The passage of AB 32 – California's climate change law – has focused the attention of Left Coast policy wonks like a laser beam on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. And as we have reported over and over again on this website , land use patterns are at the center of this debate. But adapting to a warmer world may actually be a bigger land use policy question. Indeed, reducing emissions may not be the most important -- or the most urgent -- or even the most solvable land use policy issue associated with global warming. There's also the issue that experts call adaptation – adapting to the consequences of climate change, including sea-level rise, smaller snowpacks in the Sierras, and changing agricultural conditions that might require different cropping patterns. Experts speaking at two events last week – the Haagen-Smit Symposium sponsored by the California Air Resources Board and a conference in Berkeley sponsored by the California Center for Environmental Law and Policy at Boalt Hall Law School  – raised the adaptation issue as one that is important – and also one that planners and policymakers can actually do something about.  Especially striking were the comments of Deputy Resources Secretary Tony Brunello who showed a schematic at both events depicting the impact of climate change on the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. Rising sea levels will bring salt water intrusion from the San Francisco Bay to the west – and rapid snow melts could bring more fresh water in from the Sierra to the east. The Delta is already one of the most contentious environmental issues in California and climate change could only ramp up the contentiousness. (National Public Radio recently ran a story about climate change and the Delta .) Brunello is currently looking to recruit an assistant resources secretary to deal with adaptation.  There is little question that the adaptation question will soon dominate planning and engineering discussions in beach towns and river towns throughout the state. The threat of rising water levels is probably going to lead to new and very expensive engineering solutions such as levees and sea walls – and, in some cases, calls to move buildings, people, and communities from harm's way.  Adaptation was readily on display at the Haagen-Smit symposium, an invitation-only event named for the first CARB chair, Dr. A.J. Haagen-Smit, who diagnosed the chemical processes leading to smog. The event was held at the Seascape Resort, located up on the cliffs of Aptos. But down on the beach, it was only a short walk to the Rio del Mar seawall – a massive $5 million structure that protects 20 homes depicted in the Google Earth image accompanying this blog. (You can see photos of the seawall on the website of the engineer who designed it.) As an elected official in a beach town, I can tell you that adaptation is not really on anybody's radar screen right now. But it will soon be. "We're not going to be able to save every last square inch," said Michael Hanemann , a professor of agricultural economics at UC Berkeley, during the Boalt Hall event. Adaptation will require both infrastructure and moving people, he said, "and that's going to require consensus." Given the "loosy-goosey structure" of California land use regulation, he predicted, it will not be easy to reach the consensus needed "to literally reshape land use patterns." -- Bill Fulton

The earth's climate is changing more rapidly than we had thought possible only a few years ago, and we had better both prepare for that change and do what we can to stem it. That was one of the principal points last week at a journalists forum on climate change and cities sponsored by the Lincoln Institute of Land Policy , the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard , and the Harvard Graduate School of Design. The intensive two-day program in Cambridge, Massachusetts, brought together about three dozen journalists, plus elected officials and experts in land use, transportation, geology, conservation, water and public policy. I intend to post a number of blog entries based on research and ideas presented at the forum, but today I'll start with an overview of general impressions. • First, the science. Daniel Schrag , a professor of earth and planetary science at Harvard, said that we still do not know what the effects increased carbon dioxide in the atmosphere will be. But, he emphasized, "The uncertainty is all in the wrong direction." Scientists, Schrag said, have been making conservative estimates about global climate change for decades and all of the estimates have proven wrong. In fact, the situation has grown more dire more quickly than anyone predicted. This was the part of Schrag's presentation that stuck in the forefront of my mind: Carbon dioxide is present in the atmosphere at about 380 parts per million (ppm) today, a sudden rise from 310 ppm. The carbon dioxide level will hit 500 ppm within a few decades, and could reach 1,000 ppm this century. The last time atmospheric carbon dioxide was present at 500 ppm to 2,000 ppm was during the Eocene era, 55 million to 36 million years ago. At that time, sea level was 100 meters (330 feet) higher than it is now. Are atmospheric carbon dioxide and sea level related? Yes. • A number of speakers emphasized the need to both mitigate the problem, and adapt to the likely conditions. It's not an either/or question. Mitigation means reducing energy usage, developing noncarbon sources of energy, and somehow capturing and sequestering carbon emissions. Adaptation means creating ways for people to live less energy-dependent lifestyles — in other words, transit instead of single-occupancy cars, decreased heating and cooling through better building design and construction, and drought-tolerant landscaping. Some adaptations are also mitigations. • What many planners and advocates call "smart growth," or simply good planning, has positive consequences for climate change. Think density, mixed-uses, transit, walkability, stormwater control. In other words, everything that California's post-war suburban model lacks. • What level of risk are we willing to tolerate? Mortgage lenders require homeowners to buy fire insurance, even though the risk of catastrophic fire is quite small, even in fire-prone areas. We spend billions of dollars to protect against a flood that has a 1-in-100 or even 1-in-500 chance of happening. Yet the risk of climate change influencing cataclysmic events — enormous floods, fires, hurricanes and droughts — appears to be more on the order of 1 in 20, or even 1 in 5. Shouldn't this drive public and private spending decisions? • A surprising number of speakers at the forum knew exactly how many days remain in the Bush administration. There's a feeling that the U.S. could not possibly have had two oil men in charge of the White House at a worse time. No one believes the next president, Republican or Democratic, will ignore the issues. • There's this place out there called "the rest of the world." Most Americans are pretty bad about considering this place, except maybe as a vacation destination or as the place where their job went. Yet three-fourths of greenhouse gases are generated in the rest of the world, and developing countries will soon produce more than half. Billions of people want the mobility, convenience and gadgetry that most Americans take for granted. This makes for an extremely sensitive situation, especially when, as one South African reporter pointed out, the rest of the world sees the U.S. as a climate change pariah that's unwilling to be accountable. • Most journalists are missing the big picture. What came through during forum discussions was that many journalists are skeptical of the problem, unsure of the scientists, and doubtful about the solutions offered so far. As one television reporter said, the end of the world has been predicted before but we're all still here. Frankly, I was amazed at level of skepticism, especially considering that these were elite journalists with expertise in the environment and land use. Maybe that's why I found Ronald Sims, the elected executive of King County, Washington, to be so compelling. Sims is a leading voice for climate change adaptation . He pointed out that daily journalists often underreport historic trends and events. Before the attack on Pearl Harbor, newspapers in the U.S. contained modest coverage of the war in Europe and virtually nothing about Japan while they devoted their news columns to trivial local matters. Lincoln's Gettysburg Address was a turning point in our country's history, yet it received almost no coverage at the time. What people are doing — or not doing — to ensure the planet remains habitable 100 years from now is the biggest story ever. — Paul Shigley

