Even as commuters have grown weary of the long drive from the western edge of the Central Valley to the employment centers of the Bay Area, a group of landowners in Brentwood see robust development opportunities. The formerly diminutive Contra Costa County city, now of 51,000, is hotly debating what its next round of expansion will look like.  At issue is the fate of a 740-acre tract of largely undeveloped land, which lies to the west of the county urban limit line that governs Brentwood but is nonetheless already addressed in its general plan. That plan calls for up to 579 homes to be built on the property, which is owned by only five landowners, in the event that the land was annexed by the city. Measure F, however, would expand the urban limit line and in so doing authorize a 20-year development agreement for up to 1,300 homes and 30 acres of commercial development.  The agreement itself would not, however, permit development, which would still be subject to environmental review, and approval by the city, the water board, and other agencies.  Unique to Contra Costa County, the urban limit line is a planning tool by which the county designates land, both incorporated and unincorporated, for development. The urban limit line used to be an informal policy, but since 2007 the county Local Area Formation Commission has promised to honor it (See CP&DR Vol. 14, No. 4 ). This is, in fact, the latest in many battles over the future of inland Contra Costa County and its uneasy role as bedroom community serving the East Bay and San Francisco (See Insight CP&DR Vol. 15, No. 9 ) "Brentwood will have its own urban limit line that it will control," said Tom Koch, consultant and spokesperson for the pro-Measure F campaign. "Currently Brentwood does not have that authority."  Representatives of the Brentwood Department of Community Development declined to be interviewed for this article.   Proponents have agreed to a number of concessions designed to assure residents that, if Measure F passes on June 8, all 1,300 homes -- and their estimated 4,000 residents -- would not appear overnight and would not adversely affect the community. Provisions included in the measure an in a recently negotiated development agreement include assurance that the area would not be occupied until 2015 and that developers would improve surrounding roads, provide community benefits such as parks, and fund municipal paramedic services.  These concessions are not enough for opponents, who contend that any future development should simply abide by the city's existing general plan and that the measure represents an unfortunate case of ballot-box planning.  "We understand that it may be developed in the future; it's in our general plan for that purpose," said Brentwood resident and Measure F opponent Kathy Griffin. "It's not like we're not saying that it's pristine farmland or it should be preserved for open space. Our argument is that you're replacing our general plan and doubling the number of housing units."  Measure F's proponents contend, however, that failure to extend the urban limit line now may mean that Brentwood will forfeit the ability to control the land in the future. They contend that the neighboring city of Antioch may try to annex it or that Contra Costa County will go ahead and authorize development there.  "It's clear that the land is going to be developed by one or the other," said Koch.  Opponents of the measure call these concerns far-fetched.  "There are so many hoops for to do that," said Griffin. "They'd have to do a planning process, they'd have to do an environmental report, they'd have to get LAFCO to take it out of our sphere of influence under our protest and put it into their sphere of influence...then they would have to take it to a vote of their people to get it into their urban limit line. "To just imply that Antioch can just come in and build something is simply misleading."  Griffin insists that she does not oppose growth but does think that Measure F calls for too much density. She also contends that many of the concessions that proponents are making would be required by the existing general plan and are, in fact, not particularly generous in light of the increased density.  They include a $2,000 per house fee for community athletic facilities; land that could be developed for parks and schools; a $3,000 per house fee for employment generation, such as job-training programs; a fee for paramedics; and requisite road improvements. The city's fiscal analysis estimates that at full build-out the city would net $800,000 annually, with $2 million in revenues and $1.2 million in additional expenses from the development; the city could also receive up to $45.7 million in impact fees.  "If you look at their development agreement, most of the items they're touting as over and above at contribution levels you're expected to make with a development of this size," said Griffin.  Though the battle over Measure F is being fought against the backdrop of tremendous growth in the Bay Area's inland suburbs, Griffin said that the measure is following an old pattern. In 2005 Brentwood voters defeated Measure L, which would have expanded the urban limit line to the north, and then in 2006 approved a measure that reaffirmed the city's existing (and still current) urban limit line.  Contacts: Tom Koch,  Y es on F  (925) 634-4200 Brentwood Special Election Website Brentwood Measure F Full Text (PDF)

(Please note that the word "draconian" does not occur once in the following post concerning the ongoing budget debacle. Readers susceptible to cliché-induced seizures (CIS) can read this article without ill effect.) \t By his own characterization, the governor's latest proposal attempts to close the $19 billion shortfall in the coming year's budget almost entirely through cuts. For CP&DR readers, it's probably unnecessary to explain that many of these cuts affect – or have effectively eliminated – services for low-income people, not limited to affordable housing, health care and early childhood education. Hell, we can't even afford our prisons—an irony well deserved by the Lock-'em-Up State.  I'm going to skip the usual jeremiad about short-sightedness and greed, not because I don't think it's true, but that it's been said often before, by wiser heads. Except I will add that if there ever had been a post-war "social contract" in California, it's fast evaporating. We are no longer upholding the side of the bargain that calls for sheltering and lifting up those less fortunate. This brings a sour dénouement to the all-American narrative of opportunism and occasional public spiritedness that made California the capital of postwar American optimism.    \t Amid the loss of our once-enviable social contract, then, how are we going to provide continue to provide low income housing? This goal was hard to attain even when times were good and real estate was even more expensive. One proposal allows the state to steal (my word) a portion of local redevelopment money, generated by local tax increment, to toss some additional dollars at the state's money fire ( CP&DR Vol. 25, No. 9, May 2010 ).  As most readers know, siphoning off local redevelopment dollars has a direct impact on the creation of low-income housing, because 30 percent of redevelopment monies are set aside for affordable units.  Although not unprecedented, I think such raids on local money are actionable, and possibly illegal, if the "nexus" theory of taxation, created in case law, holds up in court (although my guess the state would prevail by claiming the right under emergency powers).  \t In any event, we need to invent new and creative ways to provide low income and moderate income housing (including workforce housing). Joint use, meaning the sharing of resources, such as land and money and access to funding sources, among public agencies—has never seemed as attractive as it does now. But how will smaller cities with very few redevelopment funds meet their low-income housing requirements?  Am I insane for suggesting that organizations like Habitat for Humanity could be invited to build a half-dozen homes at a time in certain places? I'd be happy to start a thread here, if you think any of these ideas, or others, are workable. And if not, please set me straight. \t Then again, things could be worse … much worse. A brief tour of some urban ills that California policy makers can bless the stars are not theirs:  In 40 years, seven out of 10 people will live in mega-cities (from the Christian Science Monitor)  Ten Places in the world where you don't want to live (from Hottnez) And  for a worst-case in civic liability, how 'bout a s uddenly liquefied landscape that swallows an entire house, leaving little trace behind (must be seen to be believed)  ? Yes, things could be worse.

