With the June 15 Constitutional budget deadline approaching , it's getting easier if not easy to pick state bills that have a chance this season. A few measures affecting land use and planning didn't survive the suspense file or were otherwise pulled. But a lot is still up in the air. Cap and Trade - The Sacramento Bee's Dan Walters is reporting at http://bit.ly/1h9bbT0 that three proposals are now in play for the use of cap-and-trade carbon auction proceeds for environmental, transit and housing purposes. We've discussed two of them previously at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3494: Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg's proposal, with its strong emphasis on transit-oriented affordable housing, and the prior proposal by Gov. Jerry Brown. Walters reports, however, that a third version was adopted by the Senate Budget and Fiscal Review Committee as of May 23 with $450 million for transit and rail and some "sustainable communities" funding. Prop 13 Reform - AB 2372 , which would block a split-ownership tactic for avoiding business property reassessments, passed out of the Assembly suspense file May 23. As we've also discussed at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3494, the measure has historic support from the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association. The state's tracking page on the bill with text, status and a committee analysis is at http://bit.ly/1i0mbN1. A bill to restore some limited variation in parcel tax rates, Sen. Lois Wolk's SB 1021 , also discussed in our prior writeup, had passed the state Senate and has been with the Assembly Committee on Revenue and Taxation since May 12. If you're keeping score at home: a suspense file tally - The California Special Districts Association posted spreadsheets on Dropbox of bills' fates in the May 23 hearings on Assembly and State Senate suspense files. See  http://bit.ly/1tKgJVX for the Assembly and http://bit.ly/1nsbj2l for the Senate. One edgy bill that made it out of the suspense file was SB 1132 , the anti-fracking measure by State Sens. Holly Mitchell and Mark Leno. It passed with clarifying amendments. For more see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3475 and http://bit.ly/RiQt7c. Mitchell, a Los Angeles Democrat, has expressed concern for her district as close to "the largest urban oil field in the country" in Inglewood. SB 1260 , the DeSaulnier bill for a 25% affordable housing set-aside requirement on either Redevelopment-type or IFD tax-increment districts, did not make it off the suspense file at the May 23 Senate Appropriations hearing. Another ambitious housing bill, AB 2175 (Daly & Ting) to strengthen renters' rebates, also stayed stuck in the Assembly suspense file May 23. AB 1537 (Levine) - This bill to change Marin County's status from urban to suburban would reduce default zoning densities for the county from 30 to 20 units. The Marin IJ has analysis at http://bit.ly/TQD1Jd. The measure passed the Assembly May 19 and was awaiting committee assignment in the Senate Rules Committee. SB 968 (Hill) - Billionare Vinod Khosla has reportedly hired lobbyists to fight SB 968, Sen. Jerry Hill's bill to have the State Lands Commission negotiate the purchase from Khosla of Martin's Beach, a popular privately owned beach in San Mateo County that Khosla closed to public access. The public had long been allowed to visit there for the cost of parking in a private lot. (See http://bit.ly/1pv2UIs.) Despite a reported lobbying push against the measure, SB 968 made it out of the Senate Appropriations suspense file May 23 by a vote of 5-2. SB 270 (Padilla) - State Sen. Alex Padilla, also a candidate for California Secretary of State, continued to advance his bill for a statewide plastic bag ban, SB 270. Sacramento Bee columnist Mariel Garza wrote this weekend at http://www.sacbee.com/2014/05/18/6411959/mariel-garza-ban-single-use-plastic.html that Padilla was facing attack ads from the plastic industry over the matter. But the bill has passed the Senate, has survived one Assembly committee vote, and next goes to Assembly Appropriations. AB 2493 (Bloom) - Post-Redevelopment funds retention This bill by Assemblymember Bloom, D-Santa Monica, would return some $750 million to successor agencies to finish redevelopment projects. By the end of April it had passed two Assembly policy committees and had passed out of the suspense file at Assembly Appropriations. For Bloom's comments in the local Santa Monica Lookout see http://bit.ly/1jwkF9e. The League of California Cities, which supports it, has a tracking page and support letter at http://bit.ly/Q8J612. SB 1129 (Steinberg) - SB 1129, a post-redevelopment cleanup bill with League of California Cities support, would give cities' successor agencies more authority in several areas, notably to enter contracts. It was heard May 5 in Senate Appropriations and passed out of the suspense file with amendments on May 23, receiving a second reading and further amendment May 27 on the Senate floor. For an endorsement statement by the City of Glendale see http://bit.ly/SvBvvz. The League's comments on this and a crop of other March-introduced bills on the Redevelopment wind-down are at http://bit.ly/1igufww. SB 1 (Steinberg) - This bill emphasizing transit-oriented "smart growth," in a quasi-revival of Redevelopment, remains on the "Inactive" file. For background on this and other efforts to fill the vacuum left by Redevelopment's demise see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3480   AB 2280 (Alejo) - This bill to re-create some elements of Redevelopment with a housing emphasis passed the Assembly May 8 and was referred to two Senate policy committees. See League of Cities analysis at http://bit.ly/OUOtRg. SB 33 (Wolk) -  SB 33, which would remove the requirement of a popular vote from infrastructure finance districts, remained formally dormant but still informally under consideration, as discussed at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3480. AB 2729 (Medina) - Would expand use of the California Infrastructure and Economic Development Bank, or "I-Bank" to finance more infrastructure surrounding shipping and transport. Brought to a hearing for discussion April 22 but not moving at present. AB 1404 (Leno) - San Francisco Redevelopment housing backlog San Francisco-specific SB 1404, originated by the city government, passed the State Senate May 12 and went to two Assembly policy committees. The measure would both require and allow the successor to the city's redevelopment agency to replace over 5000 units of affordable housing that were destroyed during 1955-1975 "urban renewal". See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3480. AB 2292 (Bonta) - Freight rail, redevelopment sites AB 2292, per the Assembly Local Government committee's analysis, would "allow an infrastructure financing district in the Oakland Army Base, Howard Terminal or Coliseum City in the City of Oakland to finance public capital facilities or projects that include freight rail." All three sites are subjects of major redevelopment planning; the latter two are competing sites for pro sports stadiums. (See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3476.) Per the author's statement in the analysis, "we need to include freight rail as an eligible expense for IFDs" to improve the city's transportation capacity and emissions reduction through rail use. The measure was ordered to a third reading in the Assembly on May 23. AB 2549 (Ridley-Thomas) - Milpitas post-redevelopment The Assembly has passed AB 2549, to create a local commission to address Milpitas' especially deep post-Redevelopment funding losses. It is before the State Senate's Governance and Finance Committee. SB 391 (DeSaulnier) - Affordable housing via recording fees SB 391, which would raise funds for affordable housing with real estate recording fees, remains formally before Assembly Appropriations, having passed the Senate last year. It did not go anywhere in the May 23 suspense file hearings. AB 2417 (Nazarian) - Recycled water AB 2417, on "purple pipe" distribution of recycled water, passed the Assembly May 23 and moved to the Senate. It would create an exemption from CEQA for new or existing recycled water pipelines of less than eight miles. The Associaton of California Water Agencies (ACWA), which backs the measure, had background in April at http://www.acwa.com/news/state-legislation/acwa-sponsored-ab-2417-clears-first-committee. AB 1739 (Dickinson) - Groundwater management Another ACWA-backed bill, AB 1739, passed out of the suspense file May 23. Per the water committee's legislative analysis it would require "sustainable groundwater management in all groundwater subbasins determined by the Department of Water Resources... to be at medium to high risk of significant economic, social and environmental impacts due to an unsustainable and chronic pattern of groundwater extractions exceeding the ability of the surface water supplies to replenish the subbasin." See http://www.acwa.com/news/groundwater/assembly-committee-approves-groundwater-legislation SB 1077 (DeSaulnier) - SB 1077, which calls for a tax based on vehicle miles traveled, made it out of the suspense file May 23. The