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The City of Fairfield is seeking an innovative professional planner with strong technical skills and a proven track record for leading and mentoring teams. This position offers the opportunity to help shape Fairfield during a period of growth, General Plan implementation, housing production, and major development activity. Fairfield, the heart of Solano County, is a diverse and growing community located halfway between San Francisco and Sacramento. Home to just under 123,000 residents, Fairfield offers a strong quality of life. Fairfield’s Community & Economic Development Department is dedicated to implementing the community’s vision through collaborative planning, robust economic development, and safe and resilient construction. The Planning Division is responsible for guiding private development, advancing long-range planning efforts, and implementing the City’s adopted land use policies and regulations. The salary range is $147,090 - $178,789, with a competitive benefits package. To apply, please visit our website at: Peckham & McKenney www.peckhamandmckenney.com Contact Tara Schultz at (626)644-1398 if you have questions regarding this recruitment. Filing Deadline: June 19, 2026

This article is brought to you courtesy of the paying subscribers to California Planning & Development Report. You can subscribe to CP&DR by clicking here. You can sign up for CP&DR’s free weekly newsletter here. Developer Proposes 3.91 Million Square Feet for L.A. Area Oil Refinery Catellus-Deca, LLC on behalf of Phillips 66, has filed an application to redevelop the century-old decommissioned Phillips 66 refinery site in the Los Angeles County city of Carson after months of speculation over what would become of the site. The original site spans across two facilities, one in Carson and the other in Wilmington, connected by a five-mile pipeline. The proposed project at the Carson site, called Diamond Gateway, would cover 223 acres with 3.91 million square feet of building floor area comprising industrial buildings and two on-site parking lots for truck, trailer or electric vehicle parking. Plans for the Wilmington portion called Five Points Union, are still in progress, and would feature retail, outdoor space, and indoor sports complexes. The proposal also suggests possible “community benefits (such as financial contributions toward city initiatives and projects that support infrastructure throughout the city).” The project must be approved by the Carson City Council. A larger portion of the 659-acre refinery is in the City of Los Angeles; proposals for that property have yet to be issued. Concord Naval Air Station Takes Step Forward with $628 Million Proposal The Concord Local Reuse Authority, the U.S. Navy, and developer Brookfield have reached an agreement to transfer about 2,422 acres of the former Concord Naval Weapons Station for redevelopment after years of stalled talks. The term sheet establishes a price and payment structure before final contracts are written to finalize sale of the base opened in 1942, which played a logistical role during World War II and subsequent conflicts before being closed in the early 2000s. At full build-out, the Navy will receive $628 million over 30 years. The move could give planners and officials a financial pathway and clarity for what could one of the largest land reuse projects in California. (See related CP&DR coverage.) San Francisco to Vote on Measure to Expand City's Affordable Housing Fund The San Francisco Board of Supervisors has proposed a charter agreement for the November 2026 ballot which would expand the city’s Housing Trust Fund contributions from $52 million a year to $125 million by allocating a portion of future property tax growth every year to support affordable housing production and preservation. The Housing Trust Fund, which was established in 2012 and is set to expire in 2043, was approved by voters to support creating, preserving and supporting existing affordable housing projects. Under this agreement, funding for the program would be extended through 2058. This amendment comes on the heels of a proposed ordinance which would cut the percentage of affordable housing units market rate developers are required to include from 15% to 5%. Remote Workers Choosing to Leave, Avoid California on Net The California Legislative Analyst’s Office studied the effects of remote work, which has remained significantly more common in California than it was before the COVID-19 pandemic. Roughly three times as many people work remotely when compared to 2019, and although remote work rates initially fell after pandemic restrictions eased, they have stabilized since 2023. While heavily remote jobs have increased 16 percent in the rest of the U.S., the number sits at just 7 percent in California. Since the pandemic, California has experienced a net loss of workers in heavily remote jobs, with fewer remote workers choosing to move to California--for a net loss of over 37,000 in 2021. That pattern holds for California's urban areas, which had a net inflow of remote workers pre-pandemic. California has long benefitted from a range of location-specific industries which have changed in the face of increased remote work. Employers can now hire nationally, while workers are less tied to relocating to California for opportunities in key industries. CP&DR Coverage: L.A. Invokes SB 79 Delay Tactic Continuing its resistance to SB 79, the Los Angeles City Council voted March 29 to pursue an upzoning plan designed to delay implementation of the state law. But the council chose the least aggressive of three alternatives put forth by the Planning Department, and it remains unclear whether the plan will be met with the approval of the Department of Housing and Community Development. SB 79 hits Los Angeles hard because the city and L.A. Metro have expanded the rail transit system so rapidly. Approximately 150 transit stations in the city appear to qualify for SB 79 treatment, including some 17,000 parcels, most of which are zoned for single-family housing. The city is trying to delay SB 79 implementation, citing active ongoing efforts to upzone near transit stations, a plan which is technically an expansion of the Citywide Housing Incentive Program (CHIP). Quick Hits & Updates The UC Berkeley Terner Center for Housing Innovation developed the Terner Housing Policy Simulator to help policymakers evaluate how housing reforms may affect different local markets. Using data on zoning, land values, construction costs, and historical development trends, the tool estimates how likely developers are to build multifamily housing under various policies and economic conditions. The findings show that reforms that significantly boost housing production in one city may have limited impact in another. The Sacramento City Council unanimously rejected appeals against a proposed six-story mixed-use apartment development in Sacramento, clearing the way for a 332-unit housing project with retail space and parking along Alhambra Boulevard. Opponents argued the project was too large for the neighborhood, while supporters argued that Sacramento urgently needs dense infill housing. A citizen-led initiative in Grover Beach gathered enough signatures to appear on the November ballot, where voters would decide whether to lower local building height limits and require 33% of mixed-use developments be devoted to commercial space. The measure would reduce maximum heights from 55 feet to 40 feet for mixed-use buildings and from 40 feet to 33 feet in industrial zones, limiting many projects to three stories instead of four. The Placer County Board of Supervisors approved a five-year extension of the North Lake Tahoe Economic Development Incentive Program, continuing incentives through 2031 to encourage redevelopment and new lodging projects in the Tahoe Basin. The incentive program includes three primary components aimed at funding Tourist Accommodation Units required for lodging units, transient occupancy tax rebates to offset hotel costs, and offsets for infrastructure costs. California Forever is negotiating with Suisun City to buy several city-owned Main Street properties and nearby parking lots in downtown as part of a broader investment in the waterfront district. The company says it has no fixed redevelopment plans yet and is looking for community input on what