Riverside County has gained the dubious distinction of being one of the foreclosure capitals of California, if not the country.  One bright spot, however, has been the unincorporated community of Eastvale, which has grown from an exurb of scattered homesteads a decade ago to a major unincorporated bedroom community of roughly 40,000 residents.  "Eastvale is really leading Riverside County in its ascendance from the recession," said Jeff DeGrandpre, president of the Eastvale Incorporation Committee.   On June 8 Eastvale residents will consider Measure A, a multi-part ballot measure to decide whether the community, located in the northwest corner of the county adjacent to the City of Norco, will become the county's 27th city.  Eastvale is already more than halfway to its projected built-out population of 68,000, and it will have the option of continuing to follow a general plan set forth in the Riverside County Integrated Project. Additionally, proponents say they seek local control over opportunities to promote new commercial developments and contract with the Riverside County Sheriff for dedicated service.  "We're all pretty happy with the way Eastvale looks right now," said DeGrandpre. "We have residential, commercial, and light industrial to come. We're doing this to keep our tax dollars here."   While both opponents and supporters of Measure A say that they favor cityhood and the local control that it would bring, they differ over the issue of whether current economic conditions make this the right time to incorporate. In addition to bearing its own operating expenses, the city of Eastvale will have to pay roughly $1.5 million annually, for 30 years, in net neutrality payments designed to compensate Riverside County for the loss of tax revenue that it will incur upon incorporation.  Analysis revealed that Eastvale would not be able to pay the entire amount from its general fund but will have to dip into its fire fund as well, a move that concerns opponents but still conforms to state requirements.   Opponents of Measure A, however, fear that this payment may doom the city to fiscal ruin from Day One because it is both more generous than it ought to be based on prevailing economic conditions.  "The base year around which the neutrality fees were negotiated was 2008," said Irene Long, one of the leaders of Not Now Eastvale. "The county's revenues have shrunk dramatically, so if we're tied into paying them lose revenues for 2008…we're automatically giving away more money than we need to." Both Long and DeGrandpre are running to serve on the would-be Eastvale City Council. Long also contends that proponents of incorporation provided different sets of revenue projections to county officials and that the revisions created a more optimistic picture than the original numbers that appeared in the incorporation committee's Comprehensive Fiscal Analysis. Even so, Long said that the city will have to go to extraordinary lengths to pay what she considers generous net neutrality payments.  "For some never explained reason they decided to throw in what I call the ‘signing bonus'…they would give whatever was left of our fire fund, but no less than 15 percent, to the county as a gift," added Long. "We're in the red from the very first full year of incorporation." An October 2009 Local Agency Formation Commission staff report, signed by Executive Officer George J. Spiliotis, could not make a recommendation of fiscal viability, and a follow-up report in January maintained that position despite what it acknowledged as "positive fiscal changes" that emerged from subsequent negotiations between the Eastvale Incorporation Committee (EIC) and the county.  A July 2009 incorporation study committed by EIC found that "the feasibility of the incorporation is inconclusive: neither clearly feasible, nor clearly infeasible" and that feasibility would ultimately depend on "policy decisions."   LAFCO Executive Officer George Spiliotis said that the city would in fact be viable as of its first year, according to information that was presented to the commission after the publication of the initial reports on the CFA.  "There was testimony presented by proponents that allayed the commission's concerns regarding staffing, and they ended up approving it," said George Spiliotis, Executive Officer of the Riverside County Local Agency Formation Commission. "They presented information using some of predicted surplus funds and assigned staffing to those funds." "LAFCO's concerns have been largely alleviated," said Field. "Their staff report indicates that they are, I believe, comfortable with the fiscal analysis as it stands now." Field and DeGrandpre both cited retail and residential projects that are in the pipeline that will contribute to future tax receipts.  Furthermore, Spiliotis said that the use of fire funds would meet state requirements.  "There's no problem," said Spiliotis. "I don't know if you can say it's normal. Each revenue neutrality negotiation is unique, but I do not believe that is unprecedented."  For opponents of Measure A, the negotiations that led to the finding of viability were not nearly transparent enough and in fact were based on questionable data. Not Now Eastvale, which acknowledges "the simple fact that almost everyone wants Eastvale to become a city one day" cites the October 2009 Comprehensive Financial Analysis in finding that the city will run a deficit in years 2-10 of incorporation, resulting in a negative operating reserve of $3 million by the 10th year. The Not Now group wants to put cityhood on old until the economy picks up.  "The main benefit to is that we won't be locked into giving away this money," said Long. "That gives us time to renegotiate. I think 2011 is a good year to lock in based on anticipated drop in revenue and then put it back on the ballot in 2012." Supporters, however, contend that, even in light of the recession, the incorporated city will be no worse off than any other city in the state and, with projected growth, will be on firm footing before long. Proponents also claim that cityhood will not affect residents' taxes.  The revenue neutrality agreement was the best agreement we could possibly have made," said DeGrandpre. "When they started it was in perpetuity. We knocked down from infinity to 30 years. Do I like it? Not necessarily, but it's the law." While DeGrandpre said that his group's analysis points to a potential $4 million surplus in the first year, others are expressing more cautious optimism and yet still contend that the moment is ripe for Eastvale to incorporate.  "There are different ways to look at the right moment: political vs. absolute best economic time," said Field. "Even though from an economic standpoint, this probably isn't the perfect time to do it, if you can do it now and succeed…that's a pretty firm foundation for the future."  Moreover, supporters of Measure A contend that a defeat of Measure A will simply mean that the would-be city will have to go through years' more hassle and expense to craft a new measure and a new agreement, at which point it might not be any better off than it would be under Measure A. "We'd have to start the process all over again," said DeGrandpre. "We'd have to spend roughly $140,000 again, do studies again, collect signatures again. The math doesn't work out."   Contacts:  Jeff DeGrandpre, President, Eastvale Incorporation Committee , (951) 808-4840 John Field, Chief of Staff, Riverside Supervisor John Tavaglione , (951) 955-1020 Irene Long,  Not Now Eastvale  notnoweastvale@gmail.com George Spiliotis, Executive Officer, Riverside County Local Agency Formation Commission, (951) 369-0631 Eastvale Incorporation Documents

