Loretta Lynch, a San Francisco lawyer with solid Democratic credentials, is the new Office of Planning and Research director.
Gov. Gray Davis in mid-March named Lynch to the top job at OPR, which provides technical assistance to local planners and runs the State Clearinghouse for project review. The 37-year-old Lynch has been a partner in Keker & Van Nest since 1991, where she represented small and large companies in securities trading matters.
Lynch is a graduate of University of Southern California and earned her juris doctor from Yale. She clerked for U.S. Court of Appeals Judge Dorothy Wright Nelson. Prior to attending law school, Lynch was a legislative aid to Assemblyman Johan Klehs.
Lynch "developed research strategies, policy and issue positions" for the campaigns of President Clinton, Sen. Dianne Feinstein and Superintendent of Public Instruction Delaine Eastin, according to the governor's office.
While the top post at OPR is now filled, the governor has not replaced Terry Rivasplata, who has joined Jones & Stokes Associates of Sacramento as a senior environmental planner.
Rivasplata for 14 years managed the Planning and State Clearinghouse Unit and worked closely with local governments. Senior Planner Terry Roberts, who came to OPR in February from the West Sacramento Community Development Department, is in charge of the understaffed unit on an interim basis.
"Everybody who was here before is gone, with the exception of one clerk who is handling the State Clearinghouse paperwork," Roberts said in mid-March.
In his new position with Jones & Stokes, Rivasplata will provide technical expertise regarding the California Environmental Quality Act, general plans, environmental analyses, and local and regional planning to local government and private-sector clients.
L.A. may have multiple planning commissions
An overhaul of the Los Angeles City Charter, which will go before voters June 13, calls for creation of at least five area planning commissions. But those area commissions would have limited powers, and the citywide Planning Commission would remain in place, under the proposal.
"The citywide Planning Commission is seen as a body that's not very closely related to the people," Jackie DuPont-Walker, chairwoman of the Elected Charter Reform Commission said. ...
The wealthy City of Indian Wells will give $1.5 million in housing funds to the City of Coachella, a neighboring town where residents' median income is less than one-third that of Indian Wells' citizens. The money is a portion of the mandatory 20% housing set-aside from an Indian Wells redevelopment project, which transformed desert land into an upscale golf resort.
Indian Wells has spent $13.6 million in housing funds on 90 senior apartments and earmarked $14.6 million for 100 more senior units. The ...
Two lawsuits Attorney General Bill Lockyer filed against Tulare County regarding approval of giant dairies have been settled. The county agreed to add an animal waste management element to its general plan and to complete a program EIR by the end of the year.
Under terms of a settlement reached in August, the Airosa Diary agreed to suspend its 3,600-cow expansion of a dairy near Pixley until the county completes the EIR and reviews the expansion. An October settlement of a second lawsuit places the sa...
An initiative to prevent hotel and resort development on 60 acres of city-owned land in Sonoma passed with 77 percent of the vote during a Sept. 21 special election that attracted 59% of registered voters. A Mexican investor had proposed an upscale, 100-room resort for the hillside above Sonoma Plaza. Project opponents said they wanted to preserve open space and a scenic view.
Burbank city leaders and the Burbank-Glendale-Pasadena Airport Authority have announced a new agreement that would lead to expansion of the crowded Burbank Airport and end a four-year legal battle.
The deal allows the airport to build a terminal nearly twice the size of the current terminal but retain the same number of gates — 14. The airport would close concessions and services from 11 p.m. to 6 a.m. daily and phase out noisier Stage 2 jets. If the airport convinces federal regulators to approve a 1...
Completing the subdivision application process twice, and having the project rejected both times, does not qualify as an exhaustion of the administrative process, The First District Court of Appeal as ruled.
In a case from the Town of Ross, a unanimous three-judge panel said a landowner's taking claim was not ripe because the landowner had not used up all administrative remedies. The court also said the "futility exception" was not available because the landowner had filed only two applications, both ...
Failure of a county to send a copy of a mitigated negative declaration to the state Department of Fish & Game is a big enough oversight to require setting aside the mitigated negative declaration and a subsequent rezoning, the Third District Court of Appeal has ruled.
In interpreting Public Resources Code §21005, the unanimous three-judge panel ruled that the lack of notice given to a trustee agency "deprived the county of information necessary to informed decision making and informed public participa.
A county considering the environmental impact of a proposal to expand a mine may use full-capacity operation of the existing facility as the environmental "baseline" even if the facility is operating at less than full capacity, the Second District Court of Appeal has ruled.
Carson's mobile home rent control board acted properly in granting a mobile home park owner a rent increase of only $58 per month rather than the $160-170 that the park owner requested, the Second District Court of Appeal has ruled. The court also ruled that the city's formula for granting rent increases is constitutional even though it is vague.
The city board reduced the rent increase by determining that the mobile home park should amortize the cost of remediating contaminated wetlands over...
Alternate members of a Local Agency Formation Commission, when not serving in the place of regular members, may participate in public hearings and deliberations, but they may not attend closed sessions, according to a state Attorney General's opinion.
The opinion should lead to a standardization of practices for the 57 LAFCOs in California, said Mike Gotch, executive director of the California Association of Local Agency Formation Commissions.
In fact, Gotch was the one who raised the issue of parti...
Elsewhere Near River City …
West Sacramento hopes to become home to a minor league baseball team in little more than a year. The 12-year-old city is forming a Joint Powers Authority with Yolo and Sacramento counties to issue $40 million worth of taxable bonds to build a 10,000-seat baseball stadium near the Sacramento River. The new owner of the Oakland A's Triple-A franchise, now located in Vancouver, B.C., wants to play ball in West Sacramento in April 2000.
Under the plan all three entities appr...
In a region where unemployment is double the state average and many available jobs are in the low-paying service and retail sectors, a $100 million factory would appear to be a godsend. But in Shasta County, a proposed fiberglass insulation factory has instead become a lightning rod.
The two-year-old battle has split the community, with business and government leaders on one side and a mix of slow-growth advocates, physicians, and small business owners on the other.
In October 1996, representatives ...