to do with the acquired property. The purchases tie into California Forever’s larger proposal, which would annex 22,873 acres for new housing, industry, entertainment, and manufacturing developments. (See related CP&DR coverage.) The Strategic Growth Council unanimously approved guidelines for two grant programs, the Transformative Climate Communities Round 6 and Community Resilience Centers Round 2, opening up $153.4 million in awards available for communities. TCC provides funding to communities directly impacted by pollution to create a roadmap for environmental repair through local community-driven projects, while CRC funds centers and resources for climate and other emergencies. Guidelines and pre-proposals are available on their website, with deadlines in June 2026. The California Department of Housing and Community Development released a series of Housing Law Fact Sheets to assist local decision-makers and staff, elected officials, planning bodies, and other stakeholders in understanding and implementing key state laws that make it easier and faster to produce housing at all income levels across the state. The entire collection of Housing Law Fact Sheets is available on HCD’s Enforcement Authority webpage, and the individual fact sheets are linked under each of the listed laws. The San Diego Sports Arena site redevelopment project Midway Rising received support from California’s Department of Housing and Community Development, who confirmed the developers can use the state’s density bonus law to exceed the area’s long-standing 30-foot coastal height limit. That ruling strengthens plans for a massive mixed-use project featuring 4,254 total residential units, a 16,000-seat arena, 130,000 square feet of commercial space, 8.1 acres of parks, and 6.4 acres public space. President Donald Trump promised a plan to house up to 6,000 veterans at the West Los Angeles Veterans Administration campus, but the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs budget request includes no funding for new housing units. Instead, the proposal calls for about $500 million in infrastructure upgrades, parking expansion, and building repairs, raising doubts about how housing goals will be met. Veteran advocates say the plan could displace roughly 330 current residents in treatment programs without clear alternatives for where they would go during construction.

This article is brought to you courtesy of the paying subscribers to California Planning & Development Report. You can subscribe to CP&DR by clicking here. You can sign up for CP&DR’s free weekly newsletter here. Shortly after the election of San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie, he nominated Sarah Dennis Phillips to succeed Rich Hills as planning director. Dennis Phillip was both a conventional choice and an offbeat. Offbeat, because she was coming from over a decade in the private sector, working for mega-developer Tishman Speyer. Conventional because she had previously spent a similar amount of time in San Francisco city government, in planning and community development. Her appointment complemented Lurie's dedication to development and increasing the city's housing supply. A year later, Dennis Phillip has presided over the implementation of the city's "Family Zoning Plan" and is attempting to reform the department amid renewed public enthusiasm--or at least tolerance--for new housing. She spoken with CP&DR's Josh Stephens. You've been on the job for about a year now. What are your overall impressions so far? I think there are two overriding impressions. One, how amazing and evolved the San Francisco planning staff is. I left planning in 2013, for other career opportunities. We've always had really qualified staff, but the way staff practice their jobs now, that staff has really risen to the moment. They understand the challenges facing us. They understand how time impacts housing in our public realm projects, and they understand what the city wants. They're not just here regulating, they're looking at how they get to yes, to build, to get to the exciting outcomes that San Franciscans want. As we understand the affordability crisis, they've really taken that to heart. They've seen that themselves, not just because their boss told them to and not just because they just got out of college. There are plenty of people who started the same year I started here in 2005 and are still here — over 20 years — and those same humans have evolved in a really strong way. I think it's emblematic in some ways of our city And then the other one is, I forgot how brutal the politics are here. That's real, and it's a bit daunting. What lessons do you draw from Tishman-Speyer and bring into your current job? It was an incredible opportunity. I don't think everyone who works in the development sector has the opportunity to work with a firm that prioritizes design almost as much as planners do — that's endemic with Tishman Speyer and that's fabulous. What I brought back here is an understanding of the myriad ways that a project can get impacted and go south. There is not just "oh, the rents aren't high enough" — there are a hundred different ways that a project can go sideways, some of which are in the city's control: capital priorities shifting, capital partners going south, different ways you structure a joint development agreement. So many pieces along the financing and the construction side of things have made me understand the vulnerability of development, which definitely shapes my attitudes here as we regulate it moving forward. Tell us about the mayor's agenda. Which aspects are you most excited about, which are proving to be the most challenging? I came in last July, almost a year ago, with the number-one priority being we need to get the Family Zoning Plan over the finish line before we hit the deadlines mandated by the state housing element law. I'm proud of what the team built — they built it long before I got here, it had been in development for about two years before I arrived. What we brought over the finish line was largely baked by the time I arrived, but the politics of getting it approved, and the outreach needed so that the public really understood what we were doing, was a big part of those final six months. The family zoning plan wasn't the priority — that is the vehicle. The priority is housing. We need more housing for all San Franciscans, and the family zoning plan is a big part of that. There are other initiatives happening that I'm really excited about, including an expanded housing trust fund that'll create $125 million annually out of the city's budget for permanently affordable housing, and adjusted inclusionary housing percentages that allow regular market rate housing to move forward at the same time that we're financing affordable housing through that trust fund. Another priority is downtown revitalization — not recovery. I think we are past downtown recovery, but we still can make our downtown a lot better. Not just filling vacancies, but creating an amazing public realm, making it a place that people come to 24 hours a day for entertainment, for art. The third priority, which came straight from the mayor, is improving our permitting process, improving our permitting technology, and creating permitting that is oriented towards customer service. How much of that feels in your grasp versus technically challenging, or needing buy-in from staff, the supervisors, or the public? Under this mayor, there's a big chunk of it that is within our grasp. One of the things we are working on now is unifying our planning department and our building department. The people who issue rules and the people who issue building permits and inspect projects are different departments — that is not great. There are a lot of bumps in the handoff along that process. By putting us together — and we are midway through merging them — by early 2027 we hope we will be one unified department working towards housing and land use approvals together. The concept of a unified department has been talked about in San Francisco for a long time, but there hasn't been the leadership to pull it off, and the mayor has given myself and our director of the building department the authority to make that happen. A second example is our new technology permitting system. We are on a very old, disparate set of tech tools for permitting. this mayor has made it an imperative