Articles

An appellate court has directed a trial court to set aside all of a project's approval because portions of an environmental impact report were found to be inadequate.

The Fifth District Court of Appeal declined to follow the practice of allowing severance of project approvals unaffected by the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) violation. Instead, the court required that the project approval be set aside in its entirely once the CEQA violation was shown.

Since January we have witnessed the unusual spectacle of elected local officials throughout the state expressing intense and emotional anger and frustration about the possible end to redevelopment -- and no reaction at all from anybody else. 

Nothing from the people in blighted neighborhoods, who supposedly benefit from better housing and more jobs and more retail choices.

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has reversed a District Court's grant of summary judgment to two adult bookstores. The stores had claimed that a Los Angeles ordinance requiring the dispersal of adult businesses violated the First Amendment. The Ninth Circuit found that the declarations upon which the summary judgment was based were biased did not amount to "actual and convincing" evidence sufficient to cast doubt on the rationale for the ordinance.

The ruling is the latest in a 15-year-old case that the court called "resilient." Yet the ruling settled nothing. All the Ninth Circuit did was return the case, known as Alameda Books, to District Court for trial. 

Unpermitted dispensaries fails to get ordinance invalidated

By Cori Badgley

A medical marijuana dispensary has lost its fight to invalidate a Los Angeles County ordinance regulating dispensaries and to overturn an injunction shutting down the operation.

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has aside a summary judgment in favor of a city in a dispute over a church's request to relocate and develop an expanded church facility in an industrial park.

The unanimous three-judge appellate panel ruled that District Court Judge Phyllis Hamilton's decision in favor of the City of San Leandro was erroneous, and the Ninth Circuit sent the case back to the trial court for further proceedings. The Ninth Circuit did not rule on the merits of the case.

In two years the world's biggest event on water will take place in San Francisco. But, like many other mega-sporting events, the 34th America's Cup is expected to have no small impact on land. 

With an expected draw of hundreds of thousands of spectators, San Francisco is already contemplating plans to capitalize on the crowds and prestige of the America's Cup. While it's no Olympics or World Cup in terms of scope, the event does present the city with an opportunity to bring about long-term changes. San Francisco was named as the host of the event on December 31, and its plans – both short- and long-term – are already unfolding.

A great deal of literature has already anointed the hero in the fight against climate change: the city. Beginning with David Owens' Green Metropolis and including the work of Paul Hawken, Ed Glaeser, and countless others, the city has come to symbolize all the ways that humans can live densely and tread lightly on the Earth. 

These accolades might be premature. In his brief but wide-ranging book Climatopolis: How Our Cities Will Thrive in a Hotter Future, Matthew Kahn renders no such heroes. 

Alvaro Huerta grew up in a forlorn place, where urban planning surely failed. Living in Los Angeles' Ramona Gardens housing project, the son of Mexican immigrants, Huerta read only two books and wrote a single two-page paper through 13 years of elementary and secondary school in the public school system. But he knew what he was missing, and he is now in the process of completing his doctorate at UC Berkeley's Department of City & Regional Planning. Currently a visiting scholar at UCLA's Chicano Studies Research Center, Huerta has emerged as a leading voice for disenfranchised urban poor. Last fall, the American Planning Association awarded Huerta its national Advancing Diversity & Social Change award for his service to the planning world and to minority communities. 

A developer building a housing development on the site of the closed Fort Ord Army post in Monterey County was required to pay prevailing wages to construction workers, a state appellate court has ruled.

The California Court of Appeal, Sixth District, held that deeds for property acquired from the City of Marina Redevelopment Agency required the purchaser/developer to pay prevailing wages to construction workers, because the deeds incorporated a master resolution that explicitly mandates payment of prevailing wages. 

In addition, the appellate court ruled that the plaintiffs who filed the lawsuit were entitled to $73,167.50 in attorney's fees.

When you are hog butcher for the world, you become Chicago. When you make bacon and sausages for Southern California, you face a rather different fate. 

Assembly Speaker John Perez introduced last month AB 46, a bill that would take the singular action of forcing the disincorporation of a city that many consider noxious in more ways than one: the Los Angeles County city of Vernon. 

For over 100 years Vernon has operated more as an industrial park than a traditional city, and city leaders have vowed to fight -- and even sue -- to maintain cityhood and its distinctive business environment. 

As the clock ticks down to an imminent -- but as yet unscheduled -- vote on Gov. Jerry Brown's budget proposal, localities and their respective redevelopment agencies have been taking frantic evasive measures to try to shield funds and properties from liquidation and transfer to the state. 

If Gov. Jerry Brown gets his way in the Legislature in the coming days, he and the state will face a conundrum to make a Zen master's head spin: Is it illegal to transfer funds from agencies that no longer exist?

The governor has thus far been unyielding in his effort to eliminate the state's redevelopment agencies. In doing so he hopes to recoup up to $1.7 billion to help offset the state's estimated $26 billion deficit. Negotiations are ongoing at the Capitol, with a handful of Republican legislators--the so-called "GOP 5"�still in discussions with the Democratic governor. A vote is expected any day now. 

California is usually full of surprises. But we at the California Planning & Development Report -- like almost everyone else involved with California land use -- already know what the story of the year is.

The recession has hindered the production of affordable housing in California – even while it has heightened the demand for affordable housing. Yet cities in California are increasingly moving away from affordable housing requirements.