Professional and trade conventions actually are new urbanist events. People arrive from out of town, often sans car, and spend several days walking around the convention site and the host city while taking care of business and enjoying themselves. So when we at CP&DR started talking about the best convention cities in California, we ended up talking about some of California's best urban areas. It turns out that a good convention city has all the same attributes as a good urban place. A good convention city has a wide variety of restaurants, coffee houses and watering holes, decent entertainment options, parks or multi-use paths for early-morning or late-afternoon exercise, and maybe some specialty shopping — all within close vicinity of the convention site. Remember, you're at a conference. Considering all the time spent sitting around listening to presentations, and all the drinking and munching you'll do at receptions, you NEED to walk around. Of course, a convention city also should have good hotels, comfortable meeting facilities, wireless access everywhere, a decent airport, and some public transit. Resorts are a second option for a convention. The resort convention often encourages even more walking than the downtown convention, but in a different setting. It's more like walking in a shopping mall or hospital or, if you're lucky, a college campus. While there, you think about how long it will take you to walk somewhere — not the place that you're in. We love cities, so it's not surprising that we favor the downtown convention format. We also should note that we who live and work in California are darned lucky to have so many great meeting places. Many states have only a handful of locations that could handle, say, 500 to 1,000 people for three days. California has dozens of such places, which makes it difficult to choose the best. But we did. The best cities in California for a convention: 1. Monterey. Is there anybody who doesn't want to spend a few days in Monterey on the company's dime? Monterey Conference Center isn't built for those 20,000-person mega-events, but it's an ideal size for most conventions, and it's perfectly located between downtown and Cannery Row. Top-notch hotels, restaurants and comfortable lounges are everywhere. The fabulous Monterey Bay Aquarium and Fisherman's Wharf are within comfortable walking distance along a bayfront multi-use trail. Downtown can feel a touch upscale touristy, but it's easy enough to find eateries and shops catering to modest budgets. If you're able to sneak off for the afternoon, the Monterey Peninsula offers a world-class selection of public golf courses. 2. San Diego. San Diego is sort of like a much bigger version of Monterey, and with more reliably good weather. This convention center can handle the mega-event, but there are hotels with fine meeting facilities for smaller gatherings. The downtown San Diego walking environment is extraordinary. The thriving restaurants and nightclubs of the Gaslamp District are only a few blocks away from the convention center, as is the San Diego Padres' baseball stadium, and you can always stroll along the waterfront. The San Diego Trolley makes excursions to other parts of town easy. If the family comes along, they may reach the famous San Diego Zoo and other attractions of Balboa Park with a short cab ride. 3. Palm Springs. What's better than finally escaping from 8 hours of brain-numbing PowerPoint presentations in an air conditioned hall? Walking out the sliding glass doors into a pleasantly warm evening and marveling at the San Jacinto Peak escarpment towering over town. Palm Springs' convention hotels are conveniently located in an old-fashioned, low-rise downtown that has a weird, yet enjoyable, mix of businesses. The place manages to be both kitschy and ultra-modern at the same time. Plus, the Spa Resort Casino offers a touch of Vegas right in the middle of everything. The second tier: San Francisco. The City would rate higher if Moscone Center were in a better location. Unfortunately, the SoMa neighborhood right around the big convention house is pretty gritty. Union Square and the theater district are nearby, but other great attractions — such as the most vibrant Chinatown in the U.S., the amazing dining in North Beach and the dazzling waterfront along the Embarcadero — require a short cab ride. Public transit can be a little confusing to visitors. Still, if you don't enjoy a convention in San Francisco, then you don't enjoy cities. Los Angeles. Here, the location problem is even worse. Unlike San Francisco, where there are plenty of good hotels close to the convention center, in L.A. most big hotels are a mile or more from the massive convention center. Who wants to take a shuttle from their hotel to the convention? That said, there are finally some new hotels and restaurants within striking distance of the convention center. If you're lucky enough to attend a convention at one of the established downtown hotels, you'll be close to great museums and entertainment venues around the Civic Center. And, believe it or not, public transit is pretty convenient if you want to hit Olvera Street, or even Hollywood or Pasadena. San Jose. This may be the only true surprise on our list. There are good hotels fairly near the convention center and the redeveloped downtown is enjoyable if still a work-in-progress. The San Jose State University campus brings variety and vitality to area. Light-rail and a free shuttle make getting around easy, but most things are within a 15-minute walk. Very popular, but … Anaheim. OK, if you're bringing the kids, then Anaheim might be convention nirvana. But if you're looking for an urban experience, nearby Long Beach or even Santa Ana would be a better bet. Disneyland's massive surface parking lots prevent good urbanism. The Anaheim Convention Center is disconnected from everything. If you want to eat or drink somewhere other than your hotel or Disneyland, your choice is to find a ride or walk on narrow sidewalks adjacent to high-speed boulevards to, well, a different hotel or chain restaurant. That said, there has been a significant hotel upgrade during recent years, and Downtown Disney is OK for what it is. Check back in 20 years. Things might be great by then. For a change of pace … Yosemite Valley. The facilities are spread out, yet everything you could want is here — in one of the world's most spectacular settings. You may take a contemplative walk from Curry Village to Yosemite Lodge to the Ahwahnee Hotel, or you may ride the free shuttle. The boss isn't going to spring for a room in the Ahwahnee, but you may still stop in for a drink by the fireplace. And what could be better than waking up in a tent cabin at Curry Village, grabbing a steaming cup of coffee on the patio, and then deciding whether the day might be better spent on the trail to Upper Yosemite Falls? — The CP&DR Staff