Southern California Association of Governments has been talking it up (see http://bit.ly/1nkxKTG) but the measure was questioned last fall on privacy grounds (see http://lat.ms/1jwnuHj). SB 1439 (Leno) - Ellis Act restrictions State Sen. Mark Leno's Ellis Act restriction measure, SB 1439 (discussed previously at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3477) now has a heavy weight of tech industry endorsers behind it (see http://beyondchron.org/news/index.php?itemid=12611). The measure went to a third reading May 13 in the Senate. Assemblymember Tom Ammiano's AB 2405, which would have limited the Ellis Act more strongly and provided tenant litigants with other procedural protections, failed to clear the Assembly Judiciary Committee on April 29. SB 1451 (Hill & Roth) - CEQA procedural restrictions A widely shared commentary by the Miller Starr Regalia law firm at http://bit.ly/1q9qPkX is arguing for SB 1451, which would limit the ways petitioners could place allegations of CEQA violations on the record. Principally, it would exclude allegations from court review if the alleged violations were known, or could have been known with reasonable diligence, during the public comment period, but were brought to the agency's attention at another time. The legislative summary and the Miller Starr essay describe the measure as designed to stop use of "document dumping" as a tactic to delay a decision or preserve a record. The bill has passed the State Senate Environmental Quality Committee. However, it may be doomed for this season: a hearing set for May 6 in Judiciary was canceled at the author's request, and Arthur Coon, author of the law firm's commentary, posted again May 27 saying he had been told the bill was stopped by "organized labor interests." See http://bit.ly/SfjoZW. SB 69 (Roth) and AB 1521 (Fox) - Restore Vehicle License Fee revenue These two somewhat different measures, both supported by the League of Cities (and discussed previously at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3464), would restore features of the 2004-2005 budget deal's "VLF-property tax swap" and transfer back vehicle license fee income to local jurisdictions, undoing the work of 2011's SB 89, which repurposed the vehicle license money to help with "realignment" additions to the functions of county carceral systems. (Compare http://www.cdcr.ca.gov/about_cdcr/docs/realignment-fact-sheet.pdf.) The two current bills would especially help recently created municipalities such as Jurupa Valley. Per an AB 1521 legislative analysis, "SB 89 had the effect of eliminating over $15 million in the Motor Vehicle License Fee (MVLFA) revenues in 2011-12 from four newly incorporated cities (Menifee, Eastvale, Wildomar, and Jurupa Valley)." SB 69 passed the Senate last year, but with a different text focused on education funding. It was amended to substantially its current form in September 2013, then sat with formally unchanged status until it began to move in the Assembly a few weeks ago. It was read a second time and amended in the Assembly on May 6 and moved to the Rules Committee. AB 1521 made it off the suspense file May 23 in the Assembly. It passed the Assembly May 27 and is now before the Senate. The most recent floor analysis shows no opposition on file. AB 1513 (Fox) - Residential property: possession by declaration The California Association of Realtors was sponsoring a measure, also supported by the California Police Chiefs Association, described as meant to assist landlords, security companies and police in removing squatters from vacant properties. It would allow a landlord to declare ownership of a property, register it as vacant, and challenge allegedly unauthorized occupants to obtain or present proof of a right to remain within 48 hours. Some tenant activists had begun campaigns against the measure because they argued it could create an extrajudicial eviction process, giving landlords an end run around the more procedurally complex and time-consuming procedures of the standard California "unlawful detainer" eviction. (See e.g. http://bit.ly/RjmiN5 and http://killthebillcoalition.com/about/) Assembly bill analyses as posted on the measure's official page at http://bit.ly/1iooOZ2 set out the dispute in detail. Opponents listed as of the May 16 floor analysis included the statewide Tenants Together group and the Western Center on Law and Poverty. The measure passed the Assembly May 19 and is with the Senate Rules Committee for assignment.

When a mobile home park's owner proposes to convert it from space rentals to resident ownership, a local agency must "consider" the results of a survey of resident support. Residents have never had the definite right to prevent conversion by a vote -- not even under the new SB 510, which allows (but does not require) local agencies to disapprove conversions based on lack of majority tenant support. But resident surveys do carry some weight. How much? In 218 Properties v. City of Carson , California's Second District Court of Appeal considered two conversion applications, filed in 2009, in which majorities of survey respondents opposed conversion. Although SB 510 was not binding for cases of that vintage, the court viewed the newer law as "instructive on what the Legislature may have envisioned all along." On that basis it found the Carson City Council properly disapproved a proposed conversion at the Park Granada Trailer Lodge, owned by 218 Properties, LLC, where 20 of 26 renters answered the survey and all 20 opposed conversion. However, it agreed with the trial court that the council should have allowed conversion of 225-space Imperial Avalon park, where only 82 residents responded to the survey: 46 against, 18 in favor, and "18 did not state an opinion". In mobile home park conversions, the very first sale of a previously rented space removes the whole surrounding park from local rent control. (After that first sale, state-level protections, which may be less strict, still limit rent increases for low-income tenants in conversions under Government Code Sec. 66427.5.) State law therefore requires a survey of residents' wishes as part of a local review to consider whether the park owner's true purpose in beginning to sell spaces is to switch entirely to resident ownership (viewed as legitimate)  or only to end the application of local rent control (viewed as a "sham"). Reviewing pre-2014 conversion law, the court cited Colony Cove Properties, LLC v. City of Carson (2010) 187 Cal.App.4th 1487 and Goldstone v. County of Santa Cruz (2012) 207 Cal.App.4th 1038 for the rule that local agencies are entitled to base some part of their conclusions on the residents' wishes. It cited Chino MHC, LP v. City of Chino (2012) 210 Cal.App.4th 1049 for the countervailing rule that (in its own paraphrase) "a local agency may rely on the survey to find the conversion is a sham, but it may not make that finding based solely on a lack of majority support among the residents for the conversion." Under Chino, it said, either majority disapproval or the landlord's subjective wish to avoid rent control was not enough to stop a conversion. In light of those cases plus the implications of SB 510, the court considered not only the surveys from the Park Granada and Imperial Avalon parks, but the overall realism of the respective owners' plans to convert to resident ownership. At the larger Imperial Avalon park, it said, the owner "expected to sell 25 to 35 percent of the park's lots to current residents in the first 180 days" -- but that was unlikely at Park Granada, where all the survey respondents opposed conversion and all or most residents were low-income. Lacking "overwhelming" evidence that the Park Granada property would truly convert to full resident ownership, the court agreed the council had acted properly in disapproving that conversion. Turning to an alternative argument by the city of Carson, the court found the Council also could not properly reject the Imperial Avalon conversion based on inadequacies in its required Tenant Impact Report. It agreed with the trial court that the Carson council could not properly second-guess a finding by the city's planning commission that the report was complete, and that if the council wanted more information it should have asked the owner for it before declaring the report insufficient. In concurring, Presiding Justice Tricia A. Bigelow relinquished her prior dissenting opinion in an unpublished 2010 case, Carson Harbor Village, Ltd. v. City of Carson , Case No. B211777, which, she wrote, was later denied review by the Supreme Court. She had argued that Sec. 66427.5 as it then stood did not allow a local agency to reject a conversion based on opposition in a residents' survey. Now, she wrote, in light of subsequent rulings and developments, "that view will no longer carry the day," and at any rate "Cases going forward... will need to be addressed under the new statute." The case is at http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/documents/B241969.PDF. Staff reports from the Carson Planning Department on the parks are at http://carson.ca.us/content/files/pdfs/planning/sr/2010-03-09/71207.pdf and http://ci.carson.ca.us/content/files/pdfs/planning/sr/2010-02-23/mobl.pdf.