that we get on one unified system together. We started that system in March this year, we have about 10 permits up and running on it, and over the next two to three years we will fully migrate to a system that all permitting agencies in the city will be using together. You're obviously in the AI capital of the world. How has that affected the city itself in terms of rising rental rates and new influx of people? And how are you thinking about AI as a planning tool? It's a super interesting question. In terms of a business sector, AI has been the force driving our recovery. We're in a very good place from where we were in 2022, 2023, in large part due to not just the growth of AI firms and the leasing that they've done, but through the energy and ancillary support that's brought to other industries around San Francisco. At the same time, the fears that our entire country have around AI, particularly at a time of a tight and tightening job market, are even more acute here because it is so present at our front door. So there's some existential dread. We've regained our population losses, which is great. We are now seeing energy around developing new housing. We hadn't seen a lot of housing proposals in the city post-COVID, but that is starting to change because capital is following AI's impact on San Francisco, and they're starting to invest in housing projects to support the growing population. In our office, our staff are relatively nimble in figuring out ways AI can supplement their jobs. They've done some creative things in identifying and cataloging our historic resources, for example. As a city, we're a little creaky — like all bureaucracies. Executing AI in your work comes with union concerns, because people want to make sure it's supplementing their jobs, not replacing them. And we have privacy concerns, because we are stewards of public data and need to be careful about how we use it. The city is working on an emerging tech pool where we have prequalified technology partners, including AI partners, that we can develop smaller tools with — but it's a pilot and we haven't really started yet, so we'll see how that turns out. Let's get bigger and talk about the state. How do you feel about dealing with state laws? I probably can't parse out exactly which ones I like versus which ones are challenging because with so many in California, I sometimes still have to remind myself — wait, is that 2011 or 423, which one is it? By and large, I'm glad they exist and they are generally helpful. But they are most helpful when they push us towards an outcome while allowing us our own way of getting there. SB 79 describes what I was hoping for exactly — it said, “you are either going to have these types of heights and densities near your transit station, or you can show us your own way of getting there and we can tell you if we agree.” Our Family Zoning Plan basically qualified as our alternative plan under SB 79. It was one more tool we could use to explain to residents why it was important that we adopt the plan: “If we don't do it our own way, the state will do it for us.” There was some tension with some planning commissioners when you were appointed. How has that played out? That's been fine. I mentioned the politics here are kind of nasty — a knife fight in a phone booth, as our city attorney used to say. Our planning commissioners are lovely humans. Rich Hillis is my predecessor and he had a 4-3 vote on his appointment, and I joke that I was unanimous because those three recused themselves. We spoke pretty immediately after that outcome, particularly Catherine Moore, who's somebody I've worked with in a professional capacity for a long time and have a lot of respect for, and I think the respect goes both ways. Their challenge there was the process and not the person, and I'm comfortable with that. Process is, interestingly enough, one of the things we're trying to work through here in San Francisco — our planners are in favor of less process if it's the right outcome. And we've worked together swimmingly over the last nine months. San Francisco has had its share of contrverisal projects recently: the tower in the Outer Sunset; the Nordstrom's parking lot; and now the Safeway redevelopment in the Marina. What do those controversies mean to you? Are they a big deal or are they describing headlines but just part of the day-to-day for your office? Different meanings for each of them. The Nordstrom parking lot, dare I say, was a catalyst for much of the state laws that you asked me about. While it didn't turn state legislation on its head alone, the disapproval of that project and the grounds the appeal was upheld on, and just the utter shock that we could be that worried about growth on such a likely and positive development site, really helped catalyze a lot of the change at the state level that has been, as I've noted, generally helpful. The Outer Sunset tower has died. But even the noise around that one did bring to the fore a whole lot of housing supporters who were quiet before. It was just so loud that folks were like, wait, do I really care if there's a tower there? I know that's a crazy tower, but maybe I want more housing. Marina Safeway is challenging for us because we worked with the community in the Marina and the broader San Francisco community on the family zoning plan for what we felt was the right kind of density for that site. This project was filed just after that plan was adopted but before it became effective. We had been coming off a multi-year process, working with communities, telling them that yes, we need more housing, but we'll work with you on the shape and form of that housing. And then a project came in that was dramatically different. So that's a hard one. How do you characterize attitudes towards housing and development in the city today — what is the vibe? I think we are smack in the middle of an evolution. San Francisco has been for a very long time — certainly when I moved here in 2000 — a town with a lot of conflicted feelings about growth, even as it was an economic powerhouse through the first tech boom. “Manhattan” has always been a dirty word here in San Francisco. That's a long-standing attitude that is evolving. I don't think we're through the evolution — I think we're smack in the middle of it. The surveys around the family zoning plan showed that a strong majority, somewhere between 60 and 70 percent of residents, support that plan. And it was hard-fought — even though many people supported it, it was an incredibly tough approval process. So you can see that tension between high support but still those no-growth attitudes fighting against each other. The number of people who identify as pro-housing is incredibly large and well recognized. And attitudes towards growth are somewhat affected by what we saw post-COVID in our downtown — people realized they didn't want an empty downtown, and that if growth and more intensity is what it takes to get it back to activity, they can be in support of that. Where do you draw intellectual inspiration from — books, histories, people, mentors? I'm an economics geek. he overlay of the economy with the city is fascinating, not just because money has driven cities — through transfer of capital and growth — but because the other part of economics is humans and how humans want to see those things move. I'm a big fan of Edward Glaeser's books. I read The Economist weekly because it helps me understand what's going on throughout the world. I've had the benefit of some amazing mentors. Dean Macris, the planning director when I came here, who let me walk in as a very green planner and walk up to the podium and launch some exciting initiatives right from the get-go. John Rahaim, an incredibly thoughtful, design-focused planning director who I still consult with regularly. And Carl Shannon, who was my boss at Tishman Speyer, who showed me how you can be a capitalist with heart — Carl cared about affordability and design probably more than making money. And I would also say, given the brutality of land use politics, my inspiration for getting through challenging and thorny topics is running with my dog and playing my violin. I'm terrible at the violin — I only started a year ago — but there's nothing like being terrible at something when you've got a really hard job to get your head out of it. This interview has been edited and condensed.

