One of the cardinal rules of ballot-box zoning in California is that ballot measures beget ballot measures. That is, once the concept of making land-use decisions gets embedded in the local political culture, there is no getting rid of it — it only burrows deeper and deeper into the political landscape.

Where do housing unit need projections come from? If you answered, "from population projections," you are only partly correct. The little-understood and unappreciated "headship rate" translates population projections into units. Small changes in headship rates could result in significant changes in housing need projections.

While discussing a proposed downtown baseball stadium and adjoining redevelopment project, the San Diego City Council repeatedly violated the California open meeting law because the council's descriptions of closed door negotiations were too general and because some topics should have been discussed in public, the Fourth District Court of Appeal has ruled. The appellate court also ruled that a trial court judge was correct to issue an injunction detailing how the council should comply with the law in the f

An appellate court has invalidated amendments to the San Bernardino County general plan that gave the county greater authority over development within cities' spheres of influences. The Fourth District Court of Appeal ruled that the county's failure to prepare an environmental impact report on the amendments violated the California Environmental Quality Act.

Imagine this scenario: A major symphony orchestra woos an internationally renowned conductor to become its next music director. After extensive, high-tension negotiations, the conductor at last accepts the job. The day after, however, the orchestra discovers something disconcerting: The conductor is tone deaf. Truth be told, she does not care much for music. After the inevitable flap, the conductor withdraws from the contract, citing unspecified "unsuitable conditions." Given this situation, should

Local regulation of religious land uses has become the latest battlefield in California development. There are at least seven lawsuits pending over government regulation of church development, proposed private schools, and the use of facilities by religious ministries. Lawsuits have been filed against the cities of Concord, Cypress, El Cajon, Los Angeles and Morgan Hill, and against Alameda County and the California Coastal Commission. Additional lawsuits appear likely in Sierra Madre and Hun

The owners of beachfront property are not entitled to compensation for a public access easement that the state required in exchange for a building permit many years earlier, the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled.

WASHINGTON _ The U.S. Supreme Court gave state and local governments a green light to continue using temporary moratoria to limit or block development while devising long-range land use plans.

Not often does one developer slug it out with another developer at the ballot box and in a courtroom. But that is the case in El Segundo, where Kilroy Realty is trying to block Thomas Properties Group from developing 2.175 million square feet of office and retail space on the site for a former aerospace factory near Los Angeles International Airport (LAX).

These are both the best of times and worst of times for California's mining industry. The Interior Department has lifted some Clinton-era restrictions for hardrock mining on federal land. However, the State Mining & Geology Board is considering new regulations for implementing the Surfacing Mining and Reclamation Act (SMARA) that miners say will be burdensome.

Don't miss this month's installment of In Brief, CP&DR's monthly digest of land use news stories in the making or follow ups to stories that we have run in the past.

In mid-April, The first freight train emerged from an underground trench a few miles south of downtown Los Angeles and headed along a separate right-of-way toward the enormous rail yards east of downtown Los Angeles.

Slow growth advocates won eight of 14 easily classified local land use ballot measures in the March primary election. However, development supporters won elections in some long-time strongholds of slow growth, including Napa County and the City of Scotts Valley in the Santa Cruz Mountains.

Welcome to Celebrity Architectural Boxing. In this corner is the reigning champion, the New Urbanism. (Cheers.) Although he looks older than his years, this youngster is a good citizen when it comes to walkable streets, parks, open spaces, human scale and contextualism. (Yay!!) On the other hand, he has suffered some defeats in his bouts with style. At times a golden haze of nostalgia descends over New Urbanism, like a scene out of "The Natural." (Boo-o-o-!!!)