The San Francisco Bay Area Renters Federation (SFBARF) is suing  the City of Berkeley City Council over allegations that the council has repeatedly violated California’s Housing Accountability Act (HAA). The HAA, from 1982, compels municipalities to “not reject or make infeasible” housing developments that help meet housing needs. SF-BARF, along with California Renters Legal Advocacy and Education Fund (CaRLA), allege the city has violated HAA by rejecting a recently submitted application for a new three-unit development. The project was in compliance with “all applicable, objective general plan and zoning standards and criteria, including design review standards” and problems arose when neighbors were unhappy with the project and appealed. The City Council argues because the project required demolition permits to remove the existing residence, HAA did not apply. This is the second city that SF-BARF has sued to comply with HAA; the pervious case against the City of Lafayette, was settled in the city’s favor last month. Design Competition Seeks Responses to Sea Level Rise A newly announced design competition in the Bay Area, “Resilient by Design,” will select  10 interdisciplinary teams to tackle 10 sites around the bay, with at least one in each county, to mitigate the effects of sea-level rise. The Rockefeller Foundation pledged $4.6 million to fund the competition (the foundation also funds 100 Resilient Cities; see prior CP&DR coverage). Other sponsors include Metropolitan transportation Commission, City of San Francisco, and Santa Clara Valley Water District. The kickoff last week will couple a request for qualifications from design teams as well as an “open call” for Bay Area residents to suggest particular spots that might be worthy of in-depth attention. The 10 design teams will be selected this summer, and the fall will be spent gathering information and visiting the different sites, which will be finalized in December. Design solutions will be presented next May and each design team will receive $250,000 for its work. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) Trump Budget Proposal Would Eliminate Much City-Related Funding According to analysis by the League of California Cities, President Trump’s Fiscal Year 2018 budget proposes  significant cuts to programs that generally serve cities, either directly or indirectly. The budget would eliminate Community Development Block Grants, HOME Investment Partnerships, Choice Neighborhoods, and Self-Help Homeownership Opportunity Programs. Other changes include eliminating funding for Transportation Security Administration Law Enforcement Grants, Flood Hazard Mapping and Risk Analysis Program, and five components of existing FEMA Programs, while requiring a 25 percent local match on others. This is only a short list of the proposed eliminated and reduced programs. However, this is only an initial proposal and Congress must ratify the budget. Many Congressional members have expressed concerns for the major cuts proposed by the administration. The administration justifies the cuts on the “state and local governments are better positioned to address local community and economic development needs”. San Francisco Adopts Density Bonus Ordinance The San Francisco Board of Supervisors approved , 10-1, a housing density law that has been in discussion for two years. The ordinance allows developers to build taller residential structures in exchange for 30 percent of units made affordable. The only dissenting vote, Supervisor Norman Yee, asked for a special exemption for the Ocean Avenue corridor in his district. The ordinance, known as Home-SF, will bring more housing units into an increasingly expensive market and is critical in keeping working and middle-class residents in the city. The supervisors also unanimously approved a settlement with short-term rental services such as Airbnb and HomeAway that ensures all local hosts are registered with the city. L.A. Airport Settles Lawsuit with Neighboring Communities The Los Angeles City Council agreed  to settle lawsuits brought by Culver City and Inglewood that alleged potential environmental impacts from modernization projects at Los Angeles International Airport. The two cities will participate in planning future development at LAX and implement transportation projects that will be paid for by Los Angeles World Airports, according to the agreement. The airport department will give Culver City $2.71 million and Inglewood $14.9 million to implement “intelligent” transportation systems, which should involve sophisticated information and communication technologies to move people safely and efficiently. Inglewood will receive an additional $10.6 million to develop a transportation demand management system to reduce travel demand or redistribute it over time or across the transportation system. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) SCAG Announces Winners of Annual Sustainability Awards The Southern California Association of Governments handed out its Sustainability Awards at its recent Regional Conference, which "recognize projects that best coordinate land use and transportation to improve the mobility, livability, prosperity and health of Southern California." Transportation Corridor Agencies, Foothill South Settlement Agreement received an award for Outstanding Achievement in Sustainability; UCLA BruinBikeSmart received an award for Active Transportation; the City of San Bernardino’s Waterman and Baseline Neighborhood Specific Plan received the “Against All Odds” award; the Collaborative Partnership went to the Imperial County Transportation Commission’s Pedestrian and Bicycle Transportation Access Study for the California/ Baja California Land Ports of Entry. The Los Angeles County Department of Parks and Recreation won an award for Green Region; the City of Lynwood for Healthy and Safe Communities, and City of Long Beach for its Midtown Specific Plan. Quick Hits & Updates The City of Long Beach has released its Midtown Specific Plan for 369-acres along Long Beach Boulevard corridor. The plan includes walkability measure, improved mobility options for bicycles and transit riders, and new development and housing opportunities along the corridor. The California Association of Environmental Planners (AEP) awarded the plan’s vision and contributions with an Outstanding Planning Document award.  San Francisco Supervisor Sandra Fewer has requested a study on the possibility of a BART extension to the Richmond District. An MTC study revealed approximately 16,200 Richmond District residents commute downtown on a public transit lines designed to serve a maximum of 16,800. The State Historical Resources Commission earlier this month voted unanimously to recommend placing the Albion River Bridge on the National Register of Historic Places. It is the last timber trestle bridge on Pacific Coast Highway. Caltrans wants to replace the 150-foot tall bridge with a wider, more earthquake-safe bridge. However, some Mendocino Coast residents want the agency to repair and keep the quirky bridge. The Sacramento City Council approved a scaled-back renovation of the Sacramento Convention center, choosing to save money for a second, undetermined project intended to draw tourists and conventioners to the city. Mayor Darrell Steinberg told the Sacramento Bee, “It would be a missed opportunity to put all of our money in a single asset to increase tourism and hotel demand.” The original proposal was $170 million and would add more than 100,000 square feet to the convention center. The new plan that figure by $50 million. Los Angeles County Metro will open three new bike-share pilot projects this summer: 31 kiosks in Pasadena as of July 14, the Port of Los Angeles July 31, and Venice later in the summer. The pasadena program will include 370 bicycles for a two-year pilot program. Los Angeles County’s homeless population has increased 23 percent over last year to nearly 58,000 although 14,000 people are permanently off the streets through rent subsidies, new construction, outreach and support services. In City of Los Angeles, homelessness jumped over 34,000, which is up 20 percent from 2016. Santa Clara County Housing Authority has agreed to buy Buena Vista Mobile Home Park in Palo Alto for $40.4 million. The Housing Authority’s board must give final approval to the deal, but the agreement to save the city’s last real affordable housing has been worked out over the last four months.