(This is a companion article to our report on San Jose's stormwater and encampment challenges at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3495.) Leslee Hamilton, executive director of the Guadalupe River Park Conservancy , says "The biggest challenge to me being successful in my job is the presence of homeless people." Hamilton speaks glowingly of the Conservancy's programs in science and nature education, which reach about 4600 children a year. She says the program has a chance to inspire kids who have few other chances to study natural habitats. "Kids get off the bus here and their eyes get wide." But because of encampments, Hamilton said teachers sometimes feel unsafe and donors become concerned about safety. Though she saw the safety issue as "largely the perception," its effect is major: a report of a survey on the Guadalupe River Park showed 30 of 76 people who answered open-ended questions "mentioned homeless issues, security and/or safety." Among campers she meets, she said, there truly are some who "I don't feel safe interacting with." The Guadalupe River has been a subject of energetic camp evictions for more than 20 years, and was the subject of a flood-control and parks project on the Guadalupe River from 2001 to 2005. The project cost $327 million, including $99 million in Redevelopment funds -- sums that impose perspective on the homelessness response program budgets of a million or two at a time. (See http://www.sjredevelopment.org/ProjectGallery/GuadalupeRiverFloodControlFacts.pdf.) Part of the Conservancy's work is with the the area near the airport where the former large camp was evicted. It's a former subdivision where houses were demolished because of their nearness to the runways. She said volunteers there were growing roses and orchards: "We're slowly converting it to gardens." Detriments from continued encampments on the Guadalupe River are real, she said, ranging from runoff pollution to more inventive damage: shopping carts used as fish traps; makeshift stairs cut into the banks. A friend who does EIRs told her "someone would be in jail by now" if a business did anything similar. She pointed out a YouTube video dramatizing the contrasts: a naturalist who was fortunate to spot king salmon spawning in the urban reach of the river also filmed trash in the water nearby. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNMrODZ_Hgk Like many administrators speaking on the subject, Hamiilton mentioned a need for better regional cooperation among the small and sometimes insular municipalities of the South Bay. She saw the Los Angeles region as an encouraging model. Meanwhile, she noted, San Jose lost some affordable housing funds in the dissolution of Redevelopment, and rents kept going up. She had heard a developer say rents needed to rise even more downtown before it would "pencil out for him" to turn a downtown parking lot into housing. "Rents are so bloody high now, it's just hard to imagine," she said.

The transit-focused housing proposal from Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento, is being portrayed as the main state-level hope for new affordable housing funds this legislative season. Redevelopment is gone, Gov. Brown's proposed successor institutions to Redevelopment are weak on housing, bond funds for housing are running low, and the veterans' housing bond issue on the June ballot carves out a  sympathetic subpopulation rather than address the whole need. So that leaves Steinberg's proposal for the proceeds from state cap-and-trade carbon auctions, which as proposed in April emphasized transit-oriented development and "smart growth", and called for at least 20% to go to affordable housing. We summarized the plan in April at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3477. The Governor's cap-and-trade proposal emphasizes high-speed rail, other transportation, and varied further projects with environmental preservation aspects (but with $100 million for grants via the Strategic Growth Council). It hasn't budged much in the May Revise per the CA League of Cities summary at http://bit.ly/1lDa76W. Backers of the Steinberg plan are promoting a study by the advocacy group TransForm (see http://bit.ly/1lkA5M8) reporting that poorer people who live near transit are more likely to use it than richer neighbors with the same access. See StreetsblogLA at http://bit.ly/1hZ78Dp for details, but also for a thoughtful argument in comments about whether U.S. transit construction patterns may put "transit villages" too near polluting freeways, with health consequences for residents. Meanwhile the Air Resources Board issued its greenhouse gas emissions inventory for 2012 in a bouncy press release at at http://bit.ly/1oP4AMF, but as parsed by the Environmental Leader publication at http://www.environmentalleader.com/2014/05/19/california-emissions-rise-1-6/ it shows a 1.7 percent increase from 2011 to 2012 in total greenhouse gas emissions -- see also the main report at http://www.arb.ca.gov/cc/inventory/pubs/reports/ghg_inventory_00-12_report.pdf. The Air Resources Board's first AB32 scoping plan update appeared on its site May 15. See  http://bit.ly/QQx9NQ and http://www.arb.ca.gov/cc/scopingplan/scopingplan.htm. Governor Brown is still stumping for his high-speed rail project, which he seeks to back with a large proportion of cap-and trade revenues, recently defending it passionately to the San Francisco Chronicle editorial board: http://bit.ly/1sNWTH7. The estimated cost of the Fresno-to-Bakersfield segment rose another billion dollars in early May to $7.13 billion according to the LA Times at http://www.latimes.com/local/la-me-bullet-train-costs-20140508-story.html. However, the state High Speed Rail Authority has approved the project's 20,000-page environmental impact report for that segment (http://bit.ly/1o0UvyS). Per the LA Times , "Construction on the first 29-mile segment through Fresno is supposted to start by July." 9th Cir upholds Salton Sea summary judgment (This summary was updated May 28, 2014) The Ninth Circuit ruled May 19 that Imperial County and its Air Pollution Control District had standing to sue the Department of the Interior over its Environmental Impact Statement allowing contracts for diversion of Colorado River water from the Imperial Valley to Southern California coastal water systems, principally San Diego's. However, it found the EIS was not wrong under the National Environmental Policy Act, and so the transfers properly went through. The concern in the EIS was that diverting water away from the Salton Sea would shrink it, exposing more fine dust along its shores and worsening local air quality. Finding that the district court made the right decision for partly wrong reasons, the Ninth Circuit upheld the lower court's grant of summary judgment to throw out the case. The Associated Press reported "Critics sued on similar grounds in state court and lost." http://bit.ly/1ilSQgg The case is State of California ex rel. Imperial County Air Pollution Control District v. U.S. Department of the Interior , at  http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2014/05/19/12-55856.pdf. Judicial Council speeds up CEQA calendars for "leadership" projects The California Judicial Council issued new rules April 25 on expediting CEQA appeals of large developments designated by the Governor as "leadership" projects under SB 743. SB 743 requires both the trial and appellate courts to complete CEQA review of "leadership" projects within 270 days starting with certification of the administrative record. The Council's report suggests it struggled to set rules that might help parties meet that extremely tight deadline by filing and serving petitions quickly after certification. Other rules on the expedited calendar include tightened briefing schedules, a case management conference within 30 days of the petition's filing, and a hearing on the merits 80 days after that. Notices of appeal must be filed within just five court days. For the whole rule text with its staff report see http://www.courts.ca.gov/documents/jc-20140425-itemM.pdf . A recording of the approval meeting is at http://www.courts.ca.gov/25710.htm. For details see http://www.ceqadevelopments.com/2014/05/12/spring-2014-ceqa-roundup/#more-812 and a detailed description from Holland & Knight at http://bit.ly/1h2wVKG. A Prop 13 breakthrough? AB 2372, by Assemblymember Tom Ammiano, D-San Francisco, and Assembly Revenue & Taxation Committee Chair Raul Bocanegra, D-San Fernando Valley, has won surprising support from business and antitax groups, even the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association, for a compromise that represents new willingness to nibble at the edges of Proposition 13. The measure would not disturb California's generations-old property tax freeze at its core, but would stop businesses from ducking reassessments of their new real estate purchases by dividing up formal ownership of new properties. The San Francisco Bay Guardian weekly credited the crucial difficult work of the negotiation to Bocanegra: http://bit.ly/1qR5I7n. The LA Times has more background at http://lat.ms/1jPJusv and, on the Jarvis organization's historic concession, at http://lat.ms/1mpihSR. The state's tracking page on the bill with text, status and a committee analysis is at http://bit.ly/1i0mbN1. To antitax groups, the measure could be a lesser evil rather than a desired goal. Former LA Times reporter Anthony York asked on his Twitter feed if the Jarvis group was "preempting split roll, or stoking momentum?" https://twitter.com/anthonyyork49/status/466609572653051904. The Sacramento Bee 's Dan Walters likewise suggested at http://www.sacbee.com/2014/05/13/6402618/the-buzz-compromise-reached-on.html that "The deal falls well short of a full 'split roll', which would completely remove Proposition 13's limits from business property, long a goal of liberal groups." A bill actually is afoot in the Legislature that opponents are calling "split roll" but it's arguably not a "full split roll" either -- it's only an effort to legislatively overrule the 2013 case of Borikas v. Alameda Unified School District (analysis from Meyers Nave at http://bit.ly/1lXJM5d, text at http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/archive/A129295A.PDF.) Sen. Lois Wolk's SB 1021 would allow school districts to impose variable rate parcel taxes according to property type. It has drawn opposition from the California Apartment Association (see http://www.caanet.org/news_events/caa-keep-fighting-split-roll-parcel-tax-fund-school-districts/) and an April legislative analysis lists a long string of further anti-tax and business opponents. The measure further seems to be a popular punching bag for right-wing bloggers online. However, as of May 12 it had passed the state Senate and was before its first Assembly committee. Drought and Water Notes Drops in the bucket of the ongoing water crisis:  The State Water Resources Control Board issued three different agenda revisions in preparation for its May 20-21 agenda, which will consider the possibility of "curtailment" orders blocking water use by some holders of post-1914 water rights. The main