With state and local government revenues shrinking throughout California, planners are increasingly looking to the federal government – and especially transportation funds – to pay for local planning efforts, especially if they involve infill and transit-oriented development efforts. But the two major possible sources of funding – the transportation reauthorization bill and the climate bill – are both stalled with little hope of passage anytime soon. The climate bill has been caught, at least for the moment, in the crossfire of the immigration debate. So let's get back to that later and focus instead on the bill that ought to have no trouble passing: the transportation reauthorization bill. The so-called T-bill has to be reauthorized every six years – and in all the cycles since 1991 (1997 and 2003), the bill has moved further and further away from its original focus on highways and other hard infrastructure.  There are always huge debates over what it should fund – highways versus rail, capacity versus environmental enhancements – but there has never been any doubt that it will pass. Until now. The bill hasn't passed yet and doesn't seem likely to pass before the November election – if then. The problem, simply put, is money. Between increasing fuel economy because of regulation and decreasing travel because of the recession, the federal gas tax doesn't generate enough money anymore. After decades in surplus, it's now in deficit, borrowing from the federal government's "general fund" on a regular basis to make ends meet. Since everybody loves transportation pork – Democrats and Republicans alike -- there's only one way out of this problem, which is to find what folks inside the Beltway euphemistically call an "enhanced revenue source." But that means either raising the gas tax or squeezing money out of the climate bill's "cap-and-trade" provisions for transportation.  Nobody wants to increase the gas tax before the November election – least of all the Republicans, who are seeking to regain control of the House by running against tax-and-spend Democrats. So that leaves two scenarios. The first one is for the lame-duck Democratic congress to pass the gas tax after the election. This may work politically for everybody – even the Republicans, who will then have plenty of transportation revenue to play around with but can wash their hands of responsibility for raising taxes. The second is a long, slow decline of the federal transportation reauthorization system. It's possible that no federal transportation reauthorization bill will be passed in 2009, even after the election, or in 2010. So what happens? The previous authorization bill bumps along, getting temporarily extended by Congress indefinitely, and every year Congress faces the question of whether to fund it fully through a general fund subsidy or simply not appropriating all the money that's been authorized. This is not an uncommon scenario in federal programs, but it's a scenario that was unimaginable only a few years ago for the transportation bill. The conventional wisdom in Washington is that the system is broken because the gas tax no longer provides sufficient revenue for everybody's appetite. This is true, but there may be a deeper problem here – which is that the 20-year-old "TEA" concept in federal transportation may have run its course. Old-timers will remember that the passage of "ISTEA" in 1991 (the Intermodal Surface Transportation Efficiency Act) was heralded as a revolution federal transportation policy – giving unprecedented powers to Metropolitan Planning Organizations, creating the environmental enhancement program, and providing unprecedented flexibility in spending federal dollars. The changes came about largely as a result of a revolution in the Bay Area, where the Metropolitan Transportation Commission demanded and got more flexibility to fund, say, bike paths over freeway expansions. (Bush signed the bill as a "jobs stimulus" during a recession, but never mind about that.) The TEA concept was carried forward in the 1997 and 2003 reauthorizations. Yet the problem with the TEA concept is that it never contained a compelling alternative to the old pavement philosophy. As some commentators noted as far back as the mid-1990s, the TEA bills created a system that allowed MPOs to reject the highway-construction model and replace it with … a whole bunch of cool stuff that we really like. Which has never really added up to an alternative transportation system. In the era of climate change, an alternative has begun to emerge – the idea that transportation should not be a separate idea but, rather, is one component of the goal of giving people proximity and access to things people need. In some cases, people will have to travel some distance to get what they need (a job, loaf of bread) and in most cases those folks will have to drive a car. But another option is simply to put people and stuff closer together, so that folks can walk, or ride a shuttle, or at least drive their car shorter distances to get from one thing to another. That's why federal transportation funds are so frequently used these days for things like local land-use planning projects. (It's a system that, with full disclosure in mind, I benefit from in my day job as a planning consultant.) But it's also a way of looking at things that makes more sense from an integrated point of view. Federal policies tend to be very functionally segregated, so it may never be possible to truly intertwine transportation with other aspects of community-building. But this kind of alternative vision could build support for a gas tax – showing that it is possible to improve access without adding lanes and increasing congestion all at the same time. It's not clear at this point whether the climate bill will play a role in funding all this stuff. Since the burning of transportation fuels accounts for some 40% of greenhouse gas emissions, you'd think that reducing the need for transportation would be a goal in the climate bill. But transit advocates have consistently been outfoxed by deep-pockets folks like the coal industry ( Insight CP&DR Vol. 24, No. 4 April 2008). And, in any event, the climate bill is – as it were – on ice right now because Sen. Lindsey Graham from South Carolina has broken with his northeastern counterparts over immigration law.  So even though the land use alternative ought to be compelling in both the transportation and climate change arenas, it's not likely to move either bill forward toward passage this year. Which means that, for the moment, we'll just keep muddling along.

