The Santa Ynez Valley in Southern California brands itself as bucolic wine country, a mix between grape-covered hills and Old West charm. The Chamber of Commerce touts the hospitality and diversity of the valley's several thousand residents. But one thing that isn't mentioned in the Chamber's materials is the Chumash Casino Resort, a business run by the government of the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians that generated a reported $366 million in revenue in 2008.

Aided by the casino's success, the Tribe has been able to buy additional land near its 146-acre reservation. What it plans to do with that land has been a subject of angry debate.

New laws that bring back redevelopment in a limited way. The Office of Planning & Research's effort to do away with the traffic "level of service" standard. And whether you can live in California without a car.

These are just a few of the most-read stories from California Planning & Development Report in 2014. And now you can check them out again. Here's CP&DR's Top 20 List � in order:

The Second District Court of Appeal has affirmed a lower court ruling in favor of Ventura residents who sued Ventura County over a hospital project, contesting an addendum to the environmental impact report issued 11 years after the original EIR. The court held the Ventura Foothill Neighbors' petition was not time-barred under state law and that a supplemental EIR should have been prepared instead of an addendum to the EIR. The project in question has been completed in the meantime.

Fresno's 2035 General Plan proposal has been moving through packed public meetings toward final approval this month. The city's Planning Commission approved the proposal December 8. The City Council took it up in a packed public discussion hearing November 11. >>read more

California's mandates pressing large urban regions to reduce vehicle travel are tough. They possibly just got tougher with a recent San Diego appellate court ruling.

For now, the environmentalists have won their lawsuit challenging the San Diego Association of Governments' sustainable communities plan (which is part of SANDAG's regional transportation plan). SANDAG has appealed the ruling to the California Supreme Court.

I noticed the da Vinci apartment complex for the first time only a few months ago. How could I not notice it? It looked like a plywood ocean liner beached against the northbound side of the 110 freeway. Rising 4-5 stories at the time, it hovered over the freeway, uncomfortably close to the roadway. I remember hoping that it would have serious soundproofing. And air filtering. 

Restrained congratulations were circulating in late November over a deal brokered by Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti that persuaded the Kinkisharyo company to expand its rail car assembly operation in Palmdale after all. >>read more

Two San Diego agencies that lost recent appellate cases on climate planning have decided to seek review by the state Supreme Court.

With California in one of its worst droughts in recorded history, cuts have fallen swiftly on users of surface water, but the effects on groundwater will percolate more slowly.

Unlike surface water sources, including deltas, rivers, lakes, and basins, groundwater has remained largely unregulated in the state, even though it accounts for about a third of California's total water supply. That will begin to change soon under the Sustainable Groundwater Management Act, signed into law this past September by Gov. Jerry Brown.

This recruitment will close at midnight on Sunday, January 4, 2015.

The State Supreme Court heard oral arguments December 2 in the major Berkeley Hillside CEQA exemptions case, focusing on the legal significance of the term "unusual circumstances".

While the genesis of the case is a single residence, the ruling may have statewide impact on the application of exceptions to categorical exemptions from CEQA. Thus, the case has attracted interest from environmental advocates, public agencies, preservation activists, and the development community across the state.

[The news briefs have been edited as noted below.]

San Diego Climate Plan Ruling Ordered Published
On November 24, the Fourth Appellate District's Division 1 issued a publication order for its October ruling rejecting San Diego's climate plan. That same day the same division issued its major decision rejecting the EIR for the San Diego Association of Governments' regional transportation plan. The effect was to give value as precedent to two cases that impose stricter greenhouse gas reduction standards on local and regional planners. >>read more