In a rare four-day session, the Coastal Commission gave the heart of one day to hearing and approving a $6 billion project to expand the I-5 transportation corridor north of San Diego. It spent even more of another day deciding to close the Children's Pool during seal pupping season in La Jolla. And as special beach access legislation moved toward the Governor's desk, discussion returned repeatedly to the Commission's dispute over Martins Beach in San Mateo County with property owner Vinod Khosla.

It's hemi-semi-official: In the opinion of one of the state's leading geologists, no earthquake fault lies beneath the immense Millennium office development in Hollywood. That is the expert opinion of Stephen Testa, who is executive director of the State Mining and Geology Board. Unlike several other geologists who have addressed the board in this case, Testa is not a consultant for the Millenium project.

It's only $130 million. That's all the Affordable Housing and Sustainable Communities (AHSC) program has to spend this coming year. Spread out statewide, it's enough money to help steer some projects toward the prescribed goal of reducing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions through environmentally responsible development. It's not enough to build a lot from scratch.

A few highlights from this week's news: >>read more

August 11 would have been the deadline for California's statewide ballots to go to press, but state legislators pushed that date back as they continued to work on a water bond deal with Governor Jerry Brown. According to Ben Adler of Capitol Public Radio, details emerged late in the day of a plan calling for almost $7.2 billion in spending -- most of it in new bond funds -- of which $2.5 billion would support surface water storage projects. >>read more

Dear CP&DR Readers,

By now, you may have heard that I have decided to move on from my current job as Planning Director of the City of San Diego to become the Director of the Kinder Institute for Urban Research at Rice University in Houston. (See http://kinder.rice.edu/content.aspx?id=2147485438&blogid=306.) I'm writing this short missive to reassure you that I remain committed to California Planning & Development Report – and, in fact, I'll have more motivation and bandwidth to devote to CP&DR than I have had in recent years.

It's no secret that Walmart stores have caused the entire economies of small towns to decamp for some highway strip and, ultimately, wind up in Bentonville. But at least you know a Walmart when you see it - from miles away, no less.

A similarly insidious trend toward generic placelessness has been taking place in smaller-scale communities, even in many of the places that progressive planners hail as attractive, functioning communities.

The California Supreme Court has ruled that an initiative is not subject to the California Environmental Quality Act even if it is adopted by a local elected body rather than placed on the ballot.

"Because CEQA review is contrary to the statutory language and legislative history pertaining to voter initiatives," wrote Justice Carol Corrigan for a unanimous court, "and because policy considerations do not compel a different result, such review is not required before adoption of a voter initiative."

In a sweeping new set of recommendations, the Governor's Office of Planning & Research has proposed that traffic congestion no longer be considered a significant environmental impact under the California Environmental Quality Act, and that expanded roadways in congested areas be assessed for possible growth-inducing impacts. >>read more

Petitioners in the Saltonstall CEQA challenge to the Sacramento Kings arena project filed a notice of appeal July 31, but the Sacramento Bee reports the Kings began demolition at the downtown site anyway. The Saltonstall petitioners lost an injunction petition last week in superior court. The Bee reports the Kings' counsel argued that the NBA could purchase and move the team if the arena failed to open on time in October 2016. >>read more

Fresh from its major Atherton win (see Bill Fulton's writeup at http://www.cp-dr.com/node/3540), the High-Speed Rail Authority won another key ruling July 31 that upheld the validity of its authorization to issue bonds for the project and said the project's preliminary funding plan did not need to be redone.

California's Fourth Appellate District on Friday struck down a special hotel tax that San Diego hotel operators had willingly imposed on themselves, as members of an unusually defined special district, to raise money for the city's convention center expansion. The court ruled that the tax required a two-thirds citywide popular vote for approval.

Under Proposition 13 as broadened in 1996 by Proposition 218, special taxes must be approved by a two-thirds vote of "the qualified electors" of the affected district, also expressed as "the electorate" of the district.