The California Supreme Court has accepted a second case involving the application of coastal zone requirements. In January, the court voted to review a case in which the Second District Court of Appeal ruled that a state law requiring coastal zone developers to provide affordable units did not apply to a project in which all new houses would be located outside the zone.
The state high court put the issue this way: "Does the term ‘housing development' — for purposes of the Mello Act requirement that a developer provide affordable housing, where feasible, when a new housing development is constructed within the coastal zone subject to the jurisdiction of the California Coastal Commission (Government Code § 65590) — refer only to the actual housing component of a project, or is the Mello Act applicable if some aspects of the project are in the coastal zone even if all of the actual housing is to be constructed outside the coastal zone?"
The Second District Court of Appeal answered that question in the negative. In a 2-1 ruling, the court held that developers of a 114-lot project in Los Angeles did not have to comply with the Mello Act's affordable housing mandate (see CP&DR Legal Digest, November 2003). Although the coastal zone boundary splits the 45-acre project site, the only portions of the development inside the coastal zone would be a road, utilities and erosion control facilities.
The case is Coalition of Concerned Communities v. City of Los Angeles, No. S119897.
Last year, the Supreme Court voted to review a separate case involving the same project. In that case, the Second District held that the Coastal Commission could not consider the environmental impacts to areas inside that coastal zone that result from development of the proposed houses outside the zone. That case is Sierra Club v. California Coastal Commission, No. S116081.
An appellate court has overturned the City of Los Angeles's approval of a variance that allowed the expansion of a nonconforming use. The court determined that a proposal to expand a gas station located in a residential zone did not meet the city's criteria for a variance.
Specifically, the Second District Court of Appeal found that there was no evidence that imposing existing zoning requirements would create a hardship for the landowner or business owner — a requirement for a variance.
Claims that Sacramento County violated the California Environmental Quality Act while approving a commercial development have been dismissed by the Third District Court of Appeal because the project opponent did not submit a written request for a hearing within 90 days of filing a lawsuit.
The attorney for opponent Forster-Gill, Inc., argued that a telephone call to the court clerk within the 90-day period was adequate, but the appellate court disagreed, ruling that the law "plainly contemplates a written request that can be, and is, filed with the court."
A state appellate court has upheld the California Coastal Commission's denial of a development permit for a small mixed-use project in Morro Bay.
The court rejected developer Dan Reddell's arguments that the commission violated his due process and equal protection rights, and that its decision was a regulatory taking of property. Instead, the Second District Court of Appeal ruled that substantial evidence supported the commission's finding that Reddell's project was inconsistent with Morro Bay's local coastal plan (LCP).
A state appellate court has thrown out an Inyo County general plan amendment that the county argued was nothing more than a clarification of a longstanding policy.
A unanimous three-judge panel of the Fourth District Court of Appeal, Division Two, concluded that the amendment was more than a mere clarification and that the county should have completed an environmental impact report before approving the amendment.
A City of West Hollywood moratorium on new multi-family housing development has been declared invalid by the Second District Court of Appeal. The court ruled that the city had not made required findings for the moratorium.
The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has set back a plan to develop the country's largest solid waste landfill near Joshua Tree National Park. The court ruled that the environmental analysis for the project was inadequate and that the Bureau of Land Management undervalued land it would provide to the landfill developer.
A state appellate court has struck down a California Environmental Quality Act exemption for an air district rule permitting new power plants to offset emissions by paving roads. The court found that the Mojave Desert Air Quality Management District did not have adequate evidence to support its finding that the rule could not have a negative impact on the environment.
A developer is not entitled to reimbursement or damages from a consultant hired by a local government to complete an environmental impact report, the First District Court of Appeal has ruled. Even when the consultant fails to complete an EIR in a timely manner, the consultant owes no contractual duty to the developer that paid for the consultant, the court concluded.
In the first decision of its kind, a divided Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals panel has declared that the City of Goleta's mobile home rent control ordinance constitutes a regulatory taking.
The City of Claremont's moratorium on dispensaries of medical marijuana and a Superior Court injunction shuttering a dispensary have been upheld by the Second District Court of Appeal.
A city may determine that project alternatives once considered potentially feasible for California Environmental Quality Act analysis are infeasible as actual projects, the Sixth District Court of Appeal has ruled.
The City of Los Angeles had no obligation under the California Environmental Quality Act to complete an environmental impact report for a project that it had rejected, the Second District Court of Appeal has ruled.
The court dismissed all arguments put forward by the developer of the 555-acre Las Lomas project at the junction of Interstate 5 and Highway 14. "[I]f an agency at any time decides not to proceed with a project," the court said, "CEQA is inapplicable from that time forward."