curtailment discussion, on rights in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, appeared at first as a resolution proposed for approval but now appears only as a public workshop to receive comments. A proposed curtailment resolution "due to insufficient flow for specific fisheries" still appears on the agenda but it only appears to affect three creeks feeding the Sacramento River in Tehama County. See the May 20 entries at http://www.waterboards.ca.gov/board_info/calendar/. As of  June 1, a new agency will be managing the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP), also known as the Delta water tunnel project. The Sacramento Bee has details at http://bit.ly/ToEiXK. North Delta Community Area Residents for Environmental Stability was objecting that the BDCP had unfairly printed its 40,000-page EIR only in English although the report itself acknowledges that many residents speak only other languages, principally Spanish: http://www.centralvalleybusinesstimes.com/stories/001/?ID=25830 The East Bay Express was calling the whole thing a "boondoggle": http://www.eastbayexpress.com/oakland/the-water-tunnel-boondoggle/Content?oid=3922258 Recycled water is gaining ground as the drought continues. Healdsburg is now making available free municipal recycled water and Paso Robles is considering the same: http://www.winesandvines.com/template.cfm?section=news&content=132713 ACWA's town-by-town tally of water-saving restrictions was updated May 13 at http://www.acwa.com/content/local-drought-response. It's a daunting read. The city of Ukiah was considering sharing water with groundwater-starved Redwood Valley (See http://bit.ly/1oM1NGZ -- and more on Redwood Valley at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3459.) Lake Cachuma, serving important parts of Santa Barbara County and now down to 36% of capacity, had agreed with local water managers to cut their allocations by 55%: http://bit.ly/1jPO6Pn Over opposition from the California Coastal Protection Network (see http://bit.ly/Sd3Iqm), Santa Barbara was moving towards reactivating its mothballed reverse-osmosis desalination plant: http://bit.ly/1mDeJe3 It estimated that going through with the restart would cost almost $29 million: http://bit.ly/1lCpyLj Hemet, San Juan Bautista, Hollister and Delano were having problems with nitrates in drinking water: http://www.pe.com/articles/water-693943-nitrate-nitrates.html http://www.pe.com/articles/water-693957-jensen-city.html http://bit.ly/1k1mI69 http://bit.ly/1j4He0u Slate reported 10% of California's water is going to almond farming: http://slate.me/1ov9Bww In other news -- The Los Angeles City Council was considering legalizing street vendors: http://bit.ly/Sd6kEQ There's a discussion of ideas for an LA food vendors' program at http://myla2050.maker.good.is/projects/streetvendors. Trial began over public access to Martin's Beach, a private stretch of the San Mateo County coast that the prior owner had opened to the public in exchange for a parking fee. Sun Microsystems co-founder Vinod Khosla, the current owner, faced questioning in court from the Surfrider Foundation's attorney, the redoubtable Joe Cotchett. For the court drama, which has included a visit to the beach itself, see http://bit.ly/1kkqjvA and http://bit.ly/1gN8Bw2. The case is No. CIV 520336 in San Mateo County Superior Court, available via http://openaccess1.sanmateocourt.org/openaccess/civil/default.asp . The next item on calendar is a dispute over a subpoena to Khosla. The trial itself is now set to resume July 1, 2014. Unsuccessful parties and others have filed requests to depublish the Woodland "urban blight" EIR case that we discussed at www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3472. For a little discussion see http://www.ceqadevelopments.com/2014/05/12/spring-2014-ceqa-roundup/. The updated online docket is at http://bit.ly/1qrIrFt. State Sen. Alex Padilla, also a candidate for California Secretary of State, continued to advance his bill for a statewide plastic bag ban, SB 270. Sacramento Bee columnist Mariel Garza wrote this weekend at http://www.sacbee.com/2014/05/18/6411959/mariel-garza-ban-single-use-plastic.html that Padilla was facing attack ads from the plastic industry over the matter. But the bill has passed the Senate, has survived one Assembly committee vote, and next goes to Assembly Appropriations. Sacramento's planned Kings arena would cost $477 million, of which $255 million would be a public subsidy, raised largely by a bond issue to be paid off partly by city parking revenues: http://www.sacbee.com/2014/05/18/6413166/will-sacramento-take-the-gamble.html They're counting on raising those parking revenues "by as much as 50 percent in the next seven years": http://www.sacbee.com/2014/05/19/6414161/higher-parking-rates-are-central.html Forest City Development is already looking ahead past the likely June passage of San Francisco's Measure B on waterfront height limits. It's reportedly already working toward a November ballot measure to approve its planned major development on Pier 70, at the former vehicle impound lot that was previously the Union Iron Works shipyard. See http://www.planetizen.com/articles/node-68840. And see below for an image taken at an open house last fall in the old factory's massive main Building 12. Until recent years the pictured corner was where impounded RVs went to await the crusher. Now it's airing out the ghosts and getting ready for new things.

<5/21/14: this article has been updated and corrected following further comments from jack liebster of marin county.> It wasn't on the epic scale of the Santa Monica Mountains fight, but the Coastal Commission heard passionate arguments about farmers' development rights for most of May 15 before approving a revised Marin County land use plan. Despite that approval, the meeting ended with two or three big battles still left to fight before the 1981 Local Coastal Program will be fully revised: the specific zoning laws and ordinances of the implementation plan are deferred to a meeting later in the year; the Commission agreed to await a study to rule in detail on preparations for sea level rise in coastal low-lying settlements; and environmentalist objectors may still file suit over an alleged lack of cumulative-impact CEQA analysis for the effects of changed land use rules. Centrally debated at the meeting was a broadened definition of principally permitted uses for "agriculture", both allowing more construction approvals and insulating some of them from the right of appeal to the Coastal Commission by defining them as "principally permitted uses". On a social policy level, the question was whether allowing more development rights on farms would help existing farm families and farming practices maintain continuity, or whether it would encourage luxury "hobby farms" to supplant productive agriculture. The "agriculture" definition, as approved, allows clusters of homes including "intergenerational homes" to reach 7000 square feet, plus 540 for garage and 500 for office space. Since most existing farmhouses are modest older structures, that allows generous room to build a second or even a third house. The right to build out, however, is not absolute: for example, the clusters are allowed per farmer, not per buildable lot, and second "intergenerational homes" are a conditionally permitted use. Prior housing approvals in West Marin's C-APZ Coastal Agricultural Production Zone have been sleepy: Jack Liebster, principal planner with Marin County's Community Development Agency, said the county had only approved 13 homes in the C-APZ zone since 1987. Those 13 are distinct, however, from approvals in the coastal "villages" and nearby areas not zoned agricultural. Those, he said, might have had "a couple hundred" housing approvals in the same time. As approved, the land use plan authorizes further residential and other small-scale building on farm property in the two-thirds of the coastal zone regulated as agricultural. Proponents argued that newly authorized "intergenerational homes" (not necessarily required to house blood relatives) would allow farm owners, many of whom are aging, to keep family members -- potential successors -- in the farm environment even if they didn't always work in agriculture. Liebster, in an interview, said some of the local farm families went back six generations "and they want to stay on their land. You don't do farming for any other reason than, you love it, because it sure doesn't make a lot of money." Opponents, however, argued that the ability to build "intergenerational" homes as principally permitted uses on the property -- and, as a conditional use, second "intergenerational" homes on larger parcels of 180 acres or more -- would create incentives to spin off 120- or 180-acre sections of active farms to serve as "estates" or "mini-mansions" for gentleman-farmer luxury purchasers who might not take agricultural production seriously. A comment letter from the West Marin Environmental Action Committee (EAC) further suggested "it could serve as a disincentive to continue Williamson Act contracts." Rancher Sally Gale, speaking in public comments, supported the plan, saying it was pro-agriculture and "agriculture supports the environment." She praised the authorizations for intergenerational homes, small processing facilities as "principally permitted uses", and on-farm retail sales, saying all contributed to keeping the next generation in farming. She only would have preferred that paid farm tours be allowed without making them conditional uses. The rules as passed authorize exceptions to the buffer zone distances around watercourses. But Amy Trainer of EAC told the Commission that experienced environmental activists knew the tendency of such an exception, once allowed: "It will become the rule; it's meant to." As to affordable housing, Liebster said "The LCP is obviously not a housing element or an affordability plan. However we did make provisions for removing barriers to farmworker housing," in compliance with state legal requirements to leave farmworker housing out of density calculations. He said farmworker housing would be allowed up to 36 beds in group living quarters per legal lot, or 12 units or manufactured housing spaces, so long as it serves people working directly on the farm where they live or at nearby farms,  Bed and breakfast rentals on farms, however, are conditional uses. Even in inland, eastern Marin -- targeted for denser population since the 1973 General Plan -- Liebster said Marin County finds it painfully difficult to create affordable housing. In public comment at the hearing, Kim Thompson, executive director of the Community Land Trust Association of West Marin (CLAM), said the county suffers from "significant underproduction of housing" and displacement had worsened in the last two years, including due to Internet-mediated short-term rentals competing with long-term tenants. "We have perpetually internally displaced families and singles," she said. Requesting a show of hands, she asked, "Who is concerned about affordable homes? Anybody?" Hands went up. She thanked them. And her two minutes to comment were over. County