The Federal Transit Administration abruptly reversed course last week to approve a $647 million grant to electrify Caltrain tracks. Several months ago, newly confirmed Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao abruptly said it would not disburse the funds to the Bay Area commuter railroad, even though they had already been promised under the Obama administration. The electrification project, which will cost a total of $2 billion, will mean faster and more reliable trains on a 51-mile stretch, offering more than 110,000 rides per idea instead of the current 60,000. Electrification is also a crucial step towards readying the Peninsula corridor for high speed rail. The first electric trains will be in service by 2021, and construction will begin in 60 to 90 days. The electrification will replace the current fleet of diesel trains. "We are very thankful to U.S. Secretary of Transportation Elaine Chao and the Trump Administration for recognizing the value that Caltrain Electrification will create for the Bay Area and the nation by easing congestion in one of the country’s most economically productive regions and creating almost 10,000 American jobs in the process,” said Jim Hartnett, General Manager and CEO of Caltrain, in a statement . Los Angeles Metro Considers Overhaul of Bus System In response to falling bus ridership, the Los Angeles Metropolitan Transportation Authority has embarked on a study to “re-imagine” the agency’s bus network, which is the largest in California. The study, expected to take over a year, will analyze the system’s 170 lines and 15,000 bus stops. The current system has been in place for over 25 years without major changes. In that time, Metro has opened multiple rail lines, which have influenced rider behavior. Annual bus ridership on the system has fell 16 percent from 2013 to 2016, or 59 million trips. After months of preliminary research, Metro officials acknowledged the bus system is not working as well for riders as it once did. A recent survey of 2,000 former riders say the buses don't go where they want them to go or don’t come often enough or stop running too early. Of those surveyed, 79 percent now primarily drive alone. Metro's Conan Cheung told the Los angeles Times, “we’re misaligned with current travel demands.” Los Angeles County Short Half-Million Affordable Units A new report  (pdf) from California Housing Partnership Corporation contends that Los Angeles County has a need for 551,807 new units of affordable housing to satisfy demand from very low and extremely low-income earners. Lowest earnings are those making less than half the county’s median income of $64,300. The nonprofit argues the cuts in federal and state funding, including elimination of Community Redevelopment Agencies, have contributed to the shortfall. According to the report, median rent in LA has gone up by 32 percent since 2000 but household income has actually dropped about 3 percent. Recommendations from the nonprofit include providing more subsidies and incentives to encourage developers to build affordable units and adoption of proposed ordinance being considered that would charge developers a “linkage fees” that could be used to construct more affordable units. San Diego Debates Convention Center Vote San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer is pushing for a November special election to vote on a hotel tax hike to finance the expansion of San Diego’s convention center. However, both City Council members and advocates questioned the logic of the ballot measure, which would allocate funding for addressing homelessness and repair crumbling streets, at a recent City Council hearing. Those questioning the special election are wondering whether it is wise to spend million of dollars on a special election and if enough funds are dedicated to the city’s growing homeless problem. Opponents to the measure say it favors the hotel industry at the expense of the homeless. The proposal would boost the hotel room tax by 1 to 3 percent, with nearly two-thirds of the $5 billion raised over 40 years going towards expanding the convention center. The remaining balance of tax revenues would be split between reducing homelessness and tackling street repairs. The council is expected to vote soon on whether to place the measure on the November ballot. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) Infill Builders Recommend Parking Reforms in L.A.  A report published by the Council of Infill Builders found that parking policies, such as excessive parking requirements in new construction, lack of adequate pricing and enforcement of existing spaces, and poor management of parking assets inflates housing costs and limits mobility in Los Angeles. The report, “Wasted Spaces: Options to Reform Parking Policy in Los Angeles” recommends eliminating, reducing or right-sizing minimum parking requirements, charge optimal pricing for parking, and improving parking management rather than mandating new parking requirements such as shared parking and transportation demand options. (Disclosure: CP&DR Contributing Editor Josh Stephens participated in a scoping meeting for the report.) Trust for Public Land Ranks Park Access in 100 Largest Cities  The Trust for Public Land released its 2017 ParkScore rankings which analyze how the 100 largest U.S. cities are meeting the needs for parks. San Francisco was third place with a score of 80, Irvine was tied 7th with New York City with a score of 75, San Diego was 14th with a score of 69, and Sacramento was 21st with a score of 63.5. Fremont was 24th with a score of 62.5 tied with Long Beach, Oakland, San Jose, Virginia Beach, Lincoln, and Las Vegas. Anaheim was 63rd with a score of 45 tied with Glendale and Riverside. Fresno was at the bottom of the list as number 90 with a score of 33.5, Stockton was 75th with a score of 41 tied with Santa Ana, Los Angeles was 74th with a score of 41.5, and Bakersfield 71 with 43.5. Quick Hits & Updates The Strategic Growth Council has announced its schedule of technical workshops for the 2017-18 Sustainable Agricultural Lands Conservation Program: June 5, Gilroy; June 15, webinar; June 22, Ventura. The Los Angeles City Council approved $27.2 million for Vision Zero programs in 2017-2018. The programs include street and safety improvements, speed zone surveys and enforcements, street improvements, street lighting support and supplies, and vision zero corridor projects to name a few. The allocation is a nearly tenfold increase from 2016-2017, which was $3.4 million. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) Gov. Jerry Brown said he will not accept a cap-and-trade program extension with anything les than a two-thirds vote. The program has been the subject of lawsuits related to Prop. 13, so he wants the higher threshold to protect the program from legal challenges. The comment from a Brown advisor came after some lawmakers were considering pushing forward with only a majority vote. City of Los Angeles’ Board of Public Works voted to fund a $1.5 million feasibility analysis for Agence Ter’s winning Pershing Square Renew design to revitalize the oldest open space in the heard of downtown. The contract will allow the Paris-based Agence Ter and their LA contractor, Gruen Associates, to conduct an analysis for the implementation of the team’s concept for the square. Agence Ter received the highest scores from the 1,355 member public who voted on the final four, and was the unanimous first choice of the Pershing Square Renew jury. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) The opening for the new Inglewood stadium for the Rams and Chargers has been pushed back a year because of record rainfall disrupting construction. Instead of opening for the 2019 NFL season, it will open by 2020. San Jose City Council adopted a memorandum in April stating their intention to consider an ordinance to ban income source discrimination, such as Section 8 vouchers, and requiring the city’s housing department to analyze the problem. Those with vouchers in San Jose are having difficulty finding a place to live because many homes are too expensive or landlords choose not to rent to voucher holders. Marin County planners have told supervisors it may take longer than anticipated to reach an agreement with the Coastal Commission on an update to the 35-year-old general plan. Commission staff has been working on the local coastal program for eight years. Updates to the program include rules mandating coastal properties prepare for sea-level rise and more lenient policies for farmers and ranchers looking to build intergenerational housing on their land. The current section being worked on is Hazards, with the deadline for the commission to act as Sept. 29. The Inland Valley Development Agency is looking into developing 500-acres north of San Bernardino International Airport and has hired a consultant to look into options for the site. The over-arching objectives for the plan are economic development, job creation and public amenities. Los Angeles City Council has agreed to settle lawsuits brought by Culver City and Inglewood alleging that potential environmental impacts of modernization projects at LAX were not properly evaluated. Under the terms of agreement the two cities will participate in planning future development at the country’s second-busiest airport. The airport is currently undergoing a $14-billion modernization of ground transportation improvements including a people mover in the central terminal area, transportation center, consolidated car rental facility and upgraded roads. San Jose is facing a delay on a $35 million project designed to provide 100-year flood protection to 2.2 miles of Upper Berryessa Creek, reducing risk to 680 properties and Santa Clara’s first BART station. Although paperwork and permits were in order, last month state water regulators rescinded their earlier approval and said that 15 acres of wetlands or 15,000 feet of creek somewhere else in South Bay had to be restored to offset the harm to the environment from the project. The Santa Clara Valley Water District and the Army Corps are appealing the order and threatening to sue because the project could go over budget and lead to its cancellation. The planned Purple Line subway extension to Westwood may  begin  construction in 2018, nine years ahead of its original schedule. The estimated $860 million in annual revenue from the Measure M, passed in November, will help cover the cost of finishing the extension. However, the project also depends on promised matching federal funds, which still need to be allocated and approved. The Fourth District Court of Appeals has sided with Huntington Beach in a preliminary ruling that reverses a 2015 Superior Court decision that ordered the city to change the zoning on land along Beach Boulevard and Edinger Avenue to allow low-income and high-density housing. The nonprofit Kennedy Commission, a housing advocacy group, originally sued the city in 2015 claiming it has shut down opportunities to build low-income housing when it cut the number of units from 4,500 to 2,100. San Diego City Attorney Mara Elliott has raised concerns about the SoccerCity's initiative to build an MLS stadium on the site of Qualcomm Stadium, saying it doesn't guarantee a professional soccer stadium or a river park, and could burden taxpayers with hefty costs for environmental cleanup of the site. The 27-page analysis also raised questions about the contradictions and lack of clarity in parts of the 3,000-page initiative saying it could lead to costly litigation. Backers FS Investors say many of the issues raised by Elliott could be resolved in a lease the group would be required to negotiate with Mayor Faulconer if the initiative is approved. Laguna Beach is partnering with Uber for a pilot program that would provide supplement transportation needs for those 55 and older and the disabled who have relied on the city’s bus service that is being cut or reduced. Passengers will get free rides for the first two months of the six-month pilot program up to 15 miles outside city limits. The program is believed to be the first of its kind in the state.