The housing foreclosure crisis has slammed the Central Valley as hard as any region in the country. Stockton, Sacramento, Modesto, Merced and Bakersfield are typically listed the top 10 to 15 markets with the most foreclosures per capita. In some cities, 5% to 7% of homeowners are delinquent on their mortgage payments. And whole neighborhoods, such as portions of Natomas in Sacramento, sometimes seem to have been completely emptied. Why is the Central Valley suffering so badly? I put that question to Carol Whiteside recently while reporting for a story scheduled to appear in the June edition of Planning magazine. Carol founded the Great Valley Center. from which she recently "retired." Before that, she was mayor of Modesto and a member of Gov. Pete Wilson's cabinet. If anyone knows the Central Valley, it's Carol. "These markets were very subject to flippers. People were coming in from the Bay Area and other places because prices were rising so fast," Carol said. Investors put down as little cash as possible on a house, arranged some sort of exotic financing, and then assumed they could sell for a profit within 12 months, Carol observed. The scheme worked for a while. But when prices started flattening out two years ago, and the fancy loans' interest rates reset or balloon payments came due, the game was over. "The other part of it is that this is an area without a lot of wealth and high incomes," she said. Many people who bought homes in the Valley commute to the Bay Area or, from Bakersfield, to Los Angeles. These folks bought houses in the Valley on the "drive until you qualify" theory. Such families live on a tight margin, and the slightest economic blip could make their financial situation untenable, especially if they had refinanced or taken out a second mortgage on the assumption that property values would continue rising. I guess that none of this should come as a surprise. Two years ago, the Congressional Research Service reported that the San Joaquin Valley is the poorest region of the country — poorer than even Appalachia . Economic development efforts have been stymied by the Valley's poorly prepared workforce and a less-than-ideal quality of life in many places. But in recent years, public agencies, businesses and property owners have invested heavily in downtown Modesto, making it a true urban delight. (Seriously, if you haven't been there lately, you'd be surprised.) Will efforts such as downtown Modesto revitalization pay off in the long run by attracting entrepreneurs and well-educated workers who could build a stronger, more durable local economy? Carol Whiteside would like to think so. However, she warned, today's society is focused on the quick buck, not the long-term. "I hope we learn our lesson, and be smarter and more cautious," Carol said, pointing to the high-tech and real estate bubbles that have burst during the last eight years. "But experience tells me we will forget the lessons." — Paul Shigley

State water quality officials are continuing to press forward with more and more strict regulations for stormwater runoff. In response, planners and developers are worried about the cost of implementation and potentially unintended consequences. The regulations — adopted in some regions and under consideration in others — generally require measures to ensure that runoff from new development is not much greater in volume or worse in quality than runoff from the site prior to development. The idea is to prevent new development from further worsening state water quality problems. But developers complain that their projects are being overburdened, and planners question what the rules' impact could be on infill and redevelopment sites where there is little or no impermeable soil to help capture and infiltrate runoff. Water quality officials are clearly sensitive to the criticism. The process for adopting stormwater regulations for South Orange County and Ventura County has slowed dramatically while officials re-evaluate proposed rules and conduct additional stakeholder meetings. "Stormwater is one of the issues that is going to be driving land use decisions," said Clark Anderson, water and land use specialist for the Local Government Commission. "Site design is going to be driven by how you handle stormwater." The technical details can be overwhelming, though. "There is a tremendous amount of water quality regulation that is going on, and it's very technical and complex," summed up Mary Lynn Coffee, an attorney with Nossaman, Guthner, Knox & Elliott who frequently represents the building industry. With great advances in treating municipal sewage and industrial discharges, stormwater runoff (which is basically water that flows over urban surfaces) has emerged as the biggest threat to water quality. This is especially true for coastal waters along metropolitan areas such as Los Angeles. "Pollutants span the spectrum from litter and debris to pet waste to pesticides and fertilizers washing off landscaped areas to road dust and leaking vehicle fluids," said Judie Panneton, a research analyst and spokeswoman for the State Water Resources Control Board. "New development and redevelopment plays a role in the big picture because stormwater quality controls can be considered at an early stage of the planning process and integrated into the overall design of the project." While the regulations and development techniques vary from region to region and even city to city, the policy generally gets condensed into a two-part equation, explained Lisa Nisenson, a Florida-based consultant who has reviewed and commented on numerous stormwater regulatory schemes in California and elsewhere. In a piece for the Planetizen website , she wrote that the equation is thus: "(1) The postdevelopment hydrology profile equals the predevelopment hydrology profile of a development site, and (2) predevelopment hydrology equals the hydrology of a meadow. That is, any new development or redevelopment project must be designed with the infiltration and runoff characteristics of an open field." That sounds great to many people, Nisenson said, but it's not necessarily the right approach because it does not consider the big picture of land use patterns across a watershed. "A lot of the model projects for capturing runoff have been in the wrong places. You've got to consider where the project is located in addition to how a project deals with its stormwater," Nisenson said. It is often much easier to design "model" stormwater systems in greenfield development sites. But the design often relies on large lots or cluster development with expansive areas dedicated to soaking up runoff. The end result, though, is a big urban footprint — including roads — in a previously undeveloped area. How, she asks rhetorically, is that better for the environment than making more efficient use of already developed areas? This was one of the major concerns with the stormwater regulations proposed for Ventura County by the Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board. The proposed regulations (contained in the MS4 permit for county and its 11 cities) emphasizes "low impact development" or LID. The LID approach is what Nisenson describes as the development-site-as-meadow approach, and it makes infill and redevelopment very difficult (see LID sidebar). In turn, it drives development to greenfield areas. But in Ventura County there is the further complication of voter-approved urban limit lines that make most potential greenfield development sites off-limits. It started to sound like a no-growth scenario. The regional board responded by proposing that cities could develop "redevelopment project area master plans." The plans would contain a strategy for dealing with stormwater in existing urban areas, rather than requiring site-by-site stormwater measures that are difficult in infill or redevelopment situations. Developers might end up paying in-lieu fees for larger stormwater management systems. The regional board would have authority to approve or reject the plans. How practical these plans might be for cities and developers to implement remains unknown, although infill proponents such as Nisenson have expressed support for at least the concepts. In late February, the Los Angeles regional board staff conducted an extensive meeting with stakeholders and consultants on the proposed regulatory package. Stephen Cain, a spokesman for the Los Angeles regional board, hesitated to comment on what he termed "truly a draft document." The regulations are not scheduled to come before the board until July, and there is no guarantee the board will adopt them, said Cain, who declined to provide answers to specific questions. Coffee called the proposed Ventura County MS4 permit "a microcosm of all the most stringent runoff regulations that are out there." The proposed regulations for both Ventura County and South Orange County emphasize low impact development. Low impact development also is an emphasis in San Diego County, where the regional board adopted the first of the major stormwater revisions in January 2007, according to attorney Susan Hori, of Manatt, Phelps & Phillips in Costa Mesa. The San Diego permit requires that LID "best management practices" be implemented for "priority development projects," which include