Insight

Like some 60 other cities in California, Davis has a voter-approved requirement that some development projects require a vote before they can move forward.

History would suggest that the answer is no. It's more likely that the Legislature will punch a couple of holes in the law and plaintiffs' lawyers will continue to figure out how to get around the holes.

Still, some jurists still focus on expanding the law, creating a kind of schism in the appellate courts. Will the Legislature step in to clarify? Not likely.

State's 2045 goals could also upend CEQA practice and do away with thresholds.

The experience with both the builder's remedy and SB 9 suggest that we may have too many laws going in too many different directions at the moment.

AB 2097 was celebrated as a pro-housing victory. But debate over the bill highlighted the growing gap between those who believe the market can solve the housing problem and those who don't.

Residential building permits statewide are up 15% from last year and 35% from 2019.

Agency official says HCD has more open complaints about San Francisco than any other city in the state.

The City Councilmembers appointed themselves the final arbiter of whether a project met SB 35 requirements. Then they overruled their own staff. But in the end, it was really just about vagueness and inconsistency between the general plan and the zoning ordinance.

Having punched a big hole in CEQA to solve the Berkeley enrollment problem, will the Legislature be template to punch more holes in the future?<

In response to the Berkeley enrollment case, the Legislature is likely to do something. Exempting student and faculty housing would weaken CEQA -- but Justice Goodwin Liu laid out another path that could truly reform it.

The University of California tried to finesse the fact that Berkeley had blown past its enrollment target without doing additional CEQA analysis. And maybe the judge didn't have to "go nuclear" on this case. But the question of whether population growth in and of itself demand