Alameda County
Livermore: Voters overwhelmingly approved Measure K, a plan to modify the urban growth boundary to allow construction of 1,500 houses and preservation of some 2,000 acres of farmland and undeveloped property.
Pleasanton: More than 63% of voters supported a $50 million bond issue to purchase land in the city which is owned by the City of San Francisco and slated for development. But that was not enough to win the two-thirds majority required for Measure I approval.
Contra Costa County
Diablo: Voters in the unincorporated area of Diablo rejected a proposal to limit the size of houses on large lots.
Los Angeles County
Glendora: More than 60% of voters approved a rezoning plan to permit a Wal-Mart and a Home Depot.
Monterey County
City of Monterey: More than 60% of voters rejected an initiative that would have placed restrictions on future development of Cannery Row and other oceanfront areas.
Orange County
Countywide: Voters readily approved Measure F, which requires two-thirds voter approval for future jails, hazardous waste facilities, and airports. The measure was sponsored by south county cities opposed to a civilian airport at El Toro. Twice before, voters approved an airport at El Toro.
Huntington Beach: Voters rejected an initiative that would have blocked construction of a Wal-Mart.
Seal Beach: Voters affirmed a City Council decision to approve a 300,000-square-foot retail project.
Riverside County
Indian Wells: Voters in this affluent desert community approved the concept of building a 101-unit low-income senior citizen complex. The vote was an "Article 34" election, referring to a provision in the California Constitution requiring voter approval for low-income projects. Indian Wells has traditionally been resistant to low-income housing despite a large redevelopment treasury; however, this was the second time city voters have approved a low-income housing development.
Sacramento County
Elk Grove: Voters in this unincorporated community of 54,000 people south of Sacramento approved incorporation as a new city after 25 years of trying.
San Joaquin County
Tracy: Voters in this rapidly growing, San Joaquin Valley commuter town narrowly rejected an initiative that would have restricted residential building permits to 750 per year. The city has been approving between 1,200 and 1,500 units per year.
San Luis Obispo County
Countywide: County voters approved the DREAM initiative, an advisory measure that calls upon the county to prohibit development on the property surrounding the Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant when it is decommissioned.
San Mateo County
South San Francisco: A referendum on the city's decision to rezone land for a Costco was approved by some 63% of voters.
Santa Barbara County
City of Santa Barbara: Nearly two-thirds of voters approved a measure that allows the city's redevelopment agency to develop or acquire up to 181 units of low-income housing every year. Measure Y was an Article 34 election.
Santa Clara County
San Jose: Voters rejected an initiative that would have restricted the city's ability to expand San Jose airport until highway and light-rail improvements around the airport are made. Before the election, city officials agreed to provide many of the road and transit improvements, a move that reduced support for Measure O.
Los Gatos: Voters in five unincorporated "pockets" and "islands" in Los Gatos rejected the idea of annexation to the city. The votes occurred as part of Santa Clara County's program to bring such pockets inside municipal boundaries.
Palo Alto: Voters narrowly rejected a plan to restrict demolition of older buildings listed on the city's new Historic Register.
Ventura County
Countywide: In the first countywide test of the SOAR initiative, voters overwhelmingly approved rezoning a few acres of agricultural land to permit a nursing home near Ojai to expand.
Yolo County
Davis: Voters decisively approved a SOAR-like measure that will require voter approval for rezoning of agricultural or open space land in the future.
Slow-growth advocates won major victories in November 3 local elections when voters rejected a housing project in Davis and a shopping center in Mendocino County, as well as sewer extensions in Modesto.
But slow-growth forces suffered some unexpected losses. In Santa Barbara and Ventura, two cities with a history of voter-controlled development, initiatives that would have imposed strict height limits on new buildings were rejected. In the Bay Area, Walnut Creek voters approved amended parking standards necessary for the construction of a Neiman Marcus store downtown.