subdivisions of at least 10 units, hillside development of more than 5,000 square feet, industrial development of at least one acre, and anything involving at least 5,000 square feet of paved surfaces. Gary Brown, executive director of Orange County Coastkeeper, contended that the emphasis on LID is appropriate. "It's a repackaging of a lot of concepts to capture and infiltrate water on-site," he said. Brown calls the argument that LID mandates will prevent redevelopment "disingenuous." There are many emerging technologies that could be implemented, such as porous concrete, common driveways and various filters that require little maintenance, he said. "To me, what's important is not to tell a developer what to do, but to set up some goals and objectives for what runs off of a property," Brown said. And therein lies a rub. Most regulations are fairly prescriptive, while both developers and planners would rather been given runoff rate and pollution targets and the freedom to figure out ways to hit the targets. "I think the development industry has gone from a position of ‘No we can't do it, no we can't do it,' to recognize the goal and to say, ‘Here's the technical information we can provide'," said Coffee. The process for adopting heavily prescriptive stormwater regulations has slowed, suggesting that a more cooperative approach might emerge as the regional board consider new stormwater regulations this year. "Blanket regulations tend to come back and bite you," Nisenson warned. "The different performance standards will create an uneven playing field between places that adopt them and places that don't." Last year, state lawmakers approved a measure that requires formation of a stormwater advisory task force to assist the State Water Resources Control Board with "program priorities, funding criteria, project selection, and interagency coordination of state programs that address stormwater management." The legislation (AB 739, Laird) also requires the state board to prepare a "comprehensive guidance document" for measuring municipal stormwater management programs. While much of what AB 739 addresses concerns the performance of storm drainage systems, development standards are at issue. The task force includes environmentalists, government officials and representatives of the Building Industry Association of Southern California and the Western States Petroleum Association. The first meeting is scheduled for this month. Contacts: Mary Lynn Coffee, Nossaman, Guthner, Knox & Elliott, (949) 833-7800. Lisa Nisenson, Nisenson Consulting, (941) 822-0338. Clark Anderson, Local Government Commission, (916) 448-1198. Gary Brown, Orange County Coastkeeper, (714) 850-1965. San Diego Regional Water Quality Control Board stormwater website: www.waterboards.ca.gov/sandiego/programs/sd_stormwater.html Los Angeles Regional Water Quality Control Board stormwater website: www.waterboards.ca.gov/losangeles/water_issues/programs/stormwater/index.shtml Natural Resources Defense Council stormwater strategies: www.nrdc.org/water/pollution/storm/stoinx.asp Do You Know LID When You See It? What is "low impact development"? In some ways, the term has become similar to "smart growth" in that LID can mean whatever someone wants it to mean. In some Eastern states, for example, large-lot greenfield subdivisions on the edge of town qualify as LID, while dense redevelopment projects do not qualify, even though the latter adds virtually no impermeable surfaces to a watershed. The State Water Resources Control Board defines LID this way: "Low Impact Development (LID) is a sustainable practice that benefits water supply and contributes to water quality protection. Unlike traditional stormwater management, which collects and conveys stormwater runoff through storm drains, pipes, or other conveyances to a centralized storm water facility, LID takes a different approach by using site design and storm water management to maintain the site's pre-development runoff rates and volumes. The goal of LID is to mimic a site's predevelopment hydrology by using design techniques that infiltrate, filter, store, evaporate, and detain runoff close to the source of rainfall." Like many definitions of LID, state water board's definition presupposes that the development site was previously undeveloped. The Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) has been a leading proponent of LID nationwide and has done extensive research on the most-effective LID practices. The NRDC has this to say about LID: "LID is simple and effective. Instead of large investments in complex and costly engineering strategies for stormwater management, LID strategies integrate green space, native landscaping, natural hydrologic functions, and various other techniques to generate less runoff from developed land. LID is different from conventional engineering. While most engineering plans pipe water to low spots as quickly as possible, LID uses micro-scale techniques to manage precipitation as close to where it hits the ground as possible. This involves strategic placement of linked lot-level controls that are "customized" to address specific pollutant load and stormwater timing, flow rate, and volume issues. "One of the primary goals of LID design is to reduce runoff volume by infiltrating rainfall water to groundwater, evaporating rain water back to the atmosphere after a storm, and finding beneficial uses for water rather than exporting it as a waste product down storm sewers. The result is a landscape functionally equivalent to predevelopment hydrologic conditions, which means less surface runoff and less pollution damage to lakes, streams, and coastal waters," according to the NRDC. The San Diego Regional Water Quality Control Board requires LID for most development projects. The regional board defines LID this way: "A stormwater management and land development strategy that emphasizes conservation and the use of on-site natural features integrated with engineered, small-scale hydrologic controls to more closely reflect pre-development hydrologic functions." The San Diego region considers LID best management practices to include maximizing infiltration, stormwater retention, slowing runoff, minimizing impervious footprints, directing runoff into landscaping, clustering development, and incorporating features such as rooftop gardens and permeable paving. Caltrans Agrees to Clean Up Freeway Runoff When it comes to polluted runoff, roads are king. Roads are covered with petroleum products, metal shavings and trash. In addition, roads are designed, for safety reasons, to disburse water quickly, which ensures the pollutants move quickly to rivers, lakes and the ocean, and which encourages soil erosion. All this explains why the Natural Resources Defense Council and Santa Monica Baykeeper targeted Southern California freeways in litigation originally filed during 1993 in U.S District Court in Los Angeles. The environmental groups and Caltrans finally settled the litigation earlier this year. The settlement requires Caltrans to reduce runoff pollution from its 1,000 miles of freeways in Los Angeles and Ventura counties to 20% less than 1994 levels by 2011. How exactly Caltrans will achieve this reduction is not spelled out in the settlement in Natural Resources Defense Council v. California Dept. of Transportation, Case No. 93-6073. Environmentalists said that the specific numeric targets to which Caltrans agreed are the most important part of the settlement, and could serve as a model for Caltrans elsewhere in the state and for other agencies. Among the measures Caltrans could employ are roadside sand traps, catch basins and porous concrete, all of which would slow runoff and absorb contaminants. Caltrans has resisted implementing such measures previously, but a federal judge in the NRDC litigation ruled that the environmentalists could sue to force Caltrans to implement best management practices for controlling stormwater. The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeal upheld that ruling. Caltrans has been closed-mouth about how it intends to achieve the specified reduction in pollutants. The NRDC said full implementation of the settlement will prevent 6 million pounds of pollutants, including 24,000 pounds of toxic metals, from flowing into waters that drain into Santa Monica Bay.