The Regional Targets Advisory Committee returns to work next week for what promises to be a very technical meeting regarding greenhouse gas reduction forecasts. The meeting and discussion are the next step in trying to answer this question: How is California going to grow in a way that reduces the amount that people drive?   As you probably recall, the committee (known as the RTAC or "Are-Tack") was charged with making recommendations to the Air Resources Board for regional greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions from passenger vehicles, based on transportation systems and land use planning. The committee report issued last September was one of the first steps in implementing SB 375 , the 2008 legislation that ties land use planning and transportation so as to reduce GHG emissions. The committee found that a great deal more work needed to be done before the Air Resources Board could set GHG targets for the state's 18 metropolitan planning organizations (MPOs) to use in regional transportation planning and new "sustainable communities strategies." The committee urged a collaborative approach involving the Air Resources Board, the California Transportation Commission and the MPOs. Since the committee finalized its report, the MPOs have gone to work analyzing existing regional transportation plans, preparing and analyzing alternative scenarios, and, importantly, testing data. Representatives of the four big MPOs – Southern California Association of Governments, San Diego Association of Governments, Bay Area Metropolitan Transportation Commission and Sacramento Area Council of Governments – and representatives from the more fragmented San Joaquin Valley have been meeting to develop common parameters. They are scheduled to present their findings during the RTAC meeting set for Tuesday, May 25, in Sacramento. "They each are engaged in very intensive and complicated plans for implementation," California Councils of Government Executive Director Rusty Selix said of the MPOs. "It's really uncharted territory." Uncharted and complex – as the number of variables to consider appears to be almost infinite. But a May 17 report from the Metropolitan Transportation Commission provides a nice summary for us laymen: "Most of the GHG reductions that can be realized will result from how successful the region can be in moving toward more dense/mixed use and transit oriented development, and implementing more creative ways to price the transportation system to adequately reflect the true costs of a limited resource." That statement may seem obvious but it's worth keeping in mind, lest we get lost in engineering details and formulas for chemical reactions. What we're talking about here is building urban – not suburban – communities and phasing out the notion of everybody commuting to work on the free way. I don't deny the importance of quantifying things, but I think we already have some good answers to the basic question. Ten MPOs, plus a collection of small MPOs, are scheduled to make scenario presentations to the RTAC on Tuesday. They'll tell the RTAC what they think they can achieve for GHG reductions, which appears to range from a little to a lot . However, it appears not everyone is speaking the same language, which is understandable. Some of MPOs' materials are already available at the Air Resources Board website . The Air Resources Board is scheduled to give the MPOs draft GHG reduction targets next month, and to finalize the targets in September. – Paul Shigley

In the first-ever appellate court decision regarding the California Environmental Quality Act and climate change, the First District Court of Appeal has held that the future development of a plan for greenhouse gas mitigation constituted improperly deferred mitigation. For that reason and others, the court ruled the environmental impact report for an oil refinery project was invalid. The City of Richmond and Chevron Products Company gave the First District Court of Appeal the opportunity to break new legal ground regarding an environmental impact report's treatment of greenhouse gas emissions (GHG). The court in  Communities for a Better Environment v. City of Richmond  found the EIR prepared for the construction of an energy and hydrogen renewal project inadequate in its project description and its intended strategy for mitigating GHGs. Chevron proposed the project in order to upgrade its Richmond refinery. In July 2008, the City Council voted, 5-4, to approve the project. The city imposed numerous conditions to address project impacts and concluded that all of the project's significant environmental effects had been eliminated or substantially lessened where feasible. A collection of environmental groups, led by Communities for a Better Environment, challenged the approval based on the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). The Contra Costa County Superior Court found the EIR was deficient because 1) the project description was unclear or inconsistent as to whether the project would enable Chevron to process a heavier crude slate than it was currently processing; 2) the city had improperly deferred the formulation of GHG mitigation measures; and 3) Chevron had improperly piecemealed the project by failing to include a hydrogen pipeline as part of the project. The city and Chevron appealed. The factors that likely influenced the appellate court's decision include: • A deal in which Chevron would pay the city $61 million dollars to fund civic improvement; the city would fast track additional project permits • The fact that the project as described in its Security and Exchange Commission documentation, provided under oath, contradicted the project description in the EIR • The city's delay in concluding that the project's GHG emissions would create a significant impact on the environment, coupled with the fact that the plan for mitigating this contribution would not be developed until one year after the issuance of the project's conditional use permit This case is significant because it is the first appellate case requiring the quantification and mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions for a project analyzed prior to the adoption of the California Environmental Quality Act guidelines relating to GHG (see  CP&DR Environment Watch , January 1, 2010). Many jurisdictions have prepared, or are preparing, climate action plans to guide GHG emission mitigation, but this decision suggests that future development of such plans may not serve as sufficient mitigation. Project Description The appellate court first considered the adequacy of the project description. The environmental groups argued that the EIR omitted pertinent information. At issue was whether or not the project would enable the refinery to process heavier crude. According to the EIR, the "project would not alter the refinery's current design for processing