staff and Commission chair (also Marin County Supervisor) Steve Kinsey noted at the meeting that although "principally permitted use" project approvals generally would not be appealable to the Commission, some appeals would be available as of right in areas of statewide interest, such as buffer zones near Environmentally Sensitive Habitat Areas (ESHA) and coastal zones nearest the shore -- but Trainer, who was a leading organizer against the new "agriculture" building rights, said those areas would be a small proportion of the whole. "It's a rollback absolutely," she said in an interview. "This is a terrible statewide precedent that the commission removed from itself oversight over parts of two-thirds of Marin's coastal zone." Liebster responded on May 21 that decisions in large areas of the zone are appealable to the Commission: "It's a big area and in fact we tried to measure it and it's like, more than 11,000 acres out of the 30,000 acres that the Coastal Commission estimates is in the C-APZ zone." He said "that includes all of the wetlands and streams in primary sensitive habitat areas." In other areas, where a principally permitted use right was invoked for a project, appeal above the county level would be by writ petition directly to the courts. But Trainer's letters and several speakers' public comments emphasized the Commission's function as an institutional check on local action. Trainer told the Commission at the hearing: "Do your job as the gatekeeper." Trainer further saw the county as failing to perform needed CEQA analyses, both individual and cumulative, with findings of fact, analyses of changes and offers of alternatives and mitigation measures, on the potential effects of the new land use plan. On the Sunday after the meeting she said, "If the county does not do the CEQA analysis: the individual and cumulative impact analysis required by law, then we're going to have no choice but to file a lawsuit." An EAC comment letter from Trainer before the meeting said the local coastal plan revision "is supposed to be the 'functional equivalent' of an EIR," but contended it had yet to comply with requirements under CEQA Guidelines § 15091 to reach findings needed to "prevent or minimize environmental damage". Liebster responded to Trainer's comments on May 21 saying, "There are two ways to achieve the goals and standards of CEQA. One is to write an independent EIR. The other is to put a program or project through the process of an agency that applies strict environmental rules to that program or process. And that's what the functional equivalent is." The initial Coastal Commission staff report prepared for the meeting referred to provisions of Cal. Public Resources Code §§ 21080.5 and 21080.9 that exempt local government from the requirement of an EIR under CEQA for the preparation of a local coastal program, but that require the Commission to find that approval of the amendment conforms to CEQA.  The Commission report acknowledged that "the amended LUP will not be approved or adopted as proposed if there are feasible alternative or feasible mitigation measures available which would substantially lessen any significant adverse impact which the activity may have on the environment." But it stated: "In this particular case, all of the proposed amendments are being approved as submitted. Thus, there are no feasible alternatives or feasible mitigation measures available which would substantially lessen any significant adverse impact on the environment. Therefore, the Commission finds the subject LUP, as amended, conforms with CEQA provisions." (The term "functional equivalency" is sometimes used to refer to the CEQA Guidelines § 15251 exemptions for specified regulatory processes including LCP preparation. The phrase does not appear in the main text of the regulation but presumably derives from the rule's discussion notes, which Liebster cited. Per a 2002 California Research Bureau report, "Are 'Certified Regulatory Programs' Functionally Equivalent to CEQA?" the discussion notes read, "Certification of a program formally recognizes that an environmental analysis undertaken in compliance with the certified program is the functional equivalent of a CEQA analysis." See https://www.library.ca.gov/crb/02/05/02-005.pdf. Section 15251 of the guidelines is at http://bit.ly/1jtvCbY and § 15091 is at http://bit.ly/1sVC4JP. Public Resources Code § 21080.5 is at http://bit.ly/1sVA5Fj.) Long memories at public comment Powerful suspicions and long memories characterized many anti-development public comments. Gerald Meral, recently retired deputy resources secretary for California, said the new housing on farms wasn't really restricted to farm family members and wouldn't likely address the affordable housing crisis because it would provide just a few units, far from amenities like grocery stores. Like many speakers, he said he'd been among those who helped in the original campaign for Proposition 20, the founding ballot measure for the Coastal Act. And like many, he expressed concern for the public right to appeal decisions to the Commission. Speaker Alden Bevington of West Marin, identifying himself as a systems analyst, said "If I were a developer, and I've worked with a number in my career, I could game this system as it is now proposed." He warned the Commission not to underestimate "the power, tenacity, and, um, legal departments of development capital protecting its interests." The most irritable disputes turned on specific numbers of houses that would be permitted, particularly on the origins of a calculation widely mentioned by speakers: that the new rules would allow construction of 129 more homes -- called by some speakers "mini-mansions" -- creating 1 million potential square feet of construction. A widely distributed email text, attributed to Sierra Club members, reportedly had emphasized the million square feet and the concern about appeal rights in a way some found alarmist. By Liebster's calculation, 83 legal lots existed where houses could be built for the first time, and 27 more sites existed for possible "intergenerational homes." Trainer provided slides to explain the 129-unit figure. One of these, drawing on a January 2013 Board of Supervisors staff report, counts up 83 possible new farmhouses, 15 "first" intergenerational units, and 31 additional units that would further be allowed by a zoning density of one unit per 60 acres. Supposing other restrictions such as Williamson Act contracts were lifted, the same presentation increases the potential count of units to 263, and the caption speaks of a million possible square feet. In an interview, Liebster, considering the figures a little differently, agreed it was possible to arrive at a future maximum buildout total of 1 million square feet, but he said even so that would represent only 0.075% of the "C-APZ" coastal agricultural zone's land, and that maximum buildout would be unlikely to happen "within our respective lifespans." After a debate within its afternoon deliberations, the Commission chose not to defend the foggy Marin Coast preemptively against the (currently theoretical) menace of vineyards and tasting rooms. Although the weather and soils currently make the Marin coast unsuitable for viticulture, speakers didn't rule out the chance that, between climate change and growers' innovations, someday the area could be growing grapes. Commissioner Dayna Bochco's motion, defeated 7-5, would have distinguished vineyards from other agriculture as a conditional use, not a principally permitted use. "Viticulture is different than any other kind of farming," she said. "I don't care if it's orange trees or mushrooms or any other kind of use. Viticulture is its own world." But other speakers suggested if grapes could be singled out for different treatment, so could any other crop. For development sites on bluffs, the Commission adopted a strict rule based on Southern California experience: pick a spot that will not fall into the sea for a century, even without a seawall to protect it. However they agreed to wait for a study before issuing detailed rules to address sea-level rise in low-lying areas like Stinson Beach. On coastal construction rules, Liebster said afterward, "most of these have been forged in the crucible of conditions on Solana Beach in San Diego County," where development near the edges of eroding bluffs is the issue. For Marin, he said, the Commission agreed to consider the different issue of low-lying settlements in the form of a future expected amendment. The county has grants for its study on the matter of $200,000 from the state Ocean Protection Council and $54,000 from the Commission, he said. As a stopgap measure, he said for now the Commission had adopted a rule to raise new construction, including substantial renovations, a yard above the level marked by FEMA as the area's current Base Flood Elevation. Liebster called the approach to sea level rise in a place like Stinson Beach "really a difficult problem... I can't even visualize the answer at all, so it's going to take a lot of creativity to do this." Houses could be raised on stilts, he noted, but how would they be reached? Where would cars park? For its May meeting the Commission was surrounded by a distinctive West Marin sense of context and place. Meeting in the town of Inverness on the Point Reyes peninsula, fed Hog Island oysters at an evening reception, and led by West Marin's own county Supervisor, current Commission chair Steve Kinsey, the Commission heard local public commenters speaking vigorously on and for their familiar home ground. The meeting could be less locally rooted when the Commission hears the implementation plan proposal that must also be approved to clinch Marin's Local Coastal Plan (LCP) revision. Having originally meant to hear and approve the whole LCP at Inverness, the Commission agreed about six weeks beforehand (according to Trainer) to split off the implementation plan for later review. The timing of the implementation plan hearing could be difficult, as the Commission's next meeting within easy driving distance is many months ahead: November in Half Moon Bay. Trainer suggested the meeting would likely be sooner but far out of town; Liebster was looking as far ahead as the December meeting, which will be set somewhere in the Bay Area. Showers of last-minute paper descended in the form of last-minute addenda, and then several supplemental votes on Commissioners' motions. It left all sides in cleanup mode, still trying to work out days later what exactly had been approved. The plan directly addresses coastal areas not governed by Marin's two large federal parks landholders, the Golden Gate National Recreation Area and Point Reyes National Seashore, though the federal areas may be affected indirectly by the Commission's power to enforce consistency in land management throughout the area. The land use plan, for example, does not directly affect the Drake's Bay oyster farming dispute, which concerns a federally managed area of Point Reyes. The meeting's agenda, which now appears with annotations showing Commission decisions, is at http://www.coastal.ca.gov/meetings/mtg-mm14-5.html.