Environmentalists, open space advocates, planners, elected officials and residents of several Los Angeles and Orange County communities are gearing up for the next round in the battle over the fate of thousands of acres in the hills along the 57 freeway. The property owner has proposed developing 3,600 housing units and 300,000 square feet of commercial space, but opponents say most or all of the site should remain open as a wildlife corridor linking the Puente Hills Open Space with Chino Hills State Park. Interestingly, the corridor was not included in a large report on "missing linkages" issued in mid-March by the group South Coast Wildlands in conjunction with numerous government agencies (see sidebar). One report author said the corridor is indeed a linkage, but it is not one of the 15 top Southern California priorities. Still, those with concerns about development in the hills are unlikely to be deterred as the City of Diamond Bar moves forward with processing a master plan for Aera Energy's 2,935-acre site. "The project involves grading two-thirds of the entire property," said Bob Henderson, a Whittier city councilman and chairman of the multi-agency Wildlife Corridor Conservation Authority. "When you think about that, it's devastating from a biology point of view." But Diamond Bar City Manager James DeStefano insisted that it is too early in the process for anyone to draw conclusions. "There are a lot of issues out there we are still examining," said DeStefano, who estimated a draft environmental impact report is "months" from completion. Yet the project is hardly new, and neither is development of the land. Shell Oil began punching oil wells into the hills during the 1920s, and the property was both a productive oil field and cattle grazing land for decades. With oil about played out, Aera Energy, a joint venture of Shell Oil and Exxon/Mobile that produces 30% of California's oil and gas, first proposed its development to Los Angeles County. All but about 320 acres of the site lie in unincorporated Los Angeles County; the remainder is in unincorporated Orange County. Los Angeles County planners conducted their first meeting on the project in 2002, said Paul McCarthy, a supervising regional planner for the county. Most of the site is within a "sensitive ecological area" designated by the county general plan, so planners and biologists raised a number of questions. The county's Significant Ecological Technical Advisory Committee eventually asked Aera to redesign the project to lessen the impact on wildlife connectivity. Instead, Aera took its proposal to the City of Diamond Bar, which approved a planning and pre-annexation agreement with Aera in late 2006. In May 2007, the city issued a notice of preparation for a program environmental impact report and conducted a scoping meeting. City officials initially said a draft of the environmental study would be complete before year's end, a timeline that has slipped. "There was a lot back in that day we didn't really know," conceded DeStefano. "We have been going slowly through the project. There has been information that has taken a lot of time to get to us." Aera is working with The Planning Center on the master plan and environmental study, while the city has retained EDAW to review Aera's submittals. DeStefano said the city has no pre-conceived notions. "We are taking a real hard look at the land planning that is being proposed by the developer," he said. "We don't want this to be just another subdivision on a hillside. We want it to be a model." The latest public proposal is for a master plan divided among three jurisdictions. • Diamond Bar: 1,940 acres containing up to 2,800 residential units, at least 100,000 to 200,000 square feet of commercial development, and a 20-acre sports park. Diamond Bar would have to annex all of this territory, nearly all of which is outside its existing sphere of influence. • Los Angeles County: 675 acres containing 275 housing units and a golf course. • Orange County: 321 acres with a maximum of 800 residential units, 100,000 square feet of office or commercial space in mixed-use developments, and a golf course. Environmentalists say the Aera project site is located in a critical wildlife habitat corridor. Map source: Hills For Everyone. At least half of the nearly 3,000-acre site would be designated as open space, although golf courses would be part of the open space. Aera has defended the proposal as providing needed housing in a region that has few large sites available for development, yet compatible with environmental needs. "The project was designed to incorporate a wildlife movement corridor through the property from the earliest stages of planning," according to Aera's project description. "Recognizing that animals can safely cross under Harbor Boulevard and the SR-57 freeway in only one location on each road, the plan's design sets aside about 700 acres (of the project's 1,670 acres of preserved open space) to allow unimpeded passage between these locations that lead to adjacent open space preserves." DeStefano said his city has not had a lot of contact with other cities about the project. Back when Los Angeles County was processing Aera's application, the cities of Whittier, Brea, La Habra and La Habra Heights all adopted resolutions opposing the project. The Roland Heights Community Coordinating Council in unincorporated Los Angeles County is also an opponent. The surrounding jurisdictions are concerned about traffic, loss of scenic views, and impacts on wildlife. They are also concerned about their past investments in open space, as local governments have worked with state agencies to conserve about 40,000 acres stretching from the San Gabriel River to the Cleveland National Forest during the last two decades. The Aera property is located toward the western edge of this open space, between the 4,000-acre Puente Hills Open Space (between Whittier and La Habra Heights) and the 12,400-acre Chino Hills State Park, which connects via open space in Coal Canyon to Cleveland National Forest. The Aera property is crucial for healthy movement by deer, foxes, bobcats, coyotes, opossums and other animals, according to open space advocates. The property contains oak and walnut woodlands, as well as coastal sage scrub habitat important to rare species of birds. Aera has portrayed the property as highly degraded by oil drilling and more than a century of cattle grazing, but open space advocates are not dissuaded. About 900 acres the wildlife authority purchased from Chevron in 1995 was in far worse condition than Aera's property is, but the Chevron property has rebounded quickly, Henderson said. One concern of Henderson's is the amount of grading proposed. The EIR notice of preparation estimated there would be 57 million cubic yards of cut and fill work over two-thirds of the project site. Henderson finds that level of earthmoving unacceptable. Henderson and others, including the influential group Hills for Everyone, would like for Aera to sell the property to a public entity for preservation. Henderson added, though, "I've never been opposed to cutting down the size of the project drastically and making room for the wildlife corridor." Whether that's feasible is unknown. Los Angeles County's McCarthy said that Aera and Diamond Bar "have a real challenge on their hands as to how they mitigate impacts to the biotic habitat that's there." For the most part, environmentalists and surrounding jurisdictions are simply waiting for release of the draft EIR. "Until we see an EIR out of the City of Diamond Bar, we're sort of in a holding pattern," said David Sommers, a spokesman for Los Angeles County Supervisor Don Knabe, who represents the area. "We want to make sure that Diamond Bar is not just picking and choosing the best parts of the site." Possibly complicating the habitat issue is the City of Industry's purchase in 2001 of 2,500 acres in Tonner Canyon, just to the east of the Aera property and adjacent to about 3,000 acres Industry already owned in the hills (see CP&DR Local Watch, December 2001). The wildlife authority and other entities sued over the 2001 acquisition but lost in court. Industry — which is home to 700 residents and nearly 100,000 workers — has talked about building several reservoirs on the site, but no project has emerged. The concern is that large reservoirs could eliminate thousands of acres of habitat and block wildlife movement. Contacts: Jim DeStefano, City of Diamond Bar, (909) 839-7010. Bob Henderson, Wildlife Corridor Conservation Authority, Whittier City Council, (562) 945-8200. Paul McCarthy, Los Angeles County Department of Regional Planning, (213) 974-6461. Aera project website: http://www.aeracommunity.com/ Hillside Open Space Education Coalition: www.hosec.com Hills For Everyone: www.hillsforeveryone.org Report Identifies South State Wildlife Linkages Billed as an "innovating conservation strategy" by environmental groups and public agencies, the "South Coast Missing Linkages Project" advocates conservation of 15 key corridors stretching from the southern Sierra Nevada Mountains to Baja California. The project aims to conserve the existing connections that biologists say are essential. The connections lie between large chunks of national forest, state parks and other public open space. "If even one fails, the biological integrity of the entire region would be compromised," said Kristeen Penrod, conservation director for the group South Coast Wildlands. "If these 15 linkages were conserved, they would form the backbone of the Southern California ecoregion." Others involved in the project include the National Park Service, the U.S. Forest Service, California Department of Parks and Recreation, The Wildlands Conservancy and The Nature Conservancy. "Without linkages between existing parks, national forests and other public lands, many native species could be threatened or disappear entirely," said Ray Sauvajot, chief of planning, science and resource management for the National Park Service in the Santa Monica Mountains. "This is especially true for animals that disperse widely or have small populations, such as mountain lions, badgers, bobcats, desert tortoises and bighorn sheep." The strategy evolved out of a project back in 2000 that identified 232 linkages statewide, including 69 in the south coast "ecoregion." Recognizing that they could not address all of the linkages, the participants decided to prioritize the top 15 Southern California linkages based on their vulnerability to urban development and their "ecological irreplaceability," Penrod explained. The park service and other government agencies provided a great deal of information on species and habitats for the report. The priority linkages are all 1,000 acres or more and feature both high-quality habitat and multiple habitat types, Penrod said. About half are already public lands or are preserved in some fashion. Many of the linkages also are already included in habitat conservation plans or natural communities conservation plans. Purchase, easements, zoning restrictions and mitigation agreements are all potential ways to ensure the corridors' viability, according to Penrod. The report is a useful tool for the park service as it looks to acquire new territory for the Santa Monica Mountains National Recreation Area, and as the agency reviews local general plans in the area, said Sauvajot. Several local agencies, including Ventura, Los Angeles and San Diego counties and the City of Santa Clarita have already shown interest in using the linkages project for long-range planning. The full report and detailed maps are available on the South Coast Wildlands website, www.scwildlands.org