The year 2017 was supposed to be the year of housing in Sacramento. Housing cost and supply have been widely documented has major issues. There’s little debate from either side of the aisle that it has to be tackled. More than a hundred bills were introduced promoting a wide range of ideas old and new.

Developers always say they want certainty, but one property owner in San Diego sure isn’t getting it. In the latest twist on a see-saw battle, the Fourth District Court of Appeal overturned a trial judge and concluded that the City of San Diego acted properly in denying the property owner a parcel map in order to subdivide a piece of property in Point Loma.

CP&DR Vol. 32 No. 5 May 2017

Many of California’s great Native American casinos rise out of the landscape like mesas in the desert. Think of Morongo along Interstate 10 outside of Palm Springs or Cache Creek towering over the olive groves of the Capay Valley. While the California gambling industry, at an estimated $17 billion per year, eclipses that of Las Vegas, the fantasy of easy winnings and the reality of urban life seldom intersect.

Last fall, the California Supreme Court reversed the First District Court of Appeal in an environmental case from the College of San Mateo, saying that courts shouldn’t second-guess lead agencies on what is a “new” versus a “modified” project under the California Environental Quality Act.

The new draft Affordable Housing and Sustainable Communities (AHSC) Program Guidelines is being revised by the Strategic Growth Council with a few significant changes. They include organization and streamlining of guidelines, moving select scoring criteria to thresholds, revised application process and scoring criteria, including Indian tribes as eligible applicants, costs associated with parking are ineligible for AHSC funds, housing element compliance, environmental clearance requirements for transportation components, and joint and several liability. The drafts incorporate feedback obtained through public comments and workshops held in late 2016. SCG is considering two options for geographic allocation of grants. The drafts address concerns and recommendations from statewide AHSC stakeholders, as well as from an internal review of process and outcomes from the past two AHSC funding cycles. The Council is still discussion the question of regional funding distribution goals. Natural Resources Agency Seeks Public Comment on Climate Adaptation Plan The California Natural Resources Agency released a  draft of the  Safeguarding California Plan: 2017 Update  and seeks public comment on the state’s strategy for adapting to a changing climate. The update builds on the first California Climate Adaptation Strategy in 2009. This 2017 update provides recommendations and next steps to advance adaptation in 10 sectors that include water, agriculture, public health and biodiversity. As California continues to experience rising average temperatures, shrinking mountain snowpack, warmer storms, and higher sea levels, the State must consider climate change in its planning, investment, and public outreach. The Natural Resources Agency leads California’s climate change adaptation effort under several statutes and executive orders intended to foster change throughout state and local government. The draft represents a comprehensive effort by experts across 27 state agencies to describe ongoing efforts and needed actions to ensure public safety and environmental protection as average temperatures warm, precipitation patterns change and sea levels rise. The document provides a succinct “to do” list for state departments that will help the public measure progress. Some examples: Develop a map of climate change refugia (places where local conditions persist over time) for certain wildlife species, address environmental justice issues around supporting community solar projects for low-income customers, and advance programs for “living shorelines” that may include wetland plants, aquatic vegetation, oyster reefs or sand fill. The Natural Resources Agency seeks public comment on the draft plan through May and will hold four public meetings this month to gather input from interested citizens, scientists, government officials, and other stakeholders. TheSafeguarding California Plan: 2017 Update document will be revised based on public comments, with a final version scheduled for release in July.  San Francisco Faces Two Affordable Housing Proposals The San Francisco Board of Supervisors is  considering two competing affordable housing philosophies: one would focus on keeping middle-class families in the city while the other would build more affordable housing. The group Council of Community Housing Organizations is requesting the supervisors change the way affordable housing is priced so that it would be based on the market rate of the surrounding neighborhood rather than a citywide median income. The two sides will meet before the board’s Land Use Committee with the resulting legislation going to the board. Supervisor Katy Tang is promoting an ordinance that would allow developers to build two extra floors in exchange for more affordable housing. The Board of Supervisors last week reached a compromise on how much affordable housing to require in new market-rate developments: 18 percent of rental units be affordable for all projects approved between now and January, this will increase to 19 percent next year, and 20 percent in 2019. If the developer instead choses to build the affordable units at another location, the ratios increase from 30 to 32 percent. S.D. State University Pulls Out of Soccer Stadium at Qualcomm Site San Diego State University ended discussions with FS Investors for a proposed joint 30,000-seat soccer near Qualcomm Stadium, which is being abandoned by the Chargers. The University said the proposal did not meet the athletic and academic needs of the campus. The proposal is part of a ballot initiative that will head to the City Council next month for a possible special election Nov. 7. Originally the university would have contributed $100 million and received the facility as a donation after five years. Without SDSU, FS Investors will revert back to a smaller 22,000 seat soccer-only stadium without the ability to double in size if SDSU later changes its mind. L.A. Metro to Consider Two Alternatives for 710 Freeway Gap Los Angeles Metro released a study last week recommending the development of a tunnel to close the infamous gap in the 710 Freeway between Alhambra and Pasadena. A 4.9-mile tunnel is expected to cost at least $5.4 billion and would be the longest tunnel in California for car traffic. The study recommends two double-decker tunnels, one for each direction of traffic. Metro Board of Directors Ad-Hoc Congestion, Highway and Roads Committee passed, 3-2, a motion which recommends adopting the Traffic Systems Management/Traffic Demand Management alternative which would instead upgrade local streets rather than build a tunnel. Both proposals head to the May 25 Metro board meeting for consideration. The motion requires votes by 7 of the 13 members to pass. S.D. State University Pulls Out of Soccer Stadium at Qualcomm Site San Diego State University ended discussions with FS Investors for a proposed joint 30,000-seat soccer near Qualcomm Stadium, which is being abandoned by the Chargers. The University said the proposal did not meet the athletic and academic needs of the campus. The proposal is part of a ballot initiative that will head to the City Council next month for a possible special election Nov. 7. Originally the university would have contributed $100 million and received the facility as a donation after five years. Without SDSU, FS Investors will revert back to a smaller 22,000 seat soccer-only stadium without the ability to double in size if SDSU later changes its mind. Quick Hits & Updates San Francisco is the only city in the nation where every resident lives within a 10-minute walk of a park or open space according to an analysis by the Trust for Public Land. A 10-minute walk is approximately a half-mile for the average person. The group’s annual ParkScore analysis includes the number of individual parks, overall spending and facilities upkeep. Gov. Jerry Brown signed legislation restoring funding to the state’s most recently incorporated