The traditional May Revisions to Gov. Jerry Brown's budget proposal offer a big financing possibility for Infrastructure Financing Districts (IFDs), but relatively shallow support for efforts to finance and protect housing specifically. The Governor's "May Revise" proposal would "clarify" that cities and counties could securitize their Vehicle License Fee (VLF) Swap income to finance the Governor's proposed "Enhanced" IFDs, potentially doubling the districts' power over tax revenue. The proposal would allow such districts to support housing among other purposes, and would provide some protections to keep housing affordable, but the proposal offers no real replacement for Redevelopment's former 20% housing set-aside. The "May Revise" budget summary proposes to let alone the existing, relatively limited provisions for IFD creation that have been available to municipalities for years. Separately, it would authorize "Enhanced IFDs" with the new characteristics he had previously proposed, plus a few more. The Governor's prior IFD expansion proposal included a broadened list of projects that the districts could finance, and a requirement of a 55% approval vote instead of the existing two-thirds requirement.  (See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3480 for details.) The "May Revise" includes a nod to the broadly expressed objection that IFDs would not replace Redevelopment's former 20% set-aside of tax increment funds for low- and moderate-income housing. The new proposal would not actually require Enhanced IFDs to build housing, but it at least would allow such districts to finance affordable housing and would require long-term affordability covenants of 45 to 55 years for any affordable housing created or replaced. It would "clarify" that the districts "must replace any low- or moderate-income housing that is removed as part of a project plan, as is required under current IFD law". While the housing concessions went a little farther than before, they didn't impress some affordable housing proponents. The Western Center on Law and Poverty posted a critical analysis of the May Revise proposal as a whole, saying it "fails to invest in poor Californians." Alongside criticisms of health and public benefits provisions, it said the May Revise "provides little in the way of new housing proposals." It said the May proposal for Enhanced IFDs "proposes some better housing protections... but there was essentially no movement on the litigation quid pro quo," meaning the continuing proposed requirement that jurisdictions wrap up their disputes with the state over distribution of ex-Redevelopment assets before using the Enhanced IFD mechanism. The Western Center analysis said proposals for the use of cap-and-trade revenues, such as those by Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, are "a focus for housing advocates," but the May Revise "contains no new proposals on the use of that funding and neither the Governor nor his staff addressed the issue." As noted by the San Mateo Daily Journal , Assemblyman Kevin Mullin, D-South San Francisco, wrote: "One glaring omission is the continued lack of funding for affordable housing. The Governor's infrastructure financing districts proposal is a woefully inadequate replacement for the loss of redevelopment funds for housing. The legislature must step up to address to provide a stronger alternative." Additionally, the new "Enhanced IFD" proposal would "clarify" that "monies received by cities and counties pursuant to the Vehicle License Fee Swap may be securitized to fund Enhanced IFD projects" and that, if local voters approved, an Enhanced IFD could impose "new fees or assessments to support projects identified in an Enhanced IFD project plan." In its largely positive response to the budget proposal, the California Economic Summit organization estimated that the VLF Swap securitization option "would nearly double the property tax share available to IFDs, making about $400 million available each year for local infrastructure development." Under the Governor's revised proposal, only Enhanced IFDs, not old-style IFDs, would carry the requirement that municipalities first resolve their disputes with the Department of Finance over the status of ex-Redevelopment assets and receive Findings of Completion on any required paybacks. The Governor's budget summary notes this distinction would give cities continuing access to the old-style IFD process regardless of their post-Redevelopment status. However, that's a minimal concession, since IFDs have only been approved three times in two decades; the Western Center analysis called the old mechanism "virtually unusable". (See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3433.) For more details see: - The Governor's May Revision budget proposal summary (Proposed IFD changes are at Page 63): http://www.ebudget.ca.gov/FullBudgetSummary.pdf - The League of California Cities analysis: http://bit.ly/1lDa76W - San Mateo Daily Journal collecting several Bay Area legislators' written responses to the May Revise, including Mullin's: http://bit.ly/1gfz7TO - The California Economic Summit response to the May Revise, including a link to figures on the VLF Swap possibility: http://bit.ly/1lzOztp - Western Center on Law and Poverty responses: http://bit.ly/1lT16rZ and http://bit.ly/1lAtRqo Further on state revenue predictions: - Legislative Analyst's Office (LAO) suggesting actual state General Fund revenues may exceed the May Revise assumptions by more than $2 billion: http://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Detail/3017 - Sacramento Bee on that LAO report: http://bit.ly/1mLzMwJ - LAO prediction, made earlier this May, that property tax revenues will rebound: lao.ca.gov/Publications/Detail/3010 Cate Long's "Muniland" blog at Reuters with exegesis on the LAO property tax report: http://reut.rs/1t8CWgd

The Coastal Commission meets at the Inverness Yacht Club in Marin County starting May 14. The full agenda includes four revisions to Local Coastal Programs (LCPs). Of these, Marin County is the headliner, with a major proposed update to its Land Use Plan (LUP) that would expand the meaning of "agricultural" use, favoring housing for people engaged in the work of farms over services for visitors or housing for non-farmers. Major changes would include a concession easing permits for farmworker housing and "intergenerational homes" on farm property by making them principally permitted uses. A new provision would require expert biological site assessments for "development proposals within or adjacent to" environmentally sensitive habitat areas (ESHA). At the same time it would reduce some buffer requirements around wetlands and streams. The Commission's staff report praises the plan as emerging from a cooperative and thorough public process, but it recommends adoption only conditionally, stating recommended changes in a 145-page markup document (Appendix 6 in agenda materials for the item.) County proposals disfavored by Commission staff include the choice to regulate Marin County's southward coast in a separate "unit" from the rest. The staff report opposes a rule that "intergenerational homes" be only for members of farmers' families while recommending the total of such homes be limited to 27. A recent news report in the Point Reyes Light showed local critics questioning whether the county and Commission were headed toward overly strict provisions against hazards including earthquakes, bluff erosion, flooding and sea level rise, especially in a Commission-proposed revision that could force would-be builders to disregard existing "protective devices" such as seawalls in considering whether a site offers 100 years' future stability for a project. The other LCP proposals are amendments for San Diego, Pismo Beach and Santa Barbara. San Diego's proposal would revise notice and timing rules on rights to appeal city decisions and would clarify that the official implementing environmental quality procedures is the Planning Director, not the Development Services Director. < disclosure: the current san diego planning director is bill fulton, publisher of this publication. > disclosure: the current san diego planning director is bill fulton, publisher of this publication.