A development company owned by two billionaire Texas brothers who control thousands of Idaho acres proposes a giant development that includes more than 1,100 homes southwest of McCall.
DF Development is set to present plans for the 1,130-unit RedRidge Village development in Valley County. The plans represent only a sliver of a larger, 30,000-acre project stretching across a wide swath of land south of New Meadows in Adams and Valley counties.
DF Development is owned by billionaire brothers Dan and Farris Wilks, of Cisco, Texas, who sold a 70% share in their fracking company Frac Tech for $3.5 billion in 2011. Farris Wilks, 72, is estimated to have a net worth of $1.9 billion, with Dan Wilks, 68, estimated to have a net worth of about $2 billion, according to Forbes.
DF Development purchased about 172,000-acres of land in Central Idaho in 2016. Since then, the company has sold and developed smaller parcels, but no project has equaled the size of the RedRidge Village proposal.
The company owns 57,908 acres of land in Valley County and 60,930 acres in Adams County, including the land on which the project is proposed.
“The vision for the full 30,000 acres includes areas of limited development surrounded by acres of wildlife habitat,” according to application materials.
In the RedRidge proposal, homes would be built in neighborhoods around a village center and include a variety of designs with multifamily housing, single-family residences and large estate lots. Plans include a vineyard, retail and restaurant spaces, a community hall, and an outdoor amphitheater with lawn seating for about 2,000 people.
Development would take place in four phases, each requiring a separate approval at P&Z. Each phase includes access roads, trails, utilities and other amenities. Centralized water and sewer services are planned, as well as septic systems for some lots.
A local trail network is planned within the development that would connect to regional trails, according to a project narrative submitted to Valley County P&Z.
Adams County has not yet received a formal proposal, but application materials list a clustered development in Adams County about 4,900 acres in size, as well as a 9,100-acre wilderness preserve, 12,900 acres of undeveloped steep terrain and about 3,500 acres of open space and buffered areas.
A total number of homes proposed for the majority of the development area in Adams County was not available. Maps of the development show more proposed access roads in several areas, including the Whitetail development, to the west of the Little Ski Hill, directly south of New Meadows and along U.S. 95.