cities. Eastvale, Wildomar, Menifee, and Jurupa Valley were hit hardest when VLF funds were cut in 2011. SB 130 allows these cities to receive allocations of property tax as VLF adjustment amounts that all other cities receive. An earthquake fault has been discovered under Seaport Village in San Diego according to preliminary results from a geotechnical study. This could force a complete redesign of the redevelopment plan for the 37-year old retail center. The plan was to build a series of hotels, offices, an aquarium, maritime academy, shops and restaurants but an active fault would require major reworking of the development plan. The National Trust for Historic Preservation celebrated the 30th anniversary of its annual “Most Endangered Places” list with a retrospective of success stories. In California, Angel Island Immigration Station in San Francisco and Cathedral of St. Vibiana in Los Angeles have made the list for having been successful preserved. California regulators moved towards closing the last coastal sand mine in the United States, which has used a legal loophole to operate near Monterey Bay for decades. The 8-acre Lapis Sand Plant has for the last 27 years sucked up sand and seawater even after all other sand dredges were banned from the coast. The Coastal Commission has claimed Cemex is threatening both the surrounding dunes and hastening the southern Monterey Bay erosion. California State Lands Commission told the company they must immediately submit to state regulation. The San Jose City Council rejected , 10-1, a policy that would have weakened tenant protections for mobile home park closures. The city is home to nearly 11,000 mobile homes in 59 parks, the largest number of any city in the state. The closure policy had a loophole that would allow a property owner to close a park without paying high relocation benefits or face as much scrutiny but sit on the land to redevelop it later. According to a new report from the California Association of Realtors, only 29 percent of LA County households can afford to buy the county’s median-priced home of $485,800. The study also found that a minimum annual income of $99,830 was needed to make monthly payments of $2,500 on a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage at a 4.36 percent interest rate. In comparison, 52 percent of San Bernardino County households can afford the region’s $256,900 median-priced home but only 21 percent of Orange County households can afford the $750,000 median priced home. In a sign of the housing crisis in the Bay Area, Stanford University paid $130.5 million for upscale apartment and retail complex in Los Altos to house faculty and staff. The complex includes 167 apartments and 12,000 square feet of retail space. According to the Santa Clara County Assessor’s Office, the property’s value was calculated at $85.1 million a year ago.  The Office of Exposition Park Management  released an RFP seeking master planning services for the 160-acre expanse as new large-scale projects are being developed around the park, in South Los Angeles. This will generate the park’s first master plan since 1993.  UC-Berkeley’s Institute for Governmental Studies (IGS) released  (pdf) a report “Displacement in San Mateo County, California: Consequences for Housing, Neighborhoods, Quality of Life, and Health.” The study found a spike in evictions in San Mateo County, disproportionately affecting people of color. The researchers did 100 in-depth phone surveys with primarily low-income tenants who received services from Community Legal Services in East Palo Alto.

The Strategic Growth Council Sustainable Communities Planning Grants & Incentives Best Practices Pilot Program awarded  (PDF) $250,000 in Proposition 84 monies to six projects statewide. Of the 13 applicants, five were from the Bay Area, four from the Los Angeles area, two from Central Valley, and one each from Sacramento and Central Coast. The City of Arvin that incorporated a Water Element into its general plan. The County of LA won $41,000 for its Green Zones Program: Environmental Justice Ground Truthing in East Los Angeles & Florence-Firestone which aims to utilize sustainable land use tools and implementation measures to reduce and mitigate toxic pollutants from emission sources. City of San Jose won for its Bike Plan Outreach Strategy and County of Merced for its Integration of GHG Inventory. The fifth winner was County of Contra Costa for a Renewable Resource Potential Study that would identify potential for distribution-scale renewable resources such as solar, wind, biomass, and biogas. The final winner was the County of San Luis Obispo for its Oceano Eco-District Project that works with Habitat for Humanity for SLO County to provide an underserved community a clear path for projects that achieve resilience and GHG reductions. Santa Clara VTA to Overhaul Bus Network Santa Clara County’s Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) unanimously approved , on a 12-0 vote, major changes to its bus and light rail routes because of a $21.4 million operating shortfall. The VTA will increase fares by 50 cents over the next two years and the DASH line through downtown San Jose will be replaced by the Rapid 500 bus. The new bus schedules will coincide with the inauguration of BART service coming to the County with Milpitas and Berryessa stops. The redesign focuses on high-volume routes. In the current configuration, VTA considers 70 percent of routes to be “volume” routes, with the remainder as “coverage” routes that make the system accessible but do not attract many riders. That ratio will shift to 83 / 17 in the new configuration. While Uber and Lyft are luring people away from public transportation, stable gas prices and rising car purchases in Santa Clara County have also lead to the decline in ridership. Report Details Low-Income Housing Shortage in Bay Area A report from nonprofit California Housing Partnership Corp. and Non-Profit Housing Association of Northern California found that in the Bay Area it is becoming harder for lower-income residents to find affordable housing. Rents and incomes in Alameda, Contra Costa, San Mateo and Sonoma counties shows that each county is at least 10,000 rental units short of what it would take for everyone to find affordable housing. Residents who earn less than 50 percent AMI spend more than half of their monthly paychecks on rent. The report found that state and federal funding for affordable housing in the four counties analyzed have dropped 65 percent since 2008. California’s spending on affordable housing has gone down $1.5 billion since 2012. Authors Clarify Controversial Study of Transit Oriented Development A study noted in last month's CP&DR news briefs  has roused concern among planners in the Bay Area for reportedly conflating new transit oriented development with transit oriented neighborhoods. The original version of the study seemed to indicate that new TOD tended to hasten rates of gentrification in Los Angeles and the Bay Area. The study actually found the opposite. It turns out that there was significant displacement and gentrification in transit oriented neighborhoods, even where there was very little new development. According to an updated abstract, the study found “that transit proximity has a significant impact on the stability of the surrounding neighborhood, leading to increases in housing costs that change the composition of the area, including the loss of low-income households. We found that gentrification and displacement in rail station areas would only be likely to cause an increase in auto usage and regional vehicle miles traveled (VMT) when accompanied by a significant loss of population near transit.” Activists had used the original interpretation of the study to protest SB 375, which promotes new development near transit. The San Francisco Planning Department led the charge to encourage researchers to clarify their findings and terminology.  