This article is brought to you courtesy of the paying subscribers to California Planning & Development Report. You can subscribe to CP&DR by clicking here. You can sign up for CP&DR’s free weekly newsletter here. For a guy who lives in a trailer, Spencer Pratt has unusually good taste in high-rise architecture. In a recent interview with the All-In Podcast, Pratt declared, “ we're going to have L.A. so beautiful. No more of these high-density, SB-79, prison-like structures.” The video of Pratt’s interview was accompanied by an AI-generated video envisioning soaring, gleaming towers that represent a new era of order, tranquility, and beauty. He calls out Art Deco in particular as the hallmark of a more attractive city. He even assured “the YIMBY people [that they] can have all their bike lanes going through the sky.” I’m not sure that's quite what YIMBY’s want. But, anyhow, this is the city Pratt promises to build when he becomes mayor. It sounds pretty nice. Let’s back up. Spencer Pratt does not actually live in a trailer. As reported recently by TMZ, Pratt has actually been living at the Hotel Bel-Air. That’s controversial because, in a campaign video released April 29, Pratt alludes to a litany of ills and catastrophes that have befallen L.A., including, and especially, the wildfires that devastated his home neighborhood of Pacific Palisades in January 2025. The video features Pratt standing next to an Airstream on his property snarling, “this is where I live.” (See related CP&DR coverage.) Pratt is running to usher in a “new golden age,” beginning with his defeat of incumbent Karen Bass; he is polling second in a tight three-way primary race. I would forgive Pratt his #vanlife fiction, except that his entire campaign is built on grievances. Pratt blames Bass not just for the city’s fire response and for being uninspiring but for causing the very conflagration that burned down his home, as if she personally summoned 100-mile-per-hour winds and a six-month drought. It’s hard to seem too aggrieved, though, when you live in a five-star retreat that costs upwards of $1,000 per night. Whatever his domicile may be, there’s one thing Pratt is not: urban. He gained notoriety in the mid-2000s at age 23 as an enfant terrible on the MTV reality show The Hills, about L.A. rich kids who yell at each other. Pratt later sold New Age crystals and dabbled in various other reality shows. The Palisades, where he and wife Heidi Montag moved in 2017, is lower-profile but only slightly less luxurious. Skid Row, it’s not. In look and feel, Pacific Palisades operates more like a suburb than an urban neighborhood — on the fringe, separate, with its own downtown, and incredibly wealthy and incredibly white. Those are characteristics that could just as easily describe Thousand Oaks, Rancho Palos Verdes, Rancho Santa Fe, or any number of other ranchos. Pratt clearly loves his suburban lifestyle, and rebuilding the Palisades is his top priority. That’s why Pratt’s turn towards Howard Roark seems more like a jab than a genuine campaign plank. He imagines a shiny new downtown in order to cast a spotlight on the grime and lifelessness that he associates with the current downtown -- and with its most prominent figure. This vision is the flip side of Pratt’s antagonism toward homelessness and other unsavory elements of urban life. When we look at gleaming cupolas and cornices and towers, we are also meant to envision clean sidewalks full of respectable, productive people — the sort Republicans often favor. Pratt’s imagined skyline depends, implicitly, on cleaning up the streetfront. On that count, Pratt has been ruthless. He wants unhoused people moved, arrested, and if necessary, forced into housing against their will -- possibly in the desert on the urban fringe. “We’re going around and we’re just arresting people and the people that aren’t getting arrested, we’re getting to mandatory medical treatment,” Pratt told Joe Rogan. If Pratt has any humanitarian instincts, they are indiscernible. He wants to eliminate homelessness mainly because it ruins his view. The great irony, of course, is that one of the primary drivers of urban decay has been suburbanization itself. The very instincts and development patterns that produced the Palisades — and more to the point, hundreds of independent cities across California's urban areas — are what drained center cities of people, energy, money, resources, and political clout from World War II onward. Whatever disdain Pratt has for urban Los Angeles, it was partly produced by white flight and middle-class flight. Pratt’s escape to Bel-Air puts this flight into Ludicrous Mode. In that sense, the Palisades Fire is the foil for past crucibles like the 1965 Watts Riots and 1992 Rodney King Riots: every three decades, a neighborhood burns and demands reform. Only this time, the neighborhood is wealthy, and they have only Mother Nature to blame. Spencer Pratt's home. Sort of. *** For a Republican to care about urbanism all of a sudden is ironic, to say the least. Yet, there are lessons worth taking from him. (Los Angeles elections are nonpartisan, but Pratt has made no secret of his affiliations or his sympathy for the MAGA movement.) In the introduction to my book The Urban Mystique, I noted that the attractiveness and functionality of LA's built environment is inversely proportional to the city's natural beauty. It’s as if some perverse defect in our collective unconscious forbids us from having nice things. We need to break the cycle of mediocrity. I would warmly welcome a copse of Chrysler Buildings or some friends for the Eastern Columbia Building, bedecked in jade and lapis lazuli. Art Deco is lovely, and Art Deco skyscrapers are lovely. We absolutely need more of them: dense, diverse, well located, and beautiful. I think I would drop my champagne flute if ever I heard a conventional pol mention aesthetics. They are likely afraid of the specters of gentrification or elitism, or they’re wonky enough to know how hard it is to regulate aesthetics. Or -- quite likely -- they simply have no taste and consider aesthetics to be frivolous. Except, aesthetics matter. Not as much as poverty, homelessness, or housing--but they still matter a lot. Planners are not architects, of