Voters in the Santa Clara County city of Morgan Hill have changed their minds and approved a growth control modification to permit additional housing development in the downtown area. Measure A keeps in place Morgan Hill's population cap of 48,000 by 2020, but permits 500 more units downtown than had been allowed.
In balloting November 4 on local land use measures in California, slow-growth advocates won 22 of 39 elections. Opponents of development rejected an ambitious plan for the San Diego waterfront, endorsed a tight growth control initiative in Redondo Beach, and extended agricultural land protections in Napa and Solano County. But pro-growth forces won high-profile victories in Oxnard, where a subsequent vote requirement was proposed for most projects, and in Santa Monica, Beverly Hills, San Marcos and Redwood City.
Redevelopment may have been the biggest winner in Tuesday's primary election. Statewide, voters rejected Proposition 98, an initiative to prohibit the use of eminent domain for economic development purposes. In San Francisco, voters supported a huge redevelopment project at the former Hunter's Point shipyard and Candlestick Point. And in Napa County, voters rejected a slow-growth initiative that was aimed at halting redevelopment of a former industrial site just south of Napa.
Stanislaus County voters on Tuesday approved a growth control initiative that prohibits the rezoning of agricultural land in unincorporated areas without voter approval. Elsewhere in California on Super Tuesday, voters in Santa Clara and Rocklin upheld housing project approvals, while voters in San Clemente overturned conversion of a golf course into condominiums.
Voters in Palm Springs threw out a 10-year extension of a development agreement for a project on the side of Mt. San Jacinto during the November 6 election. Slightly more than 60% of voters said yes to the Measure C referendum, which called for setting aside the development agreement extension.
For the first time, residents in a Ventura County city have voted to substantially expand their urban growth boundaries in order to accommodate a residential development.
Some 61% of Santa Paula residents voted on Tuesday, May 8, to expand the urban growth boundary by 4,800 acres to bring the Adams Canyon area inside the city's growth boundary. Measure A7 also directed the city to amend its general plan to permit about 500 houses, a resort hotel and golf course, and require at least 200 acres of passive open space.
The state Supreme Court has agreed to hear its first California Environmental Quality Act case in three years.
The state's high court also agreed to review a significant brownfields case, and to let stand a controversial CEQA ruling involving water and local general plans.
The court accepted for review Friends of Sierra Madre v. City of Sierra Madre, No. S085088, in which the Second District Court of Appeal invalidated an election because the city violated CEQA. (See CP&DR Legal Digest, Janua...
A Nevada County landowner cannot prevent the public from using a dirt road across his property, as public access to the road was established prior to a 1972 state law that greatly limited prescriptive easements, the Third District Court of Appeal has ruled.
The public acquired — under the manner outlined by State Supreme Court rulings — the right to walk, run, cycle and ride horses on a dirt road adjacent to a Nevada Irrigation District (NID) irrigation canal on property owned by Jon Blasius, t...
A city is not liable for damages sustained because it failed to record a notice that a property was in a known landslide zone, despite a city ordinance requiring such recordation, the California Supreme Court has ruled.
In a case watched closely by many California cities and counties, the state Supreme Court ruled 6-1 that the City of Los Angeles was not liable when the 1994 Northridge earthquake caused a landslide that destroyed a house in Pacific Palisades.
Justices did not dispute landowne...
A vesting tentative parcel map approved in 1990 but never recorded as a final parcel map had expired by the time a developer tried to act on the map in 1996, the Second District Court of Appeal has ruled. The court held that under both the Subdivision Map Act and the Manhattan Beach Municipal Code, the map for a four-unit beachside condominium project was no longer valid.
The unanimous three-judge panel also found that project opponents properly exhausted their administrative remedies even thou...
In a recently published opinion, the U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals allowed construction of a high school in Tucson, Arizona, despite contentions from environmentalists that the school would harm an endangered owl.
The case involved differing opinions by experts and the trial judge's exclusion of testimony by two experts called by environmentalists. The Ninth Circuit ruled that Federal District Judge Frank Zapata did not rule unreasonably, and the three-judge appellate panel upheld the dec...