Group Pledges $100 Million for Homeless in S.F. Nonprofit group Tipping Point Community has pledged $100 million to cut the chronically homeless population in San Francisco in half over the next half-decade. The money will create permanent housing, improve aid for people with mental illness and other causes of homelessness, and help the city attract more state and federal funding. In the latest one-night homeless count, the city found 1,745 of the 6,686 people were chronically homeless (2015). The money was raised privately and will be given to city agencies, including the Department of Homelessness and Supportive Housing. The 12-year-old organization raises millions of dollars annually to fight poverty, but this was the first large challenge. Cox and Kotkin Release Brief on Millennials’ Prospects in California Chapman University’s Center for Demographics and Policy released a research brief “Fading Promise: Millennial Prospects in the Golden State.” Co-authored by scholars Wendell Cox and Joel Kotkin, the brief discusses how California millennial are facing “unprecedented economic challenges and, according to many predictions, diminished prospects.” This is primarily because housing prices in California have risen to 230 percent of the national average, while salaries remain lower than key competitive states. This has lead to significant out-migration, primarily by younger families in their late 30s and early 40s. The report covers a variety of statistics including homeownership rates, numbers of millennials living with parents, population change, and how to bring more millennials into the housing market and thereby restoring middle-class prosperity in California. El Monte Envisions Transit Oriented Downtown The City of El Monte is moving forward with plans to revitalize downtown through its proposed “Downtown Main Street Transit-Oriented Development Specific Plan” funded by a grant from Metro. The plan includes a 115-acre area that would generate 2,200 residential units and 500,000 square feet of commercial by 2035. Eight guiding principles have steered the process including mixed-use, pedestrian and TOD village, central shopping district, enticing place for investment, variety of housing opportunities, expanded and improved public transportation system, blend of old and new, balanced system of multimodal streets, and entryways at key intersections. Landfill Discovers Mapping Mistake, Runs Afoul of Coastal Zone Tajiguas Landfill in Santa Barbara County has been trying to expand for 15 years, but last-second discovery of a miscalculation about the location of a key boundary line means the project is “dead in the water” according to Ed Easton of the Gaviota Coast Conservancy. Planners initially discovered the mistake two months ago as they were preparing paperwork to seek financing for the $110 million construction project. They discovered the state’s Coastal Zone Boundary line was 173 yards further inland than planners had believed. This means all permits are null and void. Environmental groups have been trying to get Tajiguas decommissioned since the late 90s. Quick Hits & Updates Assemblyman Travis Allen (R-Huntington Beach) has filed paperwork seeking a 2018 ballot measure to overturn SB1, the 10-year, $54.2 billion transportation funding bill that would raise the state’s gas tax by 12 cents a gallon, increase taxes on diesel fuel and impose new annual fees on vehicles. The Attorney General’s office needs to give the measure a title and summary, then organizers must collect 365,880 voter signatures to qualify. The California Supreme Court will hear two cases that challenge the North Coast Railroad Authority’s stance that federal laws preempt it from having to conduct an environmental review on its project to restore a railway stretching from Arcata to Napa County. Friends of the Eel River and Californians for Alternatives for Toxics filed the cases in Marin County Superior Court nearly six years ago and are saying the June 2011 environmental review of the 142 mile section of the whole 316 miles is incomplete. The Safeguarding California Plan: 2017 Update-California’s Climate Adaptation Strategy covers water, food, transport of goods, and daily lives around climate and weather. The report is looking for feedback and comments on the working draft. Workshops will be held at UC Merced May 16, Metro Center in San Francisco May 22, Coachella Public Works Department May 30, SCAG in downtown Los Angeles June 3, and two workshops in Auburn and San Diego in June that have not been finalized. The Santa Monica City Council has approved the Lincoln Neighborhood Corridor Plan that will add a bus lane to the street from I-10 to Ozone Avenue. The $2.9 million plan will improve traffic flow and pedestrian safety. Developers of the controversial Lilac Hills Ranch submitted paperwork to San Diego County planning department in the hopes of keeping the project alive. The 1,700 home and retail shops in the hills of Valley Center went to voters in November and was rejected by 63 percent of the county. The County got a new stormwater management permit, which makes the project viable, and developers have included requested infrastructure improvements, such as a new fire station, in their new plan.  A San Francisco Superior Court Judge has ordered a landlord to pay the city nearly $2.4 million in penalties for violating state housing law. The judge found that Anne Kihagi and her associates had “purposefully destroyed their tenants’ quiet enjoyment and any sense of sanctuary through their long, continued and unrelenting campaign of harassment, reductions in services, and unlawful and fraudulent evictions.” Kihagi and family members have invested $24 million in San Francisco real estate with a collection of 50 units. An appeals court  found that building a parking lot in place of a 54-year-old garden on the campus of the College of San Mateo frequented by students, teachers and others would have a significant environmental impact and therefore either a full EIR or a description of steps the district would take to reduce environmental effects to “insignificance”. The court ordered the college to consider these environmental impacts.  San Bernardino International Airport has inaugurated commercial operations with an international commercial passenger flight with Volaris to and from Guadalajara. At SBD, the primary business is private business jet travel, with five maintenance, repair and overhaul businesses for general aviation. However airport officials say the number of aircraft annually taking off and landing have reached 48,000 in 2016, double the number in 2013. A developer is  suing the City of Palo Alto for assessing unlawful and excessive fines in Santa Clara County Superior Court. John Tze and Edgewood LLC, the owner-developers, received at least 72 citations totaling more than $700,000 for failing to land a grocery store at the Edgewood Plaza shopping center after the Fresh Market vacated. City officials say Edgewood broke a 2012 agreement that allowed it to build homes on the condition that a grocery store would be provided. The owner argues they are complying by reserving the building for a grocery store and no other use. The City of San Jose Deputy Director of Housing Tim Jones  resigned in early May, two weeks after being hired. Jones was previously accused of mismanagement and financial abuse when he ran the Richmond Housing Authority. A new analysis of the proposed Bay-Delta water tunnels, now known as WaterFix, indicates that the project might make life worse for fish even though the two primary goals of the project are restoring imperiled native fish and improving water deliveries to farms and cities. The USFWS and National Marine Fisheries Service released draft studies detailing how the tunnel might affect fish protected by the Endangered Species Act. Gov. Jerry Brown sent a letter to President Trump asking him to transfer oversight of environmental reviews to the state rail authority instead of the Federal Railroad Administration. This “delegation of federal authority” would give the state final approval and potentially speed up the process. Los Angeles City Council voted to approve a new law that eases the process in legalizing “bootlegged” apartments- existing units that were created without the city’s approval. In the new law, the units are only allowed if they guarantee affordable housing and meet all fire, life, and safety codes. Mayor Eric Garcetti will co-chair the LA Sustainability Leadership Council with UCLA Chancellor Gene Block to help advance the goals laid out in Sustainable City pLAn. The Leadership Council will provide vision, leadership, guidance, and support for the pLAn, the SLA GC, and other important sustainability initiatives.