course. But, anything that is planned is also something that needs to be designed. Good plans warrant good design -- and vice-versa. According to the recent article by David Broockman, Chris Elmendorf, and Joshua Kalla titled, “How Sociotropic Aesthetic Judgments Drive Opposition to Housing Development,” stakeholders oppose new housing because much of what they see is ugly. They find that “voters oppose new development not just out of self-interest or NIMBYism, but because they find certain types of development aesthetically unappealing and seek to enforce these aesthetic preferences through policy.” They’re alluding to the oversized, unadorned “five-over-one” buildings and all sorts of stucco aberrations that developers build in order to maximize their permitted square footage and minimize costs. The problem, according to Broockman, et. al., is that a developer’s payday can be a neighbor’s eyesore. Opposition leads to greater expenses for developers, which leads to less capital for niceties like design. The less housing is available, the more prospective tenants are willing to pay regardless of how a building looks and the more people end up on the street. It’s a vicious cycle. I don’t know if Pratt has read that research, but he clearly has an intuitive sense of its conclusions and an effective way of discussing them. In the All In video, Pratt refers to “soulless, SB 79 , prison-like structures” and shares images of typical five-over-ones. (It’s true that SB 79 hasn’t kicked in yet, but I actually take his point at face value; I don’t think we have any reason to expect that it will produce much other than utilitarian boxes.) Pratt's vision may be simplistic but at least it's a vision. He is, with the help of AI renderings, literally showing pictures of what Los Angeles could look like. It's fitting for someone whose fame derives from reality television, and it’s vastly more effective than the bureaucratic word salad tossed by many planners and their planning documents. What Pratt also draws from reality television is his anger. Pratt knows that comity does not make for good entertainment. Neither does consensus-building or good-faith negotiation. Whether for personal or ideological reasons, he has channeled his anger over the fires -- occasionally blaming Bass for “letting (his) house burn down”, as if he thinks she’s gleeful about it -- into relentless criticism of city leadership. Pratt’s rage is that of someone who has, admirably, woken up to these problems but who may not appreciate that a Lego version of L.A. is a lot easier to govern than the real thing is. That’s why he's doing well in the polls--not because he knows anything about governance, fire suppression, or even real estate but because he makes governance simple. To be fair, Pratt has released a more comprehensive housing and development platform. It includes many provisions -- such as streamlining -- that housing advocates and many planners would welcome. He includes a surprisingly nuanced critique of SB 79: density should focus on commercial areas rather than on transit stops, with a nice zinger: “Sure, taking a train to work is cleaner than driving, but taking an elevator to work is even cleaner than that.” Truth be told: his approach isn’t necessarily original, but, if we overlook (or embrace!) some of its impolitic language, Pratt’s platform is a lot more compelling than the incumbent’s is. I wish the capable people were more angry. Or the angry people more capable. Pratt’s turn toward aesthetics expresses a sentiment that no major LA public figure has articulated in recent memory. He is disgusted by the city's response to the crises--not just the fire but to so many other crises lying on the sidewalk in plain sight. On that count, I think almost every Angeleno — except perhaps certain members of city government — agrees with him. And yet, Pratt’s absurdities and offenses persist. *** What's interesting is that Los Angeles’s natural beauty is the very thing that put him in this situation in the first place. Los Angeles is ringed and bisected by mountains. Mountains have brush. We have a Mediterranean climate. Brush catches fire — not that it can catch fire, but that it does, and has, and will again. That is maybe the most absurd part of the Pratt campaign. He acts as if he was caught unawares, as if someone who lives on the urban fringe does not know — or does not care — that the hills may burn, and so will his house. It is that lack of judgment, more than any lack of responsibility, that I think disqualifies him from being mayor. Pratt, who reportedly did not have fire insurance, is now reportedly filming a reality show about his campaign, which he intends to extend into his mayoralty, if he can. Do I need to mention that the second-largest city in the country is simply not a serious place? Then again, who can blame Pratt? Producing a reality show surely pays a lot more than running the city does. As long as public-sector compensation is so woefully out of whack with similarly rigorous private-sector jobs, it will never attract top talent and always foment corruption and amplify the influence of special interests. Here is what I'll grant Pratt: he believes this city can be greater. He believes it can be governed better, look better, and that on average, people can live better here. If he is elected, those things may or may not come to pass. If he is not, I hope that whoever becomes mayor — and whoever fills the next round of council seats and department head positions — proves Pratt right anyway. I want Pratt, for all his weirdness and bombast, to be right. I want city leaders to learn the ample, if inadvertent, lessons that he so plainly offers. If that means we get some curves, tubes, and neon, all the better. I hope that, whenever he checks out of the Bel-Air, Spencer Pratt unpacks his bags someplace safe and comfortable. Maybe in an art deco high-rise. Maybe in his rebuilt Palisades house. Maybe in a box on a sidewalk. Really, I don’t care -- as long as he’s nowhere near Getty House.

Legislation is Sacramento has to clear the “house of origina” (Assembly or Senate) by this Friday (May 29). A wide variety of bills dealing with CEQA and land use planning are moving forward – though some have stalled.