The City of Fresno cut short its inquiry into the historic significance of two apartment buildings, one of which is proposed for demolition, the Fifth District Court of Appeal has ruled. Based on its decision three months earlier not to include the buildings on the local register of historic resources, the council determined the demolition project was categorically exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act. However, the court ruled the Fresno City Council had discretion to determine whether the buildings were historical resources for purposes of CEQA "notwithstanding previous decisions not to list the object or building in the local register." However, the court also ruled that the "fair argument" standard does not "apply to the question of historicity during the preliminary review stage of an environmental review." Thus, a decision not to consider a building as an historic resource would stand if there were substantial evidence supporting the decision — even if preservationists presented contrary evidence supporting a fair argument that the building could be an historic resource. In September 2004, the law firm Perez, Williams & Medina submitted an application to demolish one of two four-unit apartment buildings known locally as the WP Cutting flats — craftsman style structures built in about 1913. The law firm sought to expand its office building and parking lot. In response to the application, Fresno's Historic Preservation Commission nominated the flats for placement on the local register of historic resources. But in February 2005, the Fresno City Council voted 4-3 to deny the listing. The city then filed a notice of exemption from CEQA based on demolition of a residential structure with fewer than six units and infill development. A resident complained about the use of a categorical exemption, and the city treated the complaint letter as a CEQA appeal. In May 2005, the City Council conducted a public hearing and voted 4-1 to confirm the categorical exemption. The group Valley Advocates sued, arguing the city had violated CEQA in numerous ways. Fresno County Superior Court Judge Gary Austin ruled for the city. However, a unanimous three-judge panel of the Fifth District overturned the lower court's ruling and the city's approval of the project. The court explained that there are three types of historical resources under CEQA. Mandatory resources are those listed on, or eligible for, the California Register of Historic Resources. Presumptive resources are those listed on a local register or recognized by local ordinance or resolution. The flats in downtown Fresno are neither mandatory nor presumptive historic resources, the court concluded. The third type is discretionary historic resources, which are those that a lead agency decides are historically significant. "The exact scope of that discretion is not clear," Justice Betty Dawson wrote for the court, which declined to provide a definition. The flats could fall into this category, but the city did not exercise its discretion, the court determined. The court focused on written and oral staff reports that erroneously advised the City Council the earlier decision not to list the flats on the local register answered the question of historic resources for purposes of CEQA. "A listing determination and a CEQA determination are not the same thing," the court ruled. Rather than rely on its earlier listing decision, the city needed to perform a separate analysis, which it did not do, the court determined. Therefore, the city must set aside approval of the project and the findings of categorical exemption, and "conduct a preliminary review that considers the application of the discretionary historical resources category to the flats." That review, however, need not be subject to the fair argument standard that is favorable to preservationists. On this issue, the court examined the legislative history of one section of CEQA, Public Resources Code § 21084.1, regarding historic resources. " he only reasonable interpretation of § 21084.1 is that the fair argument standard does not govern a lead agency's application of the definition of an historical resource. Of course, once the resource has been determined to be an historical resource, then the fair argument standard applies to the question of whether the proposed project ‘may cause a significant adverse change in the significance of an historic resource,' and thereby have a significant effect on the environment," Dawson wrote for the court. The fair argument standard also does not apply to the question of whether the project qualifies for an exception to the CEQA exemptions, the court held. The Case: Valley Advocates v. City of Fresno , No. F050952, 08 C.D.O.S. 2003, 2008 DJDAR 2419. Filed February 15, 2008. Modified March 17, 2008 at 08 C.D.O.S. 3027, 2008 DJDAR 3699. The Lawyers: For Valley Advocates: Richard Harriman, (559) 226-1818. For the city: Kathryn Phelan, city attorney's office, (559) 498-1326. For real party in interest: Robert Gray Williams, Perez, Williams & Medina, (559) 445-0123.

Voters in the City of San Clemente will decide on a building height and view ordinance, thanks to a state appellate court ruling regarding signature gathering for a referendum of the ordinance. The Fourth District Court of Appeal ruled that referendum supporters did not have to abide by a state law requiring petition circulators to be city residents, because the law is unconstitutional. A 1999 state attorney general's opinion, issued after a pivotal U.S. Supreme Court ruling, reached the same conclusion, the court noted. The land use controversy in San Clemente concerns ocean views. In July 2006, the San Clemente City Council approved an ordinance prohibiting second-story additions in the Shorecliffs area. The ordinance came in response to complaints from homeowners who said they were losing their ocean views because of two-story houses. The ordinance limits buildings in the area to 16 feet in height, but permits reduced setbacks and increased lot coverage for affected parcels. With the help of a signature gathering company, a group called San Clemente Residents for Responsible Government circulated a referendum of the ordinance. In August 2006, the group submitted enough signatures to force the referendum onto the ballot. However, an anti-referendum (or pro-height limit) group called Preserve Shorecliff Homeowners sued. The group's primary contention was that referendum supporters (height limit opponents) violated Elections Code § 9209, read together with § 9022, because the paid circulators were not residents of San Clemente. The state law requires circulators of referendum petitions to be residents of the city subject to the referendum. Orange County Superior Court Judge Geoffrey Glass determined that the referendum proponents had violated § 9209 and the related § 9238, subdivision (c). However, he ruled that disqualification of the referendum was not proper given that the city clerk had determined the signatures were genuine. In May 2007, Judge Glass ruled the referendum valid. Preserve Shorecliff Homeowners appealed, arguing that Glass has effectively voided state law. The group argued that the constitutionality of the statutes was not at issue, so the court should simply determine whether the referendum proponents complied. But the court said the constitutionality of the law was crucial, as " ppellate courts are not in the business of directing trial courts to violate the constitution." The key case in this area is Buckley v. American Constitutional Law Foundation , (1999) 525 U.S. 182. In Buckley, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that the State of Colorado could not limit initiative and referendum petition circulators to registered voters. The court said there was no compelling reason to prevent residents who are not registered to vote from circulating petitions. Shortly after Buckley, the California attorney general's office issued its opinion concluding that § 9209's requirement that petition circulators be residents of the city subject to the referendum or initiative was unconstitutional. The requirement in § 9238, subdivision (c) is the same. The Fourth District reasoned that if Colorado's law reducing the pool of potential circulators by 18% (the difference between the number of residents eligible to vote and the number of registered voters) was unconstitutional, then surely a statute limiting the pool of circulators to residents of a particular city was not permissible. "In San Clemente, the effect of § 9238, subdivision (c) is to reduce the pool of potential circulators (from the pool of state residents eligible to vote) by more than 99%," Presiding Justice David Sills wrote for the Fourth District, Division Three, panel. This would be a severe burden on First Amendment rights, the court ruled. Referendum opponents pointed to Browne v. Russell , (1994) 27 Cal.App.4th 1116, in which a California appellate court upheld the City of Los Angeles's residency requirement for petition circulators. But the Fourth District declined to follow Browne . "At the most basic level, Browne decides a question of federal law in a manner that cannot be reconciled with the authoritative federal decisions in the area," Sills wrote. The San Clemente circulators actually had gone around the residency requirement by having petition signers also witness their own signatures as circulators. That may or may not have been a defect — city and county elections officials declined to take a position on the validity of that practice — but the fact remained that the petition contained the required number of valid signatures, Sills noted in refusing to invalidate the referendum. The referendum is now set for a June 3 special election. The Case: Preserve Shorecliff Homeowners v. City of San Clemente , No. G038649, 08 C.D.O.S. 806, 2008 DJDAR 697. Filed January 16, 2008. The Lawyers; For Preserve Shorecliff Homeowners: James Sutton, (415) 732-7700. For San Clemente Citizens for Responsible Government: Frederic Woocher, Strumwasser & Woocher, (310) 576-1233. For the city: Jeffrey Oderman, Rutan & Tucker, (714) 641-5100. For the Orange County registrar of voters: Wendy Phillips, county counsel's office, (714) 834-3300.

