conditions of approval.
A study of the wildlife linkage between Joshua Tree National Park and the Ord and Rodman mountainsThe applicant agreed to calculate the habitat lost around the site. The record has no finished calculation.
Limits on parking, staff and trafficThe documents say 36, 58 or 80 parking spaces, 18 staff a day or a shift, and 136 or 160 car trips a day. The County can't enforce a number it never settled.

From the appeal's review of the County's record, sections II through IV.

What Supervisor Rowe can do

Send it back. Do it right.

Supervisor Dawn Rowe represents Joshua Tree and chairs the Board that will hear the appeal. Four decisions are hers to lead.

Require the full review

Grant the appeal and require an Environmental Impact Report. California law calls for one whenever the evidence shows a project may cause significant harm, and this record does.

Weigh other sites

A full review has to ask whether another site would avoid the harm, and land the developer already controls counts as an option. By our count, LLCs tied to the applicant own 19 parcels nearby, and Joshua Tree's guide asks for restaurants and cafés downtown.

Make the promises binding

Hold whatever gets built to terms written to be enforced: “shall,” not “should”; dark-sky lighting with a curfew; no amplified outdoor sound; wildlife surveys before approval; a design that fits Joshua Tree; a named owner, operator and source of funding; and penalties when a term is broken.

Hear Joshua Tree

Let Morongo Basin residents comment remotely at the Board hearing, as the County did from the Joshua Tree Community Center for its mining ordinance hearing in July.

Make sure this one gets her full attention.

We trust Supervisor Rowe to steward growth for Joshua Tree, but no supervisor can watch every project, and this one cleared the Planning Commission in 29 minutes. Your letter puts it in front of her, so the jobs and tourism Joshua Tree deserves can land while still protecting the unique natural beauty of the American West.

Write to Supervisor Rowe

What you can do

Write to Supervisor Rowe

Supervisor Rowe keeps a district office in Joshua Tree. A short letter in your own words, asking her to send this back and do it right, is the most useful thing you can send her.

Write your letter

Start from this draft and change anything. Replace the line in brackets with why this matters to you.

ToSupervisor.Rowe@bos.sbcounty.gov
Ccinfo@stopcactusclub.org

Copying us lets us count the letters and email you when the hearing is set.

Open in my email

Come to the hearing

The Board meets at the County Government Center, 385 N. Arrowhead Ave., San Bernardino. We'll post the date here as soon as the Clerk sets it.

Clerk of the Board: (909) 387-3841

Hear when it's scheduled

Email us and we'll tell you the hearing date and how to comment. If you copied us on a letter, you're already on the list.

info@stopcactusclub.org

Call Supervisor Rowe

Her Joshua Tree office is at 63665 Twentynine Palms Highway.

Joshua Tree (760) 366-1488 · San Bernardino (909) 387-4855

Comment for the record

Once the appeal is on a Board agenda, send written comments to the Clerk or use the Board's comment form, and name the agenda item.

BoardMeetingComments@cob.sbcounty.gov

Back the groups on the appeal

Morongo Basin Conservation Association and the Center for Biological Diversity filed the appeal with us.

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The project

What the County approved

A two-story hotel on five acres of intact native desert, with homes on two sides. Most of the building isn't hotel rooms.

Project
Cactus Club HotelPROJ-2023-00061 · Tentative Parcel Map 20774
Location
Southeast corner of Twentynine Palms Highway and Mile Square Road, Joshua Tree 92252See the site on a map
Land
Three parcels, 12.65 acres, redrawn into four lots. The hotel takes 5.27 acres; homes border it to the south and west.APN 0608-051-02, -03, -04
Zoning
Neighborhood Commercial on the hotel lot; Multiple Residential on the three rear lots
Rooms
20 rooms, at most 40 overnight guests
Amenities
Two restaurants, a café, a wine bar, a 3,600 sq ft club room and a 3,800 sq ft spa, all for registered guests only
Parking
36, 58 or 80 spaces, depending on which County document you read
Staff
About 18 per shift in the conditions; 18 per day in the staff report
National Park
About 1 mile from Joshua Tree National Park. The applicant told the County 8.
Review
Mitigated Negative Declaration. No Environmental Impact Report.SCH 2025090539

From the County staff report, the project's environmental study and the appeal record. Sources are listed at the bottom of this page.

70% of the building isn't rooms

7,705 sq ft of guest rooms
17,850 sq ft of restaurants, café, wine bar, club room, spa, lobby and service building

Floor areas from the County staff report. Twenty rooms would support more than twice their floor area in restaurants, bars and a spa.

Guests only

A club you can't join

The hotel lot is zoned Neighborhood Commercial, and homes border the site on two sides. The families in those homes have property rights too: they bought into the quiet and the dark skies. At the hearing, the Planning Commission added a condition that limits the restaurants, café, wine bar, club room and spa to registered hotel guests. If you live here, you'd be turned away at the door.

The guests-only rule matches the traffic study, which counted hotel rooms only and assumed no one else would use the restaurants or spa. But the condition never defines a “registered hotel guest.” The record doesn't say whether outside spa appointments, invited guests, private events or day visitors would be allowed, and the County's earlier responses to comments allowed some public restaurant use and outside spa bookings. Fieldtrip, the short-term rental company that state records tie to the applicant, already lists 10 rentals within a mile of the site, sleeping up to 78 people. Would their guests count?