This article is brought to you courtesy of the paying subscribers to California Planning & Development Report. You can subscribe to CP&DR by clicking here. You can sign up for CP&DR’s free weekly newsletter here. Redondo Beach Adopts Housing Element after Years of Tension with State The Redondo Beach City Council unanimously adopted a revised Housing Element Tuesday night in an effort to comply with California housing law and avoid triggering Builder’s Remedy. The new plan replaces the city’s previous proposal for “overlay areas” that allow alternative development uses, instead increasing density on five designated housing sites and removing a sixth site, as well as requiring that 50% of its floor space in these buildings be residential. At South Bay Marketplace, located at Hawthorne Boulevard and 182nd Street, the city approved the largest density increase in the plan, raising allowable residential capacity from 55 to 80 dwelling units per acre while keeping the existing seven-story height limit unchanged. City officials said the revisions were necessary after a California appeals court ruled last year that Redondo’s 2022 Housing Element failed to identify “realistic” sites capable of meeting the city’s Regional Housing Needs Assessment requirement of 2,490 new housing units by 2029. San Diego Finalizes Diverse Package of Development Reforms The San Diego City Council unanimously adopted a 134-item zoning and land-use code update Monday, including wide-ranging updates that soften development rules, loosen rules for Old Town sidewalk cafes, roll back an incentive for building small apartments, ban cannabis outlets from using leaf images in their signage, allow more child care businesses in Miramar and clarify that property owners may have to honor wider setbacks to help fight wildfires. Three controversial proposals were removed prior to the vote, including requirements for some hotels and apartments to upgrade pool heaters, new restrictions on shrubs, and requirements for softer transitions from high-rise housing to low-rise housing and open space. Thirty-one of the code changes apply only to downtown, including more lax rules for farmers markets, rules to preserve old-growth trees, and incentives for buildings with rooftop gardens. The package significantly increases fines that had not been changed since 2006, raising maximum penalties for municipal and building code violations to $10,000 per violation and up to $100,000 annually for abandoned properties. Appeals fees for planning decisions were also raised, though reduced rates will apply to appellants from low-income neighborhoods. Settlement Enables Palisades Tahoe to Proceed with Scaled-Down Base Redevelopment After more than a decade of conflict, conservation groups League to Save Lake Tahoe and Sierra Watch reached an agreement with Alterra Mountain Company and Palisades Tahoe after significantly scaling back redevelopment plans for the base area of the Olympic Valley ski resort near Lake Tahoe. The revised project, which includes 1,500 hotel rooms, 896 lodging units and 222,000 square feet of commercial space, cuts the number of bedrooms by 40% from the most recent proposal and nearly 60% from the original 2011 plan, reduces commercial space by 20%, permanently protects sensitive open space near Shirley Canyon, and eliminates the controversial indoor waterpark in favor of a smaller Mountain Adventure Center. The agreement prevents Alterra from pursuing additional development on the property for 25 years while maintaining plans for 296 workforce housing beds for resort employees. Conservation groups said the scaled-back project could reduce projected daily vehicle trips by as much as 38%, lowering anticipated environmental impacts on the Lake Tahoe Basin. In exchange, the conservation groups agreed to withdraw their 2024 lawsuit, pending county approval of the revised proposal. HCD Drafts Guidelines for Conversion of Commercial Sites to Housing The Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) released Draft AB 2011 Guidelines designed to make it easier to build housing on commercial sites near jobs and transit. AB 2011, known as the Affordable Housing and High Road Jobs Act, first took effect in 2023 and has since been updated through additional legislation in 2025 and 2026. The law aims to address California’s housing shortage by allowing eligible housing developments to go through a faster, streamlined approval process instead of lengthy discretionary reviews. The guidelines clarify requirements and explain areas of the law that have previously caused confusion in an effort to support more consistent implementation across California cities and counties. CP&DR Coverage: Cities Contemplate Massive Upzoning Wrought by SB 79 The largest upzoning in the history of California will drop on select cities July 1. Collectively, SB 79 will increase the state’s zoned capacity by several million units. Some cities will gain so much that, upon full build-out, their populations could more than double. The point of SB 79 is to force transit-heavy cities statewide to simultaneously accept more housing and sidestep anti-housing sentiment. It does, however, give cities some latitude through TOD Alternative plans, which allow cities to reduce densities in certain areas by up to 50% and increase them in other areas by up to 200% as long as the total new capacity does not diminish. While most affected cities appear to be either ramping up to comply with the law or quickly submitting TOD Alternative plans, the Los Angeles City Council stands in opposition to SB 79, and the board of L.A. Metro voted against implementing it. Quick Hits & Updates The Metropolitan Transportation Commission and Association of Bay Area Governments adopted Plan Bay Area 2050+, a long-term regional plan focused on transportation, housing, economic resilience, and environmental sustainability through 2050. Over 17,600 Bay Area residents and other organizations contributed to the plan’s development, which outlines 35 strategies aimed at making the region more affordable, connected, equitable, and climate-resilient, including investments in affordable housing, improved public transit, and protections against sea level rise and wildfires. The Imperial County Board of Supervisors approved a new Lithium Valley Construction Workforce Ordinance establishing labor, hiring and workforce standards aimed at ensuring local residents benefit from jobs created by future lithium industry development. The ordinance requires covered projects to submit workforce plans with local hiring goals, apprenticeship participation, and strategies to support small businesses and disadvantaged workers. (See related CP&DR coverage.) The Los Angeles County Supervisors voted unanimously to advance a housing ordinance update for unincorporated areas, including provisions that expand affordable housing incentives, create a new “Acutely Low Income” category for households earning under 15% of area median income, and require 1:1 replacement of demolished affordable units. The city of San Diego and the San Diego Community College District will evaluate the potential redevelopment of a 62-year-old arena downtown that has been vacant since 2024. City leaders and community partners envision transforming Golden Hall into a space with classrooms, museums, arts programming, and public gathering areas as part of a broader effort to revitalize the Civic Center. The Santa Maria City Council unanimously adopted the Santa Maria 2045 General Plan, a long-term development strategy designed to accommodate nearly 60,000 new residents and over 16,000 