intermediate and light crudes." As a result, the EIR did not contain any data regarding the current crude mix processed at the refinery and did not analyze the environmental impacts of processing heavier crude. Some evidence, however, indicated the project would allow the refinery to process heavier crude. For example, the EIR explained that the project is proposed within the context of "a crude oil supply that is  increasingly heavier ," and consequently, the project was "designed to allow more flexibility in refining future crude supplies." Further, a disclosure document submitted to the Securities and Exchange Commission following the 2007 fiscal year cited the central purpose of the project as enabling the processing of heavier crude. The court concluded the EIR failed CEQA's informational purpose because the project description was inadequate with respect to whether the project would enable the refinery to process heavier crude, and failed to properly establish and analyze baseline conditions for measuring the project's potential impacts. Deferred Mitigation Of GHG The court found the EIR improperly deferred the development of greenhouse gas mitigation measures. The court relied on the Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 (Health & Safety Code, § 38500  et seq. , better known as AB 32) and a "white paper" prepared by the California Air Pollution Control Officers Association as evidence that "climate change impacts are significant environmental impacts requiring analysis under CEQA." The court criticized the timing of what it characterized as the city's "post-EIR" determination that project's 898,000 metric ton increase in carbon dioxide emissions was significant. The court focused on the mitigation measure proposed after the city did make a finding of significance. The mitigation measure required Chevron to submit to the city "a plan for achieving complete reduction of GHG emissions" within one year of project approval. The EIR certified by the City Council concluded that implementation of the mitigation measure would "result in no net increase in GHG emissions over the project baseline." In other words, the mitigation measure would reduce the GHG impact to less than significant. The court found this to be a classic case of deferred mitigation. "Numerous cases illustrate that reliance on tentative plans for future mitigation after completion of the CEQA process significantly undermines CEQA's goal of full disclosure and informed decision making," Presiding Justice Ignazio Ruvolo wrote for the unanimous three-judge panel. The court noted the decisions in  California Native Plant Society v. City of Rancho Cordova , (2009) 172 Cal.App.4 th  703 (see  CP&DR Legal Digest , May 2009), and  Sacramento Old City Association v. City Council , (1991) 220 Cal.App.3d 1011, allow a lead agency to defer the formulation of specific mitigation measures, but only if the agency first: • Undertook a complete analysis of the significant environmental impact; • Proposed potential mitigation measures early in the planning process; and • Articulated specific performance criteria that would ensure that adequate mitigation measures were eventually implemented. Richmond performed none of these tasks and instead relied on the fact that scientific information about GHG and techniques for mitigating GHG impacts were constantly expanding during the years the project was under review, making it difficult to decide which specific actions to take. The court rejected this approach. "The difficulties caused by evolving technologies and scientific protocols do not justify a lead agency's failure to met its responsibilities under CEQA by not even attempting to formulate a legally adequate mitigation plan," Ruvolo wrote. Finally, the court noted that the inadequacy of the project description was a more fundamental flaw than the inadequacy of the GHG mitigation measure. But because the EIR must be revised anyway, Ruvolo wrote, " he revised EIR should take advantage of any pertinent new information in analyzing the project's potential greenhouse gas emissions and their cumulative impact on climate change, as well as defining legally adequate mitigation measures to avoid those impact." The court directed the parties to new CEQA Guidelines § 15064.4 relating to the determination of significance of a project's GHG emissions and § 15183.5 relating to tiering. Piecemealing The environmental groups also asserted the city had improperly piecemealed the project by failing to include and analyze a proposed hydrogen pipeline that would transport excess hydrogen to other hydrogen consumers as part of the project. The law prohibits agencies and applicants from chopping a project into smaller pieces to avoid the appearance a project will cause environmental impacts. Here, however, the court found that the project and the proposed pipeline would perform entirely independent and unrelated functions and, therefore, their separate treatment did not constitute illegal piecemealing under CEQA. The Case: Communities for a Better Environment v. City of Richmond,  No. A125618, 2010 DJDAR 6136. Filed April 26, 2010. The Lawyers: For Chevron: Ronald E. Van Buskirk, Pillsbury, Winthrop, Shaw, Pittman, (415) 983-1496. For the city: K. Scott Dickey, chief deputy city attorney, (415) 678-3827. For Communities for a Better Environment: Adrienne L. Bloch, (510) 302-0430.

UCLA Extension will offer a one day seminar, Managing EIRs & EISs on Thursday, June 3.  The class will be held at the Extension Lindbrook Center in Westwood Village (Los Angeles, CA).    This seminar tackles the day-to-day practical issues and challenges in managing the preparation of Environmental Impact Reports (EIRs) and Environmental Impact Statements (EISs) required by state and federal environmental laws.  It equips participants with proven management tools to make projects run more smoothly and ensure successful and professional products and services.   This seminar draws extensively upon case examples and practical experience, presenting project management issues from the standpoint of both public agencies and consultants.  It allows ample time for questions and discussion, and provides numerous examples designed to enhance participants' problem-solving and communication skill regarding particular EIR/EIS management issues.  John E. Bridges, FAICP, Senior Vice President of P&D Consultants and Thomas E. Smith, Jr., AICP, Founder and Principal of BonTerra Consulting will lead the seminar.  For more information visit our website, www.uclaextension.edu/publicpolicy. The seminar runs from 9:00 am to 4:30 pm. The fee is $350 and includes materials.  Please reference registration number V5929 when enrolling online or over the phone. To enroll by phone, please call (310) 825-9971.     Check out our blog – www.uclaextensionppp.wordpress.com and Twitter – www.twitter.com/unexpubpol.