I can think of at least a few buildings in the world that exquisite enough that they warrant a little elbow room. The Taj Mahal comes to mind. The Farnsworth House. Certain monasteries and castles. Most quotidian pieces of architecture, though, gain their value not from splendid isolation but rather from their relationships -- with surrounding buildings and streetscapes. Setbacks, which are perhaps the most ubiquitous way that planning imposes on architecture, are to these relationship what adultery is to romantic relationships. For those residents of, say, Paris, Vienna, and New York City who are unfamiliar with setbacks: they are spaces that “set” buildings “back” a certain distance from the property line and, usually, the sidewalk. A distant but useless cousin of the front yard, they appear in, I reckon, the majority properties developed nationwide since 1950 and nearly all properties developed in California. For all their popularity, setbacks have little basis in engineering or architecture. They are simply regulatory whims. Setback requirements come in all shapes and sizes. Some are minimal (a foot or two) while others are dramatic (ten feet, fifteen feet). Some make way for pleasant things like outdoor dining spaces; others turn into unwelcoming bollards. In each case, setbacks are mandated voids, either to be ignored or landscaped, unusually in decidedly half-assed ways. Ferns for everyone! (I refer mainly to setbacks that separate buildings from sidewalks, not to those that separate buildings from each other. I have slightly more sympathy for the latter type.) Received wisdom holds that setbacks make urban spaces feel less crowded. They supposedly ensure that buildings do not overshadow streets and sidewalks. They create the illusion of less density and protect buildings’ personal space. They create room for “green space,” “light,” and “park-like settings,” which sound great in real estate listings. They assume that buildings are impositions on their cityscapes, to be contained so as not to offend delicate sensibilities. A street in Paris (l.) and a street in Los Angeles (r.). This rationale is mostly nonsense, of course. Like so many other concoctions that come courtesy of regulators rather than designers, setbacks are a scourge on our cities. At best, setbacks persist because of habit. But, like elevator music and parsley, they are not actually as pleasant as we pretend they are. They confer psychological satisfaction even if they have nothing to do with aesthetics or economics. To the proponents of setbacks, a few patches of grass might as well be Luxembourg Gardens. But think about the classic street in any of the cities I cited above. If you enjoy Paris or New York, you already know why you shouldn’t like setbacks. Density in a city is good. And not just population density. The actual appearance of density (which may or may not have anything to do with population density, depending on the type of structure in question) is good, too. With scant exceptions, the most pleasant streets and neighborhoods – from the Île de Saint Louis to Greenwich Village to Old Town Tucson to the row house neighborhoods of Philadelphia – are those not where buildings recede from their streets but indeed where they are closest together, working in harmony with streets to create a public realm. A sense of enclosure is one of the hallmarks of great streets, whereby space is created and defined by the intersection of vertical and horizontal planes. Pedestrians also benefit from the shade created by snug buildings and vertical facades (and awnings, if they’re lucky). The no-man’s-lands created by setbacks detract from streets and buildings alike, only scarcely less aggressively than do walls and cyclone fences. From a developer’s perspective, setbacks waste space and, therefore, money. Who would want to give precious square footage to ferns, ficuses, and snails rather than to people? Even worse, setbacks create lousy buildings. When a pedestrian’s feet and eyes might travel mere inches from a façade, that façade ought to be at least somewhat attractive or inviting. Setbacks invite architects to pay that much less attention to detail. I enjoy dragging my fingers on a Parisian façade because, well, Parisian facades are attractive. To fans of setbacks, a building nestled right up against a sidewalk is scary. A ten-foot “landscaped” setback? Just fine. Never mind those shrubs look like mighty attractive hiding places to aspiring muggers. There’s a reason it’s “eyes on the street,” not “eyes on the setback.” What about privacy? I’m sorry, but if your living room faces the street, you’re going to need curtains no matter how far back you are. Setbacks don’t create privacy. They create the illusion of privacy. In short, there is no economic, aesthetic, or security reason for setbacks to exist. Cities have gotten along fine for centuries without them. So, what gives? Let’s think about who might lobby for setbacks, either in an individual project or in a zoning code. They’re certainly not the tenants of buildings. Unbuilt buildings have no tenants. The people most likely to demand that a development be worse are those who don’t like development in the first place and who object to density on principle. Setbacks are the currency of anti-development activism. Homeowners who like their cities and their property values just fine don’t care how far away a building is from a street. They’re likely only to see those buildings at 35 miles per hour anyway, and probably from a lane or two away (plus a few feet if there’s a devil strip ). But they know how to push planners around. For them, setbacks are just a bargaining chip – a palpable way to stick it to developers. Setbacks persist because they are quantifiable and negotiable. Once opponents have whittled down the number of units or the amount of floor space in a project, they can bring on the setbacks. The developer wants a setback of zero feet. Neighbors want a setback of ten feet. When it gets settled at five feet, the neighbors chalk up a win. Why is that a win? Because they don’t care in the first place. They gain nothing, except for a five-foot pain-in-the-ass for the developer and a lousy place to take a stroll. This isn’t advocacy, and it’s certainly not planning. This is urban trolling. I bemoan setbacks not to redesign every condo building from Riverside to Santa Monica. Setback regulations and their proponents have already done their damage to the buildings that exist and the streets that they face. Fortunately, with a few deletions from zoning codes, and more tenacity from the planners who care about density, walkabilty, aesthetics, and fairness, cities can play with a full deck once again. And when the next Shah Jahan comes along with a great idea for a mausoleum, then we can talk. Photo Credits: Paris: Zoetnet via Flickr ; L.A.: CP&DR Staff.