The Second District Court of Appeal has ruled that a lower court erroneously rejected an injunction requested by a community group that is seeking to prevent construction of a new school in Los Angeles's Echo Park area. Los Angeles County Superior Court Judge Daniel Solis Pratt "erroneously declined to consider the potential merit of the coalition's claims," the appellate court ruled. Those claims concern the adequacy of an environmental impact report adopted by the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD). Pratt considered only the relative harm that the district would suffer if he were to issue an injunction halting the project against the harm the coalition would suffer if the injunction were denied. But he also needed to consider the project opponents' likely success on the lawsuit's merits, the Second District ruled. The appellate court sent the case back to Pratt for reconsideration, a move that, for a time, ensures that houses the LAUSD took by eminent domain remain standing. In 2004, the school district selected a two-block site on North Alvarado Street, just south of Sunset Boulevard, for a new elementary school. The decision was controversial because the site contains about 50 housing units and is on a busy thoroughfare considered rather unsafe for pedestrians. The following year, the district approved a mitigated negative declaration, which says that all project impacts can be resolved, for construction of the school. A group called Right Site Coalition, composed of the Echo Park Historical Society and neighborhood activists, sued over the mitigated negative declaration. In late 2006, Judge Pratt ruled the mitigated negative declaration inadequate. The school district responded by preparing an EIR, which the district certified in June 2007. The coalition returned to court, arguing the document failed to consider reasonable alternatives and did not adequately address air quality, traffic, pedestrian safety, public services, land use, cultural and historic resources, housing and cumulative impacts. The coalition also sought an injunction to prevent the school district from demolishing 49 housing units on the site. The district acquired the houses after selecting the site in 2004, and the houses have now stood empty for several years. When Pratt declined to issue the injunction, the coalition immediately turned to the appellate court, which swiftly ordered the LAUSD to maintain the status quo. The Second District then hurried its consideration of the coalition's appeal. In its decision overturning Pratt, the appellate court cited King v. Meese , (1987) 43 Cal.3rd 1217, 1227, for this general principle when a court considers an injunction: "The likelihood of plaintiffs' ultimate success on the merits ‘does affect the showing necessary to a balancing-of-hardships analysis. That is, the more likely it is that plaintiffs will ultimately prevail, the less severe must be the harm that they allege will occur if the injunction does not issue. This is especially true when the requested injunction maintains, rather than alters, the status quo.'" The LAUSD contended that delays would add $110,000 a week in construction, property management and security costs. This would be greater harm than the coalition would suffer if the project went forward and houses were demolished, the district argued. Pratt accepted that argument and declined to go any further. That was his mistake. "The trial court's denial of the preliminary injunction, without any consideration of the potential merit of the coalition's claims, was clearly erroneous," Presiding Justice Joan Klein wrote for the Second District, Division Three. The appellate court declined to address the merits of the claims. Instead, the court sent the case back to Pratt with direction to weigh "the likelihood that plaintiffs will prevail on the merits at trial, and the comparative harm to be suffered by plaintiffs if the injunction does not issue against the harm to be suffered by defendants … if it does." The Case: Right Site Coalition v. Los Angeles Unified School District , No. B202053, 08 C.D.O.S. 1900, 2008 DJDAR 2747. Filed January 30, 2008. Ordered published February 22, 2008. The Lawyers: For Right Site Coalition: Robert Silverstein, (626) 449-4200. For LAUSD: Patrick Breen, Allen, Matkins, Leck, Gamble, Mallory & Natsis, (213) 622-5555.

People who design roads don't ride bicycles. That is evident to any cyclist. I'm not sure that even the people who design bike paths ride bicycles. Near my house is a very nice bike path that runs for about two miles roughly parallel to a high-speed collector road. The bike path is great if you're headed north. But if you ride to the south, the bike path spits you out on the the wrong side of the road. You have to ride against traffic for about 100 feet and cross a right turn lane to reach an intersection. Of course, every motorist making the right turn is checking for cars coming from the left — not bicycles coming from the right. Once you reach the intersection — maybe I should say if you reach the intersection — you have to make a left turn onto the busy collector, which has no stop signs to control the 50 mph traffic.   The upshot? When I ride south, I use the road and its potholed shoulder, and I avoid the bike path. All cyclists have their examples. Slate V recently posted a hilarious (or tragic) video from Westwood about what the editor calls the "stupidist bike lane in America." You can check out the video as well as dozens of horror stories from around the country in a New York Times wellness blog .  Happy riding. - Paul Shigley

Location, location, location. Those are the three most important factors in real estate, and — as evidenced late last month — in land use decision-making. On a 10-5 vote, the Los Angeles City Council on March 19 directed the Planning Department to stop processing the application for Las Lomas, a project that proposed 5,500-housing units, 2 million square feet of office space, 225,000 square feet of retail space, a hotel and a school on 555 acres at the junction of Interstate 5 and the Antelope Valley Freeway. A little more than a week later, the Delta Protection Commission voted 11-6 to reject a proposed mixed-use project on a 105-acre former sugar beet processing plant in the unincorporated Yolo County town of Clarksburg. So, that's one vote against a very dense project in the most urbanized area of the state, and one vote against a modest redevelopment project in a rural riverfront town. The problem? Location. The Las Lomas site is extremely rugged and located next to two clogged freeways. The Clarksburg sugar mill lies in the Delta's protected primary zone. Both projects have merit. The Las Lomas plan is extremely efficient, squeezing a mix of uses onto about 270 acres above a proposed MetroLink station. The sugar mill project would bring 123 homes and new industry to a site that has sat largely vacant for 15 years. Las Lomas is proposed for what is now unincorporated territory between Santa Clarita and the Los Angeles. The developer, Palmer Investments, fought off Santa Clarita's attempt to annex the territory urged Los Angeles to take control (see CP&DR Local Watch , January 2004 ). However, in 2006, the county's Local Agency Formation Commission told Palmer to file a new application for annexation to the City of Los Angeles after the city completed an environmental impact report. With funding from Palmer, city officials and consultants have been reviewing the plan and working on the EIR since 2002. For reasons that are unclear — at least to me — things came to a head last fall, even though the EIR remains incomplete. Los Angeles City Councilman Greig Smith released a "white paper" making clear he thought little of the project. Traffic that Las Lomas would generate on I-5 became a rallying point for project opponents, who already included the City of Santa Clarita and environmentalists. Palmer thought little of