housing units by 2045. The plan emphasizes higher-density housing, downtown development, and annexing additional land while balancing growth with agricultural preservation and community needs like a new high school. The council also approved applying for a roughly $30 million grant from the California Department of Transportation to build a new transportation loop for pedestrians and cyclists. President Trump appointed six new members to the Presidio Trust Board a month after removing the Biden-appointed trustees, selecting several political allies and prominent business figures, including Lynne Benioff, who previously served on the board during Trump’s first term. Trump previously threatened to significantly reduce Presidio operations, even though the Presidio Trust largely funds itself through real estate and hospitality revenue rather than federal appropriations. A report from the California Policy Lab finds that hundreds of thousands of residents have left California in recent years in search of more affordable housing in other states. The study found that people who leave tend to have lower credit scores, more student and auto debt, and slightly weaker financial profiles than those who stay, however within about seven years of moving are about 11% more likely to own a home than similar people who remained in California. Most Americans prefer less dense, more spread-out communities. About 55% of adults say they would rather live where homes are larger and farther apart, even if schools, stores, and restaurants are several miles away, according to a Pew Research study. 44% prefer smaller homes in walkable neighborhoods with nearby services. Nearly 59% of white adults prefer spread-out housing, compared with 69% of Asian adults who prefer denser, walkable areas, while Black and Hispanic adults are more evenly split. Republicans favor larger, more distant housing (71%), while Democrats are more likely to prefer smaller homes closer to services (60%). Jared Huffman of the House Natural Resources Committee has launched an investigation into the Trump administration’s involvement in discussions about a Southern California water district potentially acquiring two dams on the Eel River in Northern California. Los Angeles issued the Homes for L.A. Notice of Funding Availability, the first large-scale deployment of funds generated by Measure ULA, which adds a 4 percent property transfer tax on all real estate over $5.3 million and a 5.5 percent tax on sales over $10.6 million. The action will allow the Los Angeles Housing Department to assign $361 million to create over 5,200 units across 80 projects.

The California Chamber of Commerce initiative revising the California Environmental Quality Act seems sure to appear on the November ballot.

A San Diego judge has hit Huntington Beach with a $160,000 fine – with $50,000 per month going forward – for not adopting its housing element in time.

Local Ballot Measure Roundup June 2026

Located along 1.7 miles of southern California’s coast and just 22 miles north of San Diego, the 3.5 square mile beach community of City of Solana Beach (population approximately 13,000) is home to a lifestyle defined by beautiful beaches, active parks, a thriving arts scene, and a walkable downtown. The entire City of Solana Beach is within the Coastal Zone. The community is known for bicycling along the scenic Highway 101, surfing, beaches and outdoor activities, neighboring lagoons and open spaces, and the Cedros Design District and Highway 101 District comprised of boutiques, galleries, cafes and shops, and restaurants. The City seeks a creative, innovative, hands-on collaborative and approachable team builder, leader and Executive Team member as Planning Director for finding efficiencies; maintaining / improving the City’s high level service expectations; addressing changing state legislation / regulations; working with neighboring cities; oversight of the processing of coastal-related projects; handling department and inter-department entitlement reviews; and achieving the City Council’s priorities. The typical experience, education, knowledge and abilities to serve as the Planning Director includes a bachelor’s degree from an accredited institution in urban planning or closely related field, at least 10 years of increasing responsible municipal planning experience including at least 5 years of supervisory (staff and consultants) and administrative experience. It is highly desirable to have a master’s degree, AICP certification, and coastal city experience. The salary range is $164,216 to $255,132 with placement based on experience and qualifications. The City provides an excellent benefit package. For this exciting career opportunity, please confidentially apply through our website by June 12, 2026 at: Peckham & McKenney PeckhamAndMcKenney.com/searches Resumes are acknowledged within two business days. Call Tony Dahlerbruch at (866) 912-1919 for more information. A detailed brochure is also available at www.PeckhamAndMcKenney.com.

This article is brought to you courtesy of the paying subscribers to California Planning & Development Report. You can subscribe to CP&DR by clicking here. You can sign up for CP&DR’s free weekly newsletter here. San Francisco to Adopt SB 79 Local Alternative San Francisco is moving forward with a local alternative to California’s new transit-oriented housing law, Senate Bill 79, which takes effect July 1. The state law requires taller and denser housing within a half-mile of transit stops, but San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors unanimously approved a modified plan backed by Mayor Daniel Lurie that exempts large parts of the city. Officials estimate about 80% of parcels in the city fall within SB 79 transit zones, but argue San Francisco already has high housing capacity due to earlier zoning reforms. Pro-housing groups such as SF YIMBY and GrowSF say the exemptions for “low-resource” neighborhoods where officials say residents face higher risks of displacement could limit thousands of potential homes in transit-rich areas as the city struggles to meet a state requirement to permit 86,000 new homes by 2031. (See related CP&DR coverage.) Los Angeles to Consider Package of Streamlining Reforms Los Angeles Mayor Karen Bass is advancing a package of reforms aimed at speeding up housing construction and making it easier to open businesses in Los Angeles. The initiative focuses on reducing delays, simplifying permits, and modernizing city approval systems to address the city’s severe housing shortage. Speaking at the Department of Water and Power, Bass said Los Angeles needs “structural change” in how housing and business projects are approved. The reforms include launching the city’s first standard pre-approved home plan program with an online portal for single-family homes. The city will direct LADWP to reduce delays in power connections and create a project tracking system for developers and applicants. Developers have criticized the department for delaying projects. The reforms include implementation of AI tools to connect city departments into one digital permitting system so reviews can happen simultaneously instead of sequentially. State Proposes VMT "Mitigation Credits" as In-Lieu Fees The California Governor’s Office of Land Use and Climate Innovation released draft rules for a new statewide program that would let developers pay into a fund to offset transportation impact from new projects under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). The program would allow developers to buy vehicle miles traveled "mitigation credits" instead of