According to a new State Population Report from the Department of Finance, California grew by 0.85 percent or 335,000 people in 2016. While most counties and cities saw growth, the largest numerical  increases occurred in Los Angeles, with more than 42,000 residents, San Diego added over 15,000 people, San Jose almost 10,000 more residents, and San Francisco over 9,000. The City of Sacramento had the largest percentage gain in population with 1.4 percent or 6,900 people. The fastest growing counties in the state are all in Sacramento area: Amador, Placer, and Yolo counties. The fastest growing county was Amador County with 1.9 percent due to prison expansion. Generally, smaller, suburban localities are growing more quickly than their large urban counterparts, with large cities growing around 1 percent and the most booming small cities around 5 percent. Even so, multi-family units represented 57 percent of unit growth last year. The report also found the state’s housing supply increased by 88,562 units, meaning one new home for every 3.78 residents. Developers are adding homes at a higher pace than recent years, but still far below what experts believe would be enough to keep up with California’s growing population.  Study: Development in Los Angeles Comes at Expense of Trees Researchers at USC have found that trees and other greenery in single-family neighborhoods in Los Angeles are declining significantly with the increase in housing construction. In some cases the trees are disappearing because of mansionization , where smaller homes are replaced with disproportionately large properties. Using aerial imagery the study found the amount of trees and greenery fell between 14 and 55 percent in the period from 2000 to 2009 in LA County. For instance, for each home expansion about one-third of the existing green cover is lost. Trees produce many benefits such as carbon sequestration, shade, decrease chance of erosion and landslides, and other public health benefits such as filtering dust particles. In Baldwin Park, green cover dropped from 70 percent in 2000 to 31 percent in 2009. Compton lost 41 percent, Downey, San Pedro, Sylmar and Pomona experienced 20 percent losses. The City of Los Angeles has a tree-planting program now, and last year more than 18,000 trees were planted. SPUR Chastises Tech Companies for Location Choices San Francisco Planning & Urban Research released a report “Rethinking the Corporate Campus” that accuses the innovative Silicon Valley companies of being backward in their choice of office locations and typologies. According to the report, many are located in suburban one-story campuses with sprawling parking lots, far from public streets. These choices come at high environmental and social costs as commutes get longer and housing prices more expensive. The report tackles two questions: How do we encourage employers to choose efficient, sustainable, high-performance locations? How do we create new locations that are more efficient, sustainable, and high-performing? While there are a few examples of companies moving next to mass transit: Twitter, LinkedIn, Samsung, Salesforce, the majority have stuck to their suburban sprawling offices. Judge Thwarts Sierra Club Wish for Development Moratorium in San Diego County San Diego Superior Court Judge Timothy Taylor denied  the Sierra Club’s attempt to block new large-scale developments on previously undeveloped, unincorporated land before the county adopts a revised plan for curbing greenhouse gas emissions. Taylor however did say the court was very concerned that county officials have not been acting more quickly and that the environmental group can renew its request if the county has not made significant progress within two months. County officials earlier this year said the climate plan would be released this summer. The climate action plan was first found inadequate in 2012 and was directed to be redrafted to set clearer standards on what emissions levels are acceptable. San Francisco Inclusionary Housing Policy Advances The San Francisco Planning Commission approved an ordinance that would require market rate developers to make 18 percent of rental units affordable to low- and moderate-income households. The commission was decided between two versions: the more aggressive of which would have required that 24 percent of rental units be affordable. While both sides wanted to maximize the number of affordable units, the disagreement was on how many affordable untis could be squeezed out before a project became economically infeasible. This housing ordinance would only represent about 10 percent of the affordable units the city produces, 75 percent are funded with federal tax credits and are only available to households that earn less than 55 percent AMI, or $63,400 for a family of four. The County Board of Supervisors must approve the housing law. Two California Projects Vie for ULI Housing Award The Urban Land Institute (ULI)  Terwilliger Center for Housing  has announced the finalists for this year’s  Jack Kemp Excellence in Affordable and Workforce Housing Award , which honors exemplary developments that ensure housing affordability for people with a range of incomes. Two of the seven nominees are in California: The 2017 Jack Kemp Excellence in Affordable and Workforce Housing Award finalists are: 1) Perris Station Senior Apartment Homes (Perris, Riverside County) replaced a blighted property, fulfilling the city's goal of adding high-quality, sustainable housing that is affordable to low-income seniors, and providing space for retail/office uses. The development is a model for offering amenity-rich living for active seniors as well as resource-efficient and “green” design features. 2) The apartment complex Veo (Carson, Los Angels County) serves as a mixed-income, mixed-use walkable community of for-sale townhomes sized specifically for families. Street-level retail has rejuvenated the area by enhancing the streetscape with outdoor dining and other improvements. The winner will be announced during the Terwilliger Center’s Housing Opportunity Conference, set for September 10-11 in New Orleans. Quick Hits & Updates Environmental groups have filed a federal lawsuit against President Trump’s executive order to open protected coastal waters to offshore drilling. The suit, filed in U.S. District Court in Alaska, claims Trump has no legal authority to undo protections adopted by President Obama in 2015 and 2016. California officials condemned the executive order and vowed to fight any new oil development off the state’s shores. The Congress for the New Urbanism (CNU) announced winners of its annual Charter Awards for excellence in architectural, landscape, urban, and regional design. CNU recognized 16 projects across the US, Mexico, Spain and South Africa. The two California projects were Plaza La Reina in Los Angeles as a “timeless and artful building” and St. Joseph’s Redevelopment in Oakland as “harmony of old and new is gift to city." The San Francisco Metropolitan Transportation Commission voted unanimously to provide $13.3 million in funding to extend the forthcoming SMART rail line from downtown San Rafael to Larkspur Landing by 2.1 miles. The city will also receive a new transit center to better accommodate buses and trains, but funding has not been identified and it could take at least five years. Planning firm Nelson/Nygaard along with business leaders, nonprofits and advocates  released a report titled “The Silicon Valley Bike Vision Report.” The document includes designs and maps that analyze existing bikeway conditions in Silicon Valley, mode share metrics, a collision analysis, an inventory of existing bikeways, and origin0destination pairs for significant locations. Sober Network Properties, which owns seven sober living facilities in San Clemente, has filed a lawsuit against the city’s zoning of such facilities. The lawsuit alleges residents of one home were verbally abused and harassed by groups of people opposed to sober living homes. San Clemente finalized ordinances in 2016, with an 18-month lifespan, allowing sober living homes to certain areas of the city. Los Angeles Metro has begun soliciting bids from companies interested in conducting a feasibility study of potential modes of transit and possible routes for the traffic-clogged Sepulveda Pass. The combination of Measure R transportation sales tax in 2008 and Measure M tax, give nearly $8 billion for this project. Metro’s current schedule call for a transit system to be built through Sepulveda Pass by 2033. A new UCLA environmental report gave Los Angeles County a “C” in energy use and persistent air pollution. The 2017 Sustainable LA Environmental Report Card for Energy and Air Quality gave the grade based on a failure to reduce fuel use, increasing commute times, and some of the worst smog in the nation. However, the county had reduced its GHG emissions by 20 percent in 2013 from 1990 levels, and are on track to meeting its 45 percent reduction goal by 2025. Developer FivePoint Communities has sent the Irvine City Council a proposal for switching land for the Orange County veterans cemetery. Instead of putting the cemetery in the Great Park, it would be swapped for land near the 5 and 405 freeways. The change would not cost any money for the city or its taxpayers, and there are no substantial zoning, traffic or environmental issues affecting the freeway cemetery land. However, some City Council members are accusing the developer of trying to improperly get additional homes built in the Great Park. Santa Barbara County Supervisor Joan Hartmann is urging Congressman Doug LaMalfa to stop the legislation that would immediately annex the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indian’s 1,400-acre Camp 4 in Santa Ynez Valley. The fight began in 2010 when the tribe purchases the land and announced it planned to build housing. Neighbors of the site worried they would overdevelop the property. Airbnb and HomeAway settled a lawsuit with San Francisco agreeing to help ensure all local hosts are registered. The websites will now only include legal listings and the city “has tools for quick, effective enforcement,” according to City Attorney Dennis Herrera. In 2015, a San Francisco law required all vacation-rental hosts to register with the city but only about 2,100 out of 8,000 hosts had done so. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Richard L. Fruin Jr. concluded that the City Council’s approval of a Hollywood Target shopping center violated planning rules. The project has been defeated in courts twice in three years. Target first filed an application to build in 2008, and the partially built, three-story structure has been empty since 2014. Redfin's “ migration report ” ranks the San Francisco metropolitan area, including San Jose and Oakland, as the first market where house hunters are most likely to leave. The analysis showed 1 in 5 home seekers living in the Bay Area is looking outside the region. Last month, the Bay Area Council found 40 percent of Bay Area residents want to leave in the next few years. The number jumps to 46 percent among millennials.

