Riverside extends pallet-yard freeze, moves to make pallet storage its own zoning category

The City Council voted June 16 to extend an emergency moratorium it first adopted May 19, adding 10 months and 15 days to the original 45-day freeze. Until it lifts, the city won't approve any entitlement, building permit, or business license to start or expand a pallet yard. As an urgency ordinance, the extension needed a four-fifths council vote.

The reason the freeze exists is that the zoning code has no category for pallet storage. Under Title 19, pallet yards are treated as general outdoor storage or warehousing — standards built for screening and fencing, not for the fire load of large volumes of stacked combustible wood. The Fire Department inspects these yards once every four years.

The case for tighter rules is built on an enforcement record. The staff report counts 29 pallet-yard incidents requiring emergency response since January 2025, including a March 2026 fire in the Northside neighborhood that damaged multiple businesses and sent three firefighters to the hospital. Separately, code enforcement has issued 36 notices of violation to 11 pallet businesses since 2023, with nine cases still open. Some yards were cited for unpermitted assembly and disassembly of pallets — outdoor manufacturing the current rules don't contemplate.

What's coming next is the part operators should watch. Staff will bring preliminary regulations to the Land Use Committee in July, then draft a Title 19 amendment that has to clear Planning Commission and Council public hearings before it takes effect. The standards on the table — where pallet yards are allowed, stack height and separation, screening, circulation, security — will set the operating cost of outdoor pallet storage in Riverside. The freeze is the pause; the zoning rewrite is the durable change, and it's being shaped over the next several months.