Smith's white paper and enlisted the support of Councilman Richard Alarcon. But the concern about traffic was apparently too much for the council majority. The next step is probably the courthouse, which is where most projects of this magnitude wind up anyway. Clarksburg is not Los Angeles. Although it is located less than 10 miles from Sacramento and Elk Grove, Clarksburg feels a long ways away. The Sacramento riverfront town is surrounded by pear orchards and vineyards. Last year, the Delta Protection Commission rejected the sugar mill redevelopment, which would be the first significant urban development within the Delta's "primary zone" since it was designated in 1992 (see CP&DR Local News , February 2007 ; Environment Watch , January 2007 ). Developer Carvalho-Stanich Properties reworked the project, primarily by reducing the number of housing units from 162 to 123, and returned to the Commission. At its March 27 meeting, commissioners said they were satisfied with an increased buffer between the new homes and agricultural operations. But the project would increase population density within the primary zone, which the Delta Protection Act prohibits, the commission concluded. What the decision means for the commercial redevelopment is unknown. The commission appears comfortable with that portion of the project because it involves no housing in the floodplain. But the developer has said it needs the housing component to fund the other projects, which are pretty nifty. There are already five wineries operating at the old sugar mill , and there are plans for restaurants, agricultural processing, artists space and a Delta visitors center. In short, approval of new houses in the fragile Delta, right next to an iffy levee, just isn't going to happen right now. It's the wrong location. — Paul Shigley

When individuals barter, they generally have a firm sense of underlying value, i.e. "What's this thing really worth to me?" A 10-year-old car might be worth $1,000, to judge from the Recycler or Craig's List. At $20,000, a used car is a bargain only if it is a 1949 Ferrari Spider with the original piping on the seats. Cities, on the other hand, often appear not to have a sense of "beyond this price we will not go." True, they bargain for big things on which it is hard to pin values, such as stadiums for NFL football and professional soccer. Still, the fact that cities are willing to entertain highly aggressive offers suggests to me that some city officials have a hard time drawing a line between a good deal and a bad one. I am not stating unequivocally that two pending deals for sports stadiums in two cities in Santa Clara County are bad, but both give me the shivers. In one case, a developer is asking a king's ransom from a middle-sized town for the privilege of putting a National Football League stadium in its midst. In another, a developer has proposed a novel quid pro quo: He promises to build a $100 million soccer stadium, if the city agrees to rezone a large industrial tract so the same developer can build housing. For 100 points, write an essay comparing and contrasting these two deals, telling us which is worse, and why. Let us start with the offer that the San Francisco 49ers have put before the City of Santa Clara, a community of 114,000 people. The NFL football franchise has asked the city for up to $230 million in subsidies, including a $42 million garage with nearly 20,000 parking stalls, for a new stadium. Even if the city wanted to, however, it probably can't cough up that much. Santa Clara has about $70 million of bonding authority left, according to Deputy City Manager Carol L. McCarthy. When you add tax increment and sales tax to that, the largest possible package would be about $136 million, she adds. (For a sense of scale, the city's general fund is only $147 million.) The city could raise some additional money by creating a 2% assessment district on eight of its largest hotels that would be layered atop the existing "bed tax" of 9.5 percent. That district could yield up to $35 million a year for the stadium. The rationale for this assessment district, of course, is a consultant's report saying that the 49ers will bring the city $1 billion of business over the next few decades. In attempting to set a new world record for chutzpah (I mean cold-blooded outrageousness) the team has also asked the city to contribute the land for the stadium. (I asked Ms. McCarthy if the 49ers want the Santa Clara City Council to play their road games for them, too. "That's you saying that, not me," was her wise retort.) The city has refused the land deal, because it makes a tidy sum in land leases. In the other deal under discussion here, sports team owner Lew Wolff has been looking for a place for his soccer franchise, the San Jose Earthquakes, to play. Being a brilliant real estate developer, Wolff has come up with a creative concept: He will build the city the soccer stadium using revenues from a 1,300-home development in the city's suburban Edenvale district. However, Wolff needs the city to rezone 74 acres of industrial land for his housing development. That sounds equitable, on its face. The project will "pay for itself," and few, if any, public subsidies will be required. A recent city report, however, finds some financial flies in the ointment. The site to be rezoned is in a redevelopment area, so all increases in property taxes, the primary fiscal benefit of home building for cities, will go to the redevelopment agency, not the city's general fund. Also, research has shown that housing becomes a net loss for cities after about 15 years, meaning that the cost of providing services to mature neighborhoods generally exceeds the amount of property tax revenues they generate. For me, however, the most distributing part of this deal could be put in the form of a rhetorical question: Since when does a city barter away its general plan just because a developer waves a bauble in front of it? Actually, most cities in California would submit to this sort of offer. They remind me of that scene in Ghost Busters, when Sigourney Weaver is trying to seduce Bill Murray. He demurs, telling her his company has rules against employees fooling around with clients. Predictably, he weakens quickly. "They're not rules, actually," he says. "They're more like guidelines." Perhaps I am over-reacting. With 6 million square feet of undeveloped land zoned for industrial development in north Coyote Valley, San Jose is not exactly begging for industrial land. Still, the city has an existing policy not to rezone its industrial land for home building (see CP&DR , November 2007 ). Why should the city trash its own policies for a single, non-essential project? Good heavens, San Jose. Get a hold of yourself! If you want a soccer stadium, then assemble the land and issue an RFP to build the facility, you silly municipality! Do not cut off your nose so you can buy lipstick and mascara. In evaluating these two deals for relative badness, I confess I am almost stuck. I dislike subsidies on principal. My motto is: No socialism for sports magnates. The deal that really gets under my skin, however, because it exemplifies so much that is wrong with planning in California, is the soccer stadium proposal in San Jose. True, the city does not spend its own money; San Jose merely bargains away its ability to do long-term land-use planning and economic development. Opinions may vary, but I find that trading away the powers of governance for a handful of beans is actually worse than throwing money at rich people. Therefore the San Jose deal is the worse deal, from my perspective. Hopefully, it's not too late for either city to get out. I know that stadiums are catnip for voters. But get a grip, city fathers! No deal is worth all of your remaining bonding authority, nor your ability to make land-use decisions. Unless, of course, it's a really nice stadium with a luxury box for planning journalists.