Even on a typical day, Las Vegas often seems like an extension of Los Angeles. Throngs of tourists arrive via car on the I-15 each day, and it's not uncommon to walk down the Strip and run into people you know.

This week, however, the American Planning Association conference – being conducted at two hotels along the Strip – has often seemed like an extension of Los Angeles as well. Not only is the conference flooded with planners from L.A., but there are so many sessions on L.A. that it could become a whole separate track!

Today, as planners, we are constantly inundated with new ideas and theories, and nowhere can this become more of a reality than a planning conference in Las Vegas. This year's national APA Conference is being held between the Paris and Bally's casinos, quintessential locations for gambling, shopping, dining, nightlife, and, well, apparently planning conferences. Where else can conference sessions be held in banquet halls decorated like extravagant French parlors?

All the urban planners in the country are in Las Vegas this week, and it's clear they have a love/hate relationship with the place.

Vegas is kitschy and over the top, and at first glance it always looks like the least sustainable place on the planet. Vegas is acres of neon plastered across the front of 30-story casinos in the 100-degree desert – each casino more outlandishly upscale than the other – along with the occasional lake and 200-foot water fountain.

The City of Baldwin Park is pressing forward with an extremely ambitious redevelopment project that would convert the present downtown area of mostly single story commercial structures and modest houses into a very high-density, mixed-use district adjacent to a Metrolink station. However, the city's extensive planning and a deal with a developer may be for naught if state voters approve eminent domain restrictions that will appear on the June ballot.

Dave Brown of Calabasas is this year's recipient of the American Planning Association's leadership award for a planning advocate. A member of the Santa Monica Mountains Conservancy advisory committee since 1985 and a Calabasas planning commissioner since 1992, Brown has been involved in land use and natural resources issues in the area since the 1970s. He received the award in part for his "overlooked but instrumental" role in creating the 153,000-acre Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area. For 45 years he has been a history professor at Los Angeles Valley College, where he still teaches two classes. Brown spoke with CP&DR Editor Paul Shigley in April.

I hate to be repetitious, but sometimes in the column-writing business it's inevitable.

Eighteen months ago, I wrote that the debate over Proposition 90 came down to two unfortunately simpleminded campaign slogans – "protect our homes" or "taxpayer trap." The latter won, but not by much. So now we've got Proposition 98 on the June ballot – a watered-down and slightly sideways version of Proposition 90. And for good measure we've got Proposition 99 – a countermeasure put forth by local government organizations that would restrict eminent domain, but only in the case of owner-occupied single-family homes.

A bill that would permit the City of Industry to extend its redevelopment plan's effectiveness for 10 years appears to have died when the bill's author, Sen. Gloria Romero (D-East Los Angeles), pulled SB 1771 before a scheduled mid-April committee hearing.

A hypothetical or speculative use of property is not a proper basis for determining damages caused by a city's temporary construction easement, the First District Court of Appeal has ruled.

The unanimous three-judge appellate panel overturned a jury's decision to award a Fremont homeowner $195,000 in temporary severance damages. The First District ruled that the trial court judge improperly permitted the jury to consider compensation for hypothetical — rather than actual — injuries.

In a potentially important decision for environmental advocates, the Third District Court of Appeal has ruled that environmental groups are eligible for attorney's fees in a Bay-Delta water lawsuit, even though public agencies won similar litigation.

OK, so everybody's bought into the idea that Sacramento's Blueprint process is a national model of regional smart growth planning. But what happens next in this cooler-than-we-ever-imagined metropolis? Depending on who you talk to the answer is:

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has permitted a property owner's defamation lawsuit against a San Diego County supervisor to go forward.

A divided three-judge panel overturned a lower court's ruling that Manufactured Home Communities' lawsuit against Supervisor Dianne Jacob was a SLAPP suit. The Ninth Circuit determined that a jury could find some of Jacob's challenged statements were "actionable as provably false assertions of fact."

The principles of smart growth should also be used as the principles of adapting land use patterns to climate change.

That's what Ron Sims, executive of King County, Washington, said in so many words while speaking April 12 at forum on climate change and cities.

The passage of AB 32 – California's climate change law – has focused the attention of Left Coast policy wonks like a laser beam on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. And as we have reported over and over again on this website, land use patterns are at the center of this debate. But adapting to a warmer world may actually be a bigger land use policy question.

The earth's climate is changing more rapidly than we had thought possible only a few years ago, and we had better both prepare for that change and do what we can to stem it.