relying only on project-specific traffic reduction measures. The money would help fund affordable housing projects in transit-friendly and infill areas, based on the idea that residents in these locations drive less than average. Affordable housing projects funded through the program would be required to remain affordable for at least 55 years. Credit prices would vary widely by region, ranging from about $1,515 per daily vehicle mile reduced in parts of Madera County to $6,682 in the Santa Barbara region, with most areas falling between $2,000 and $4,000. (See related CP&DR coverage.) LAO Report Assails High Speed Rail Business Plan A new report from the Legislative Analyst’s Office criticizes the California High-Speed Rail Authority for lacking transparency in its latest business plan. The report says the agency failed to clearly disclose assumptions about relocating stations in Merced and Bakersfield, which could significantly affect costs and planning. The 171-mile Merced-to-Bakersfield segment boasts a potential cost of $34.76 billion, and is predicated on changing the Merced and Bakersfield stations without specifying how. The HSRA board has delayed a vote on the 2026 business plan on grounds that it may violate state law due to a lack of required details on costs, timelines, and how the full San Francisco–Los Angeles system will be completed. The board, which is facing widespread criticism, will consider the plan on May 20th and procure the finalized version by June 1. CP&DR Coverage: Cities Consider Warehouse Restrictions Amid Concerns About Tariffs As the global economy has wobbled in the face of tariffs imposed by the Trump administration, the California logistics industry has followed suit. The promise of jobs and economic development has pushed jurisdictions to embrace warehouses by the millions of square feet -- totaling over 1.17 billion square feet of warehouse space in Southern California alone and sprawling further into desert territories. Meanwhile, local opponents remain vigilant, citing concerns of environmental damage and job insecurity that may follow such expansion. The tension between expansion and restriction plays out against the backdrop of 2024’s AB 98 (and a 2025 cleanup bill, SB 415), requiring jurisdictions to impose buffer zones between warehouses and sensitive uses, create truck routes, use solar power, and adopt a host of other measures designed to reduce pollution and lessen other impacts on residential neighbors. Quick Hits & Updates Environmental groups are asking a judge in Oakland to stop a major expansion of Oakland San Francisco Bay Airport, arguing the project was approved without adequate environmental and public health review. Three lawsuits claim the Port of Oakland violated state environmental law and is relying on outdated data to justify a large modernization plan that would add 16 new gates, a roughly 55% increase in capacity. Eureka City Council will consider approving $50 million in bond financing for two of the city’s largest affordable housing projects this week. One proposal would allocate $20 million for the eaRTH Center Apartments, a 46-unit affordable housing mixed-use building with a transit hub; the second would provide $30 million for the Green Phase Apartments, which is part of a larger redevelopment plan expected to replace 106 existing units with 256 new ones. A state judge has ruled that a Trump administration executive order does not override state environmental and regulatory laws in a dispute over oil pipeline operations off the Central Coast. The decision upholds a state order blocking Sable Offshore Corp. from restarting a pipeline system that closed in 2015 after a major spill until it complies with California permitting rules and other legal requirements. According to the 2026 State of the Air report, 82% of California residents live in counties affected by unhealthy air, as compared to 44% nationwide. Of the fifteen counties most impacted by smog last year, eight were in California. Los Angeles remains the most ozone-polluted metro area in the nation, and has ranked worst for ozone in 26 of the 27 years the ALA has conducted the study. Despite building over 677,000 new housing units statewide in the past six years, demand for housing has increased due to demographic change, according to the Public Policy Institute of California. As the number of people sharing a household has been falling over the past five years, more units are needed to house the same number of people. Despite new construction and higher incomes, the study estimates that 14% of homeowners and 28% of renters spend more than half of their income on housing. Brisbane, a city of fewer than 5,000 on the San Francisco Peninsula, is considering a major redevelopment that could nearly double its housing supply and significantly reshape its shoreline. The 684-acre plan proposes about 1,800 to 2,200 homes, up to 7 million square square feet of non-residential space, over 100 acres of new parks, and transit-oriented development near the Caltrain station on the edge of the San Francisco Bay. The 2026 Draft Specific Plan is scheduled to be released the week in May, with the Planning Commission review expected to begin in mid-June. A recent study by SmartAsset found that nine out of eleven American cities with the highest salaries needed to live comfortably are in California. The study used the cost of necessities such as housing, groceries, utilities, and transportation and discretionary costs and the 50/30/20 budgeting rule, assuming 50% of your post-tax income goes to needs, 30% to your wants, and 20% gets set aside for the future. The average cost of living in the top 10 most expensive cities hovers between $130,000 and $150,000 for single adults, and over $400,000 in some places for families. While New York had the highest individual salary needed to live comfortably, the rest of the top-5 consist of San Jose, Irvine, Anaheim, and Santa Ana. A January 2026 study argues against the common assumption that restrictive regulations limiting housing supply are to blame for lack of affordable housing. The study found that even major deregulation leading to large increases in market-rate construction would take decades to significantly improve affordability in high-cost U.S. cities. Instead, they argue that rising inequality and uneven demand growth across regions and income groups are the primary drivers of worsening affordability. The study concludes that relying on supply-side deregulation alone would deliver benefits too slowly and insufficiently for cost-burdened households. The Pasadena City Council unanimously adopted most elements of the “Reconnecting Pasadena” plan for redeveloping the 50-acre "710 Stub" site, a former freeway project area left undeveloped after the 2017 cancellation of the 4-mile extension connecting the 710 to the 210. Approved items include a goal of about 1,800 housing units along with transit and infrastructure changes in the unused patch. California’s Board of Forestry and Fire Protection has proposed new wildfire “Zone Zero” landscaping rules that establish a “Safety Zone” around homes in high fire-risk areas where flammable materials such as plants, mulch, and grass, would be prohibited.

In the wake of two court cases striking down voters’ decision to eliminate a coastal height limit in San Diego, developers of the city’s sports arena site have now taken the position that they can violate the height limit under the Density Bonus Law. And now the California Department of Housing and Community Development has issued a letter that would appear to validate that position.