It was a warm day with very little breeze. Visible to the south, east, and west, motionless smoke columns served as precise geographic markers of the buildings that had been torched so far. The cops were nowhere. As white gentrifiers in West Adams, we were at the mercy of any neighbor who might want to settle a score, such as the guys who lived in the gang house down the block. My street of early-1900s Craftsman houses was as eerily tranquil as an Edward Hopper painting. The party was elsewhere: three short blocks to the east, buildings were ablaze on all four corners of the intersection of Western and Washington boulevards. A mile to the north, in Koreatown and the Wilshire District, storeowners perched on rooftops with rifles to ward off arsonists and looters. (As it turned out, the gang viewed us part of their turf to protect, as the gang leader told me a few days later in a friendly conversation. In spite of myself, I felt grateful.) Before they ended, the Los Angeles riots extended from South Central all the way to the Hollywood Hills to the north. How did the unrest become so widespread? L.A. is an automobile city, and the unrest was literally a riot on wheels. Much of South Los Angeles is organized around endless north-south streets, like Western, Vermont, and La Brea, that span the 20-mile distance between downtown and the beach cities. Who started the fires? It’s unclear whether they were lit by locals inspired by news reports, or perhaps a small number of people, sitting in the back seats of cars and tossing incendiaries out the rear window, block by block, as their drivers headed north to Hollywood. In the first hours, I was determined not to leave my house. Some of my reporter friends were actually cruising the streets in search of interviews and photo ops, despite a police curfew. When a cloud of acrid smoke settled on our house, it was time to go. The family of four, a large white dog, and a Selmer saxophone piled into the car to join the exodus to Sherman Oaks, behind the protective barrier of the Santa Monica Mountains. In the end, the five-day riot left 50 people dead. It destroyed or damaged more than 1,000 buildings, at an estimated cost of a $1 billion. About a year later, some new commercial buildings, in candy colors and fashionable zig-zag angles, came to my neighborhood to replace the nondescript strip malls burned. In my opinion, they were not an improvement, even though the bar was pretty low. *** In the days immediately after the riots, some people felt that Los Angeles needed fresh leadership and ideas. Their impulse was to privatize the project of community redevelopment. This belief may been particularly strong in Los Angeles, where government is perceived to be weak and business to be resolute and wise. To head this ad hoc committee of civic repair, organizers chose Peter Ueberroth, a Republican resident of Orange County. Ueberroth, who had organized the successful 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles, was “a guy who knows how to get things done.” No sooner had Rebuild LA formed than it ran into a problem: How would this city-building be done, exactly? What projects should they undertake? Based on what policy? No one ever figured it out. Despite good intentions and some nice gestures, Rebuild LA quickly turned into one more poverty agency in search of projects, “partners” and funding, and companies that had pledged either money or initiatives seemed to shrivel up. More action, arguably, came from the city’s official civic-improvement arm, the Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency (LA/CRA.). The agency gained great power in the Bradley years. It built some projects and attracted developers with free land and expedited financing, among other benefits. CRA created new project areas, including one centered on the riot-damaged corner of Vermont and Manchester. The agency supported commercial ventures like Magic Johnson’s 12-screen multiplex at the Crenshaw Mall, the agency’s attempt to give South Central a real mall a few years priors to the riots. Another attempt at a shopping center, this time a grandiose effort called Vermont Gardens, which promised a cultural performance space in its center, started construction in 1995 but stalled out a year later. The agency helped build a number of low-income housing complexes, although projects that are instantly identifiable as affordable housing tend to stigmatize their neighborhoods. Momentum to repair the city faded when the sense of crisis diminished. When the Northridge earthquake hit two years later, followed by the immensely entertaining O.J. Simpson murder trial, Angelenos found something else to focus on. While there were some individual success stories from the CRA and Rebuild LA, it’s hard to assess what lasting good was done. A recent released report  from UCLA, timed to coincide with the anniversary of the unrest, reports that economic conditions in South Central, if anything, have worsened slightly. *** The emergence of downtown as a popular residential neighborhood, along with the redevelopment of Hollywood, were perhaps the two most remarkable planning events in the past quarter century – and it was quite a quarter-century. Other great planning events include the completion of the Century (105) Freeway, creating a link between southern suburbs and aerospace jobs in the LAX area, which was no longer needed because those jobs had largely disappeared. Several new transit lines reached completion to Pasadena, East L.A., the San Gabriel Valley and Santa Monica, but these expensive projects were not enough to offset freeway congestion. More importantly, football returned, in the form of the Rams. And the Chargers. Boba drinks, designer cupcakes, Korean-Mexican fusion tacos, all left their marks. South Central L.A. was renamed South L.A. The web arrived, swallowed the music, travel, and newspaper industries, among others, while failing to end civilization on New Years 2000. Forest fires grew more frequent and more intense. Multiple droughts occurred. The Chinese became the biggest foreign investors in L.A. real estate. Jerry Brown killed the redevelopment agencies. Housing prices grew to absurd levels, and city officials acknowledged that the city was in a perpetual housing crisis. L.A. had three boring mayors who seemed to accomplish nothing; the current mayor is a bright young man with some good ideas about walkable streets and other urban amenities that world-class cities should enjoy. Again, the question is where is the constituency for planning? Los Angeles still doesn’t know what it is. Civic awareness is non-existent in this unfriendliest of cities. *** On a personal note, I remarried, sold my West Adams house at a $50,000 loss after I heard gunfire one afternoon while the children were playing outside. I remarried and bought a house in the Valley. I read about violence in South Central in the L.A. Times with a mixture of revulsion, guilt and relief. Young people were still dying needlessly from gun violence, but now they were far away; there was nothing to do but shake your head and turn the page. As for South Central, the experiences of both Rebuild LA and the CRA suggest that the social and economic problems are too deep to respond to real estate solutions by themselves. Physical planning can provide improvements in mobility and housing. The fundamental problem remains economic. In my view, the federal government should revive the Depression-era Works Progress Administration, and create millions of jobs. In other words, the government should invest directly in individual people by giving them paychecks -- as opposed to tax credits or other financial incentives to developers and contractors. The much-discussed need to repair perhaps $1 trillion in freeways, roads, dams and bridges would seem like a good fit here. In addition to a new WPA, government should form joint ventures with tech companies, and create manufacturing or just-in-time delivery warehouses in inner city locations. Perhaps the government could subsidize the physical plant, the cost of training and other non-business-related costs. I believe Freud when he says that people need “love and work.” High unemployment is a cause of substance abuse, fatherless households, spousal abuse and incarceration; an unemployed person is a frustrated person and sometimes a dangerous one, too. Glitzy shopping centers and expensive upgrades of cultural monuments like Watts Tower are nice, but they don’t really touch the fundamental issue, which is economic. Neighborhoods improve when people are working. People can buy homes, or refinance and repair existing ones. Unemployment is a persistent problem in South Central, because African-American unemployment is higher than white unemployment, especially for teenagers and young adults. High-paying jobs, followed by improve education and better health care, are the right medicines for South Central. Compared with those five days, the breeze has been relatively gentle in Los Angeles over the past 25 years. We need to do more to keep it that way.