Opening the doors wouldn't fix it. Public restaurants, a public wine bar and a public spa would bring traffic the study never counted onto a stretch of highway the California Highway Patrol has already flagged.

Who gets what
At the hotelGuestsNeighbors
Two restaurantsYesNo
CaféYesNo
Wine barYesNo
Club room, 3,600 sq ftYesNo
Spa, 3,800 sq ftYesNo
New traffic on Twentynine Palms Highway—Every day
Lights after dark—Every night
Five acres of desert cleared—For good

The record

What the approval skipped

California law requires a full Environmental Impact Report whenever the evidence supports a fair argument that a project may cause significant harm. The County skipped it. These are the gaps the appeal lays out.

Wildlife checked once, in winter

The finding that wildlife harm would be minor rests on one reconnaissance survey on Feb 2, 2023, outside the desert tortoise's active season and not done to the species protocol. More than 25 tortoises have been found at Copper Mountain College, across the highway, since 2005. California Fish and Wildlife flagged burrowing owl habitat and nearby sightings.

Appeal §III · Desert Tortoise Council · CDFW comments

Protections that “should” happen

The County's responses promised protocol tortoise surveys, bird-safe glass, lighting limits and limits on amplified sound. The adopted mitigation program still says surveys “should” follow protocol, and the conditions don't clearly require the rest.

Appeal §IV

Numbers that don't match

Parking is 36, 58 or 80 spaces depending on the document. Staff is 18 a day or 18 a shift. Daily car trips are 136 or 160. The traffic study counted hotel rooms and left out the two restaurants, the café, the wine bar and the spa.

Appeal §II.B · Desert Trumpet hearing recap

A highway the CHP is worried about

The California Highway Patrol raised concerns about congestion, crash risk, enforcement and emergency response on this stretch of Twentynine Palms Highway. The County's findings say Caltrans accepted the site access; other documents say that review is still going on.

Appeal §II.B, §V

Wastewater, three ways

The environmental study describes a holding tank pumped out and trucked away. Other project documents describe a septic system, or a package treatment plant “if necessary.” The record doesn't say which one was studied.

Appeal §V

Drainage on paper

The drainage plan depends on permeable paving that hasn't been approved for access roads, and the highway has no curb or gutter. The area near the site is prone to flooding.

Appeal §V · Desert Trumpet hearing recap

Pools nobody studied

Pools and water features in the desert draw ravens and other tortoise predators. The project includes them, but none of the environmental studies mention them.

Appeal §III.B

Noise measured for 15 minutes

The noise baseline is a single 15-minute reading on one afternoon, applied to every nearby home. Nights with guests, staff, deliveries, outdoor gathering areas and mechanical equipment were never measured.

Appeal §V

Dark skies and the Park view

The Visual Impact Study, prepared by the applicant, couldn't be opened because of a corrupted file until less than two days before the vote. Views from the National Park, the scenic highway and the night sky got almost no public scrutiny.

Appeal §VI · Desert Trumpet agenda preview

Three more lots

The parcel map creates four lots. The environmental study assumes the three rear lots stay empty, but statements at the hearing suggested they'd be developed later. That growth was never studied.

Appeal §II.A

Who's behind it

Four company names, one hotel

The County's own documents name different companies as the applicant, owner and developer. State records reported by The Desert Trumpet show Evoque Modern LLC shares a manager, addresses and properties with Fieldtrip Hospitality LLC, a Los Angeles company that runs luxury short-term rentals around Joshua Tree, including in Panorama Heights. At the hearing, the applicant denied any association with Fieldtrip.

Fieldtrip already lists 10 rentals within a mile of the hotel site, with 33 bedrooms that sleep up to 78 people.

By our count, LLCs tied to Evoque and Fieldtrip own 19 parcels, about 123 acres, in and around Panorama Heights.

Before the County approves a hotel a mile from a national park, it should know who owns it, who runs it, who's paying for it, and what's planned for the land around it. We're asking the County to require that disclosure before anything is built.

Yucca Trail 11 LLCApplicant on the Planning Commission agenda
Evoque Modern LLCApplicant on the environmental study
Sullivan 80 LLCOwner and developer on the traffic study form
Cactus Club 1 LLCFormed March 14, 2023

Joshua Tree wasn't heard

Approved in 29 minutes

The Planning Commission met in San Bernardino, more than an hour's drive from Joshua Tree, with no way to comment remotely. Two of five commissioners were absent, including the commissioner for the Third District, which includes Joshua Tree. The agenda listed the project under an LLC name, not as the Cactus Club Hotel. Decisions about Joshua Tree should be made with the people who live here.

  1. The project's only biological survey: a reconnaissance visit in winter.

  2. Cactus Club 1 LLC is formed.

  3. The application is filed with the County as PROJ-2023-00061.

  4. Public review of the draft Mitigated Negative Declaration. The County received nine public letters, none in support.

  5. The Visual Impact Study, unreadable until now because of a corrupted file, finally opens.

  6. County staff acknowledge that the Center for Biological Diversity asked in writing to be notified of the hearing and never was.

  7. The Planning Commission approves the hotel 3–0 with two commissioners absent, from 9:06 to 9:35 a.m., and adds the guests-only condition.

  8. The Center for Biological Diversity, the Morongo Basin Conservation Association and a Panorama Heights neighbor file an appeal. The approval is on hold until the Board decides.

Sources

Read it yourself

Every fact on this page comes from these public documents and reporting.