California's redevelopment agencies are pondering their next step after a court ruling that forced them to give $2.05 billion to the state in early May. The state's redevelopment association plans to appeal the ruling by Sacramento County Superior Court Judge Lloyd Connelly � but most of them had to write big checks back to their county treasurer on May 10 to comply with the ruling. The Third District Court of Appeals ruled against the California Redevelopment Association's request for a temporary stay on making a potentially devastating transfer of would-be redevelopment intended to ease the state's $20.7 billion budget deficit. California's redevelopment agencies were forced to hand over a collective $1.7 billion on May 10, with another payment of just over $300 million slated for next year. At least three agencies -- in Monrovia, Placentia, and Richmond -- have refused to make their assigned payments. They either consider the payment a bad investment and are willing to accept penalties in exchange for being able to continue with their projects or because they simply do not have the funds. This is the ninth such transfer of funds in recent memory but the others were "modest" by comparison, according to John Shirey, executive director of the California Redevelopment Association. In some cases, the giveback represented between one-third and one-half of their tax increment. The $2.05 billion price tag came about through legislative negotiations and has been divvied up according to agencies' tax increments -- regardless of the agencies' indebtedness, operating expenses, or project pipelines. The result is that some agencies are feeling more pain than others. The San Francisco Redvelopment Agency cut a check to the state for $28 million. The San Jose Redevelopment Agency paid $62.9 million of an annual tax increment of roughly $200 million. Lora Kutka, chief financial officer of the Fresno Redevelopment Agnecy, said that her agency's payment of $6.7 million represents roughly half the agency's net tax increment. Agencies have stated that the transfers will consume their operating budgets and "cripple" redevelopment--and the job and economic growth that is supposed to accompany it.  In the aggregate, the transfer will affect countless projects that are already underway, and the lack of funds may mean that agencies cannot dedicate time and expense to the planning of new projects that would, in turn, create more tax revenue when complete. The CRA contends that each dollar that a redevelopment agency spends generates up to $13 in economic activity. Moreover, affordable housing  will suffer considerably. "We expect about a $630 million shift will move away from the low- and moderate-incoming housing fund," said Julie Spezia, executive director of advocacy group Housing California. "That equates to 8,400 homes and almost 10,000 jobs statewide. We're really concerned that this sweep is happening at a really poor time and is going to hurt the state's economy and revenue overall." The funds will go the state's Supplemental Educational Revenue Augmentation Fund and will be earmarked for K-12 schools that serve or are located in the respective redevelopment project areas from which funds have been culled. In its legal challenge, the CRA contended that the transfer of funds violated Article XVI, Section 16 of the State Constitution, which provides for the local reinvestment of tax increments generated through redevelopment activities. Connelly, who had ruled in favor of a challenge to a similar proposed transfer last year, disagreed and ruled that the transfer was constitutional so long as the funds served the areas from which they were gathered. Connelly is former mayor of Sacramento and state legislator. The transfer was mandated last year in Assembly Trailer Bill ABX4 26, which arose from negotiations between Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger and legislative leaders. Whether the size of the represents an appropriate sacrifice or an egregious imposition is a question for the legislature. "I don't think there's a single metric for that," said Marianne O'Malley, principal fiscal analyst in Legislative Analyst's Office. "Ultimately it's the job of the legislature to look at all the needs of California and figure out a way of funding them. I think those are policy calls that we elect legislators to do." Some agencies, such as San Francisco, consider themselves lucky to be able to weather a storm that was foreseeable only as soon as a year ago.  Although the impact on this year's projects and operating budgets are bound to be significant throughout the state, Shirey said that the long-term implications of the ruling that authorized the transfer are profoundly troubling. "What Judge Connelly ruled is that the legislature can define redevelopment to be whatever it wants to be, and under that kind of sweeping nod to the legislature, what it could mean is that the legislature starts using redevelopment for any purpose that it wants," said Shirey. "Every year will be open season on redevelopment by the legislature and the governor, and redevelopment agencies will never have any ability to do long-term planning." In the short term, agencies are coping in a variety of ways. Fortunate ones such as the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency, are financing their transfers through bonds and therefore has avoided, for the time being, cuts to any projects. "We are in a very fortunate position relative to a lot of our sister agencies in that our debt coverage ratio allows us to finance the payment to the state," said Fred Blackwell, executive director of the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency, of his $28 million payment. "It's a one-time deal for us. We didn't want to forego stuff that was already in the pipeline, but it's not sustainable." Other agencies, however, are turning to far more drastic measures, especially given that most, if not all, are seeing lower tax increments because of the recession. Most commonly, they are cutting back on infrastructure improvements, which, unlike the development of commercial projects, do not hold the promise of generating property tax revenue. "We had to basically cut our budget in half from where we were earlier in the year, plus the double-whammy of the economy being in the shape it's in," said San Jose Redevelopment Director Harry Mavrogenes. "On a project-specific basis, we have to ask, what's the upside?" said Ontario Redevelopment Director John Andrews. "That future upside is increment revenue, as opposed to a project where it's a traffic signal improvement or curb and gutter improvement. It's going to create for some more difficult choices." Andrews said that he would be having some "difficult conversations" with existing and potential project partners. Despite these hardships--and the fact that it has pledged to file an appeal--the CRA advised its member agencies to pay their share of the SERAF as of the May 10 deadline even though it believes that the decision is unconstitutional. "We did recommend to everyone that they make those payments," said Shirey.  "We did that because we follow the law. As result of the court's decision and the previous action taken by the state, that is the law. We're not going to engage in the hypocrisy that the state engages in by not following law." The firms that refused to pay said they simply didn't have enough cash to write the check. "For us to pay the $3 million ransom to the state, we would have to borrow money," said Monrovia City Manager Scott Ochoa of what he called the Monrovia City Council's "principled stand" against taking money from other city programs. "If these deals mature, we'll sell our holdings, generate proceeds, and with that be able to pay the obligation to the state, however distasteful that might be." In Monrovia, major projects such as Station Square, an 80-acre, 700-unit transit-oriented development near a future light rail station, might have to be put on hold if the agency pays the SERAF before it can raise more cash. "If the state is not above paying out IOU's, I don't see why they should be above accepting IOUs," added Ochoa. In Richmond, officials say that they were simply tapped out. "It's not because we're saying �we don't like what you did,'" said Richmond Community and Economic Development Director Steve Duran. "We're in a financial situation where we don't have any money to pay." These agencies that refuse to pay are subject to a so-called "death penalty" detailed in ABX4 26 that prevents them from undertaking any new projects until the transfer is paid. Regardless of the SERAF's impact on the state's agencies, many are questioning why local funds should be sacrificed for the sake of a problem for which they blame Sacramento. "Given the state that the California budget is in, everybody should be expected to share the pain," said Blackwell. "On the other hand, I think that redevelopment agencies were disproportionately affected in a negative way. Many in the Legislature end up looking at development and land use activities and comparing them to things like health and safety and come to the conclusion that economic and redevelopment activities are more expendable." "I think it's short-sighted," he added. "In times like these, redevelopment agencies are often the only real local stimulus tools that local governments have." While last year's court victory temporarily retained what the CRA considers the sanctity of local funds, it actually set the stage for a careful crafting of ABX4 26 that eliminated the clauses that concerned Judge Connelly last year in such a way that the legislature was able to blur the historical distinction between a tax increment and the rest of the property tax pool. Last year's ruling was, thus, a Pyrrhic victory for redevelopment agencies. "What the judge did when he ruled in our favor the last time around was basically to provide a roadmap for the legislature on how to do the taking in a way that was constitutional," said Blackwell. "And they followed that roadmap to a T." In effect, what the legislature decided � and what Connolly endorsed � was the legislature's ability to decide how to spend increment money within the project area, at least with regard to schools. "In terms of redevelopment, the agencies effectively modify the allocation of the property tax, and some revenues that otherwise would go to cities, counties, special districts and schools go to the redevelopment agency," said O'Malley of the LAO. This interpretation squares with what some consider to be the state's legitimate claim to all property tax funds. "I am of the belief that you can't separate the state budget from local government. You need to look at the totality of public services," said Jean Ross, executive director of independent watchdog group the California Budget Project. "In the whole series of policy decisions made since the voters passed Prop 13, they really have intertwined state and local government finance." The redevelopment community, however, considers even the transfer to local schools to be an affront to the spirit of redevelopment law. And they say that the legislature is simply taking advantage of redevelopment agencies' ready access to funds. "We view the issue as one of constitutionality," said Shirey. "We're not saying that we're worse off or better off than any function or entity that's having money cut, or having money stolen from us, as we are. This money is going to schools that are in redevelopment project areas, ignoring the fact that schools have nothing to do with the redevelopment purpose." The legislature's rationale, however, contends not only that schools conform to the definition of redevelopment but in fact have their own implicit economic value that may or may not be equal to that of the projects that redevelopment agencies support. "The fundamental question isn't would reducing redevelopment have an effect, but would preserving schools funding have an effect too?" said O'Malley. While those effects play out in the coming months, the CRA is hoping to address its concerns for the fate of long-term planning through a legal appeal and a ballot measure that has qualified for the November ballot which is intended to reaffirm the use of tax increment funds for redevelopment and prevent such future transfers.

After recently clearing its docket of California Environmental Quality Act cases, the state Supreme Court has accepted a new CEQA case for review. All seven high court justices voted to review the Second District Court of Appeal's decision in Save the Plastic Bag Coalition v. City of Manhattan Beach. In January, the appellate panel ruled 2-1 that Manhattan Beach should have completed an environmental impact report before adopting an ordinance banning the distribution of plastic shopping bags within the city limits (see CP&DR Legal Digest, February 1, 2010). The court ruled that an association of plastic bag manufacturers had legal standing to bring the lawsuit, and that the association presented substantial evidence to support a fair argument that the ordinance would have environmental impacts. The city argues that the coalition brought the suit purely to protect its commercial interests, which is not permissible under CEQA. The city also argues there is no substantial evidence the ban could harm the environment. The state Supreme Court accepted two questions for consideration: Did the association of plastic bag manufacturers have standing to challenge a local ordinance banning the use of plastic bags? Did the trial court err in ruling the ordinance invalid for the failure to prepare an environmental impact report? The Supreme Court's acceptance of the case means the Second District's opinion no longer stands. The case is Save the Plastic Bag Coalition v. City of Manhattan Beach , No. 180720.

President Obama has now nominated two women to serve on the U.S. Supreme Court – and the addition of Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan -- nominated Monday and almost sure to be confirmed -- will definitely give the court a new tilt. But the tilt isn't about gender. It's about geography. In Sotomayor and Kagan, Obama has selected two women who have lived their whole lives in big cities – they're both from New York, though from very different backgrounds (Sotomayor's from the Bronx). And that means they are likely to give the Supreme Court an urban spin that it hasn't seen since the Roosevelt/Kennedy/Johnson era, when the court included urban veterans like Felix Frankfurter (who grew up on the Lower East Side in New York) and Thurgood Marshall (from Baltimore). Even Kagan's predecessor, John Paul Stevens , who was from Chicago, wasn't this gritty; after all, he always wore bow ties. Other than Princeton, where they both went to college (though at different times, as did First Lady Michelle Obama), Sotomayor and Kagan have never lived outside big cities. Sotomayor lived her entire life in New York City until she took her seat on the Supreme Court last fall. Kagan's life has consisted of Manhattan, Cambridge (just outside Boston), Chicago (where she taught law school with Obama), and Washington, D.C. Indeed, all three women on the Supreme Court are New York urbanites, including Ruth Bader Ginsburg, who grew up in Brooklyn and subsequently taught at Columbia University in Manhattan. How will the urban spin affect a court that is already deeply divided over major social and cultural issues? Though it isn't often discussed, there has always been tension between urban ideas and suburban/small-town/rural ideas on the Supreme Court. In the land use arena, the victory for planning in the seminal case of Euclid v. Ambler in 1926, which upheld the constitutionality of zoning, was largely the result of the fear that affluent justices from small towns had about urban immigrant populations. "The constantly increasing density of our urban populations, the multiplying forms of industry and the growing complexity of our civilization make it necessary for the State, either directly or through some public agency by its sanction, to limit individual activities to a greater extent than formerly," wrote Justice George Sutherland for a very conservative, business-oriented court. An urban tilt might affect a number of divisive issues – such as gun rights, which often reflect differences in urban and rural viewpoints. However, it might also tilt land use issues toward government involvement and away from property rights, as urbanites – living in a more crowded and complicated world – tend to accept more regulation than suburbanites and rural dwellers. Of course, Kagan's confirmation wouldn't change the delicate balance of power on the court. The scales are generally still tipped by which way Justice Anthony Kennedy swings in any given case. And Kennedy's not from Manhattan, the Bronx, or Brooklyn. He's from Sacramento.

The ongoing catastrophe in the Gulf of Mexico may be the best thing ever to happen to the renewable energy industry. I hope that doesn't sound crass. Really, I'm not celebrating in any way a disaster that has already killed 11 oil platform workers and is threatening the livelihoods of countless people in the fishing and tourism industries. But history teaches us that the Santa Barbara oil spill of 1969 was one of the galvanizing incidents of the environmental movement. That spill also was caused by the blowout of an offshore oil well. Three million gallons of crude oil spilled into Santa Barbara channel, coating miles of coastline and thousands of birds. You can almost draw a direct line from that event to the California Environmental Quality Act to the California Coastal Act. In fact, many of our cornerstone state and federal environmental laws stem from the early- and mid-1970s, when the environmental movement was ascendant. Last month's Gulf Coast oil rig blowout occurred just as the Obama administration began moving to open up more coastal areas to drilling. But what the president is now calling a "potentially unprecedented environmental disaster" has put all offshore drilling plans on hold, possibly forever. That includes Gov. Schwarzenegger's proposal to permit additional drilling in the Santa Barbara Channel to generate revenue for parks. In fact, on Tuesday, May 4, the governor withdrew his support for the offshore drilling proposal. "Why would we want to take that risk?" he asked. If the Gulf fishing industry is indeed put out of commission, tar balls roll onto land from Galveston to Tampa, and our televisions fill with images of dead birds and fish, nobody is going to be chanting "drill baby drill." Rather, I suspect there will be a huge surge of interest in placing solar panels on every structure, erecting wind turbines all over the place, and fueling cars with electricity and alcohol. Even if, somehow, the oil spill doesn't turn into an environmental disaster – and here's hoping that it doesn't – I still think the petroleum industry will have a public relations disaster on its hands, especially in California. One other likely casualty of the oil spill: the oil industry-funded initiative that would overturn AB 32 . Campaign advisors working against the initiative already have just about all the headlines and images that they will need. – Paul Shigley

It's possible to reduce greenhouse gas reductions in Southern California 7-9% per capita by 2020 with a mid-range growth scenario that "achievable and ambitious," Hasan Ikhrata, executive director of the Southern California Association of Governments, said Thursday. In a long-awaited presentation to the SCAG General Assembly in La Quinta, Ikhrata said SCAG would convey the estimate to the California Air Resources Board, which is scheduled to provide SCAG and other regions with a per-capita GHG target in June under the terms of SB 375 . Ikhrata's presentation was clearly an effort to influence the ARB's draft target. Elected officials in the SCAG region and elsewhere have expressed concern that ARB will establish a target that is beyond the reach of communities to hit. "Before ARB gives us a target we want to tell them what we can do," Ikhrata said.  Achieving the target would probably not reduce overall GHG emissions because the per-capita savings would be more than offset by population growth. Ikhrata also announced that SCAG will expand the Compass/Blueprint demonstration grant program from $1.2 million to $5 million in the 2011-12 fiscal year and will also launch a $2 million annual green incentive competition for its members as well. the Compass/Blueprint program provides consulting services to local governments in the SCAG region to craft smart-growth-oriented plans. SCAG developed five growth scenarios examining buildout in 2020 and 2035. He said the scenarios included assumptions not only about land use but also about six other topics -- transportation, public transit, nonmotorized transportation, transportation demand management, transportation system management, and pricing. He said the range of savings from the scenarios ranged from 6% to 10% in 2020 and 3% to 12% in 2035, depending on how aggressive the scenarios were. He did not provide specifics about the scenarios themselves. -- Bill Fulton