> Also on the Commission's calendar are an amendment to the Port of Los Angeles master plan, a big batch of Orange County renovations, and a detailed informational report on radioactivity reaching California from the Fukushima Dai-ichi nuclear disaster. Links: Commission agenda: http://www.coastal.ca.gov/mtgcurr.html Marin staff report from the May 15 agenda item: http://documents.coastal.ca.gov/reports/2014/5/Th12a-5-2014.pdf. County LCP planning site: http://www.marincounty.org/depts/cd/divisions/planning/local-coastal-program Point Reyes Light : http://www.ptreyeslight.com/article/coastal-commission-set-vote-revision-lcp Fukushima staff report: http://documents.coastal.ca.gov/reports/2014/5/F10b-5-2014.pdf Environmental groups appeal Tahoe challenge to 9th Circuit The weary battlers over Lake Tahoe's Regional Plan Update (RPU) are in for another round. On May 7 the Sierra Club and Friends of the West Shore appealed the decision by U.S. District Judge John Mendez that upheld the 2012 RPU as appropriately reconciling current scientific and regulatory practice with the prior 1987 Regional Plan scheme and overarching environmental law. Earthjustice, the environmental nonprofit firm representing the plaintiffs, issued a statement based on elements of its district court arguments, saying the RPU is too optimistic about its own effects on the lake basin environment, and that its incentives to replace "aging, poorly located" projects with denser, better-mitigated urban ones will allow too much construction to serve the lake overall. It quoted Tahoe area Sierra Club leader Laurel Ames as saying the defendant Tahoe Regional Planning Agency (TRPA) "has abandoned its core mission to restore and protect Lake Tahoe's environment." TRPA issued a cool response quoting Executive Director Joanne Marchetta as saying, "While the appeal makes its way through the legal process, we will continue to put the substantial environmental benefits of the plan into place." In a Tahoe Daily Tribune opinion piece, Steve Noll, former board chair of the Lake Tahoe South Shore Chamber of Commerce (TahoeChamber), wrote in part, "While for many of us this is disheartening I believe that the science utilized by the TRPA in the RPU was solid, and that common sense will again prevail." Links: Some of CP&DR's prior coverage on the plan and the dispute: http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3471, http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3435 and http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3223. Tahoe Daily Tribune coverage: http://www.tahoedailytribune.com/news/11331878-113/plan-lake-regional-tahoe Earthjustice's statement: http://earthjustice.org/news/press/2014/conservation-groups-continue-to-fight-to-protect-lake-tahoe-from-development TRPA's response: http://www.trpa.org/11354/ Response from Steve Noll of TahoeChamber: http://www.tahoedailytribune.com/southshore/11342023-113/plan-tahoe-area-regional Short news report, long debate in comments thread, Lake Tahoe News -- worth a glance as indicator of continuing strong local sentiment: http://www.laketahoenews.net/2014/05/trpa-regional-plan-court-decision-appealed/ SCOTUS review denial upholds LA County runoff liability (This report was updated May 28, 2014.) The Supreme Court's refusal to review a Ninth Circuit ruling has fastened responsibility more tightly on Los Angeles County and its flood control district for pollution in untreated runoff from city streets that travels through storm sewers to the Los Angeles and San Gabriel Rivers. The Ninth Circuit ruling, issued last August, said the two government entities needed to do more than monitor the high levels of toxins and fecal coliform: when results showed that storm sewer flow into the rivers violated the terms of existing discharge permits, the county and the district had to respond. The county had sought to diffuse responsibility for the high pollutant levels detected at its monitoring stations, arguing that part of the fault rested with private and public entities upstream whose drains feed into the county system. The water quality journal Stormwater reported the county was preparing to impose fees to pay costs of the cleanup, "an estimated $8 billion over 20 years." The ruling was a victory for two plaintiffs: the National Resources Defense Council and LA Waterkeeper (captioned under its former name, Santa Monica Baykeeper). The matter now returns to federal district court for proceedings on the remedies portion of the case, which was stayed pending the decision on liability. The LA Times' Bettina Boxall writes that LA County is already working on "green infrastructure" efforts to mitigate runoff in new projects, and "The county and cities are considering construction of regional infiltration basins to collect runoff to recharge aquifers." Links: Bettina Boxall, LA Times : http://lat.ms/1qawNCb NRDC statement: http://www.nrdc.org/media/2014/140505.asp Stormwater journal report: http://www.stormh2o.com/SW/Forum/Paying_for_the_LA_Cleanup_1965.aspx LA Waterkeeper: https://lawaterkeeper.org/news/ SoCal Public Radio: http://www.scpr.org/news/2014/05/05/43977/supreme-court-says-la-county-is-responsible-for-st/ Underlying 9th Cir. opinion: http://cdn.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/opinions/2013/08/08/10-56017.pdf Supreme Court docket: http://www.supremecourt.gov/search.aspx?filename=/docketfiles/13-901.htm

If you think browsing court records in public policy lawsuits is a sensible use of time -- and since you're reading this publication, you may -- here's a warning that, if you don't work in California or federal government, the best time to read court documents in Sacramento Superior Court is before July 1. On that date, unless local court officials relent, online case records will become expensively paywalled. The fee plan, which is still tentative for now (comments are due June 6) has been criticized locally as a setback for public access, and as a special hardship for security companies and others conducting background checks or interested in criminal cases. The Sacramento Bee 's editorial board called it "unfortunate but not outrageous." But the fee plan's effects extend far beyond the local concerns of one county. Sacramento County Superior Court judges regularly hear matters of statewide importance, including disputes that both affect and shed light on the deep levers of California power relations. In the area of land use, such topics include water rights, state authority over major public works, taxation, and the post-redevelopment wind-down. Concerned Californians throughout the state will now have to pay to research such matters unless they qualify for exemption as participants in the case researched. Name searches will cost a dollar each, or somewhat less at bulk rates for frequent searchers. PDF document downloads will cost a dollar for each of the first five pages and 40 cents for each page thereafter, up to a maximum of $40 per document. Because of a fee exemption for California and federal governmental staff, private individuals and organizations will face a lopsided obligation to pay for research on cases where they are not direct participants. The fee plan's major way of accommodating researchers who can't afford document fees will be to let them visit the courthouse in person and view records at kiosks. That may be practical if the case is, say, a Sacramento eviction and the researcher is a local Sacramento tenant researching a landlord's course of conduct. It becomes less practical if the researcher is a civic activist living in Bakersfield and the case is, say, the document-heavy four-year litigation on the validity of the Monterey Plus Project that followed from the Monterey Amendment water rights agreement on water deliveries to Southern California. (This is the litigation that recently produced a decision invalidating the EIR for current management of the Kern Water Bank, discussed at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3456.) An advantage of the new system is that people with accounts can subscribe to notifications of filings in cases whether or not they are participants. Also, a researcher who knows a case number (or a criminal defendant's XREF number) may call up the case docket for free. It's just name searches and documents that cost. In news interviews and their own announcement memo, local court officials have attributed the paywalling to budget cuts and to the need to pay for the sophisticated new data portal that will be managing the paywalling process. The new portal won an award in November. The new portal, which went live in early April, is already requiring users to establish a free account to search for cases by party name or to download documents. Although searches and PDF downloads are currently free, they already must be obtained through an account that allows for "Purchases" of name searches and, for PDFs, a "Document Cart" and "Checkout" process. These processes take the user through the hair-raising step of racking up fees that would apply if the order were after July 1. In a major long-running litigation docket like the Monterey/Kern dispute, the cost for PDFs of the complex administrative and scientific record can get into thousands of dollars. Those thousands are currently hypothetical but as of July 1 they will be real enough. Below is a starting list of Sacramento case numbers, and links to lists of Sacramento cases, on widely followed issues with statewide effect such as water disputes, high-speed rail and post-redevelopment disputes. Readers are invited to share more case numbers in comments at the foot of this article or on CP&DR's Twitter account at http://twitter.com/Cal_Plan. Links: - Court notice describing the fee plan and explaining where to send comments by June 6: http://bit.ly/1oHb0xj - November 2013 press release on the court's award for its new access system: http://bit.ly/1ji7hBc - Court site's main explanation on the new fee system: https://services.saccourt.ca.gov/PublicCaseAccess/ - Public Case Access account creation page: https://services.saccourt.ca.gov/PublicCaseAccess/Account/CreateAccountType - Sacramento Bee on the paywalling plans: http://bit.ly/1jQJXzd - Sacramento News & Review on hardships for security companies: http://bit.ly/1nyfQ2s - Sacramento Bee on implications for criminal courts research: http://bit.ly/1sCUu3C - Sacramento Bee editorial -- "unfortunate but not outrageous": http://bit.ly/1jwY2SM Starting list of case numbers and listings of cases: Sacramento Superior Court Complex Case Calendar: http://www.saccourt.ca.gov/civil/complex-case-calendar.aspx Dispute between San Diego County and some cities in the county over post-redevelopment tax revenues: City of Chula Vista v. Sandoval , Case No. 34-2014-80001723 Dispute, currently on appeal, over the validity of California's cap-and-trade program: California Chamber of Commerce v. California Air Resources Board , Case No. 34-2012-80001313 and 34-2012-80001464 Monterey Plus and Kern Water Bank litigation described above, in two companion cases: Central Delta Water Agency, et al. v. CA Dept. of Water Resources , Case No. 34-2010-80000561 Rosedale-Rio Bravo Water Storage District v. CA Dept. of Water Resources , Case No. 34-2010-80000703 Challenges to the validity of High Speed Rail bond financing, now on appeal with 3d Appellate District (see news coverage at http://cbsloc.al/1jihRIn): John Tos vs. California High Speed Rail Authority , Case No. 34-2011-00113919 High Speed Rail Authority v. All Persons Interested... , Case No. 34-2013-00140689 Challenges to the Merced-Fresno scection of the High-Speed Rail project in litigation that is now mainly concluded: Case Nos. 34-2012-80001165, 34-2012-80001166 and  34-2012-80001168 The key opening post-Redevelopment case, League of CA Cities v Matosantos , decided in December 2013 (Many documents at https://www.cacities.org/AB1484lawsuit): Case No. 34-2012-80001275 The key post-Redevelopment clawback case, recently also appealed, of C ity of Brentwood v. CA Dept. of Finance , discussed at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3478: Case No. 34-2013-80001568. (Direct link to online docket:  http://bit.ly/1kdSwmQ.) Post-Redevelopment successor agencies' disputes with the state Department of Finance, all in Sacramento county courts, summarized with case numbers at the Gibson Dunn site: http://bit.ly/1mMsrP9 February 18 summary of post-Redevelopment court cases by the League of California Cities site, naming Sacramento County Superior Court judges and departments, and case numbers minus the uniform Sacramento County prefix of "34-": http://bit.ly/1jNWNdy. Verizon's property tax dispute with 38 California counties: Verizon California Inc. v. California State Board of Equalization, et al. , Case No. 34-2014-00157245 Readers, what other cases of statewide importance would you add?

Opponents of San Francisco's tech bus shuttle program filed May 1 for court review of the county Supervisors' decision to exempt it from CEQA review. The double-decker buses, which carry city residents to jobs on South Bay office campuses, pay the city a dollar every time a bus makes a stop. Opponents say the buses disrupt public transit but, more important, that they cause displacement by driving up housing prices along the bus routes. While the buses do reduce car trips to the campuses, they have been viewed as both a mitigation and a condition to mitigate. See our prior discussion at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3466. Respondents named in the suit alongside San Francisco municipal entities include Apple, Genentech, Google and multiple bus companies. Petitioners include SEIU Local 1021, Elizabeth Alexander, housing activist Sara Shortt, and a nonprofit, the Coalition for Fair Legal and Environmental Transit. See http://bit.ly/1kRgc0s . The San Francisco Superior Court case number is CPF 14 513627. Court documents can be downloaded via case number search at http://sfsuperiorcourt.org/online-services . Pomona can sue business for 1920s-50s fertilizer imports The Ninth Circuit will let the City of Pomona return to trial court with testimony by an expert witness on the likely origins of perchlorate molecules in the city's water supply. The court's opinion said Dr. Neil Sturchio of the University of Illinois at Chicago had offered testimony, based on "stable isotope analysis," that -- in the court's paraphrase -- the "dominant source of perchlorate in the Pomona groundwater is from the Atacama Desert in Chile" and had "the same distinctive isotopic composition" as perchlorate in naturally formed  sodium nitrate fertilizer that the defendant, SQM North America, "imported into southern California from Chile... between 1927 and the 1950s." In an evidentiary hearing under Daubert v. Merrell Dow Pharmaceuticals, Inc. , 509 U.S. 579 (1993), the district court had excluded Dr. Sturchio's testimony as unorthodox, taking the heart out of the city's case. The Ninth Circuit, however, found Dr. Sturchio's methods were sufficiently reliable, scientifically acceptable, and capable of being re-tested by others, to make his testimony at least worth hearing. The appellate ruling further agreed with the district court that the case should not be thrown out based on either the statute of limitations or SQM North America's argument that Pomona's claim was barred by the "economic loss rule" for being insufficiently direct. The Ninth Circuit found Pomona's suit could go forward because the city had a direct enough property claim on its groundwater rights, and a strong enough argument that recent discovery of the problem made the timing of its suit acceptable. The case is City of Pomona v. SQM North America Corp. , at http://1.usa.gov/PYHyqf. Water highlights Just a few links on California's topic of the year: EBMUD made its first use of an emergency water supply from the Sacramento River: http://bit.ly/SvnDRO Officials were near issuing curtailment orders to property owners to stop diverting water per established junior water rights: http://bit.ly/SdVC16 The state Department of Water Resources issued a major report showing low levels of groundwater where measured and gaps in monitoring statewide. See http://bit.ly/R8DgNS. The Sacramento Bee 's Matt Wiser unpacked the results at http://bit.ly/1ue4zG4 . CNN reported on Orange County's use of recycled water for drinking at http://cnn.it/1nOsPNa Some statewide ballot measure highlights Here's an unsystematic look at the lineup of local June 3 ballot measures: South Lake Tahoe's Measure P, if approved, would end a kiosk-based parking fee program in busy tourist areas. See http://www.cityofslt.us/index.aspx?NID=743 and Among measures in Los Angeles County, the city of Monterey Park will vote on Measure A to amend its general plan and zoning map, and to approve a specific plan to build a development of single-family homes. The city of Signal Hill will Measure U, to require a 2/3 vote for all "taxes, assessments and fees". See http://lavote.net/VOTER_ELECTIONS/Upcoming_Elections.cfm#06032014 and http://www.cityofsignalhill.org/index.aspx?NID=378. Measure U is supported by a group called Signal Hill Community First (http://www.signalhillfirst.org/) The Long Beach Press Telegram reports supporters lost a challenge to the way the city presented the measure on the ballot: http://bit.ly/1nkMTnX San Francisco's Measure B, which would require a vote for all future height limit variances on the waterfront, lost some of its point when the Warriors basketball team management up their contested effort to build an arena on Piers 30-32 near the Golden Gate Bridge, and instead picked an arena site farther south in Mission Bay near Third and 16th Streets. Considerable future development plans are still at stake, however, notably for the old Union Iron Works property at Pier 70. For Measure B see http://www.sfgov2.org/index.aspx?page=4279 and our February discussion at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3443. On the Warriors see http://bit.ly/Q9kLbg . On Pier 70, which for years was a backwater of warehouses, studios and a huge car impound barn, see developer Forest City's plans at http://pier70sf.com/ and artist Wendy MacNaughton's impressionistic history of the place at http://pier70community.com/. San Diego's Measures B and C, on the Barrio Logan Community Plan, are discussed at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3473. The Monterey Peninsula Water Management District's Measure O, which was the subject of a court battle over ballot arguments and descriptions, is discussed at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3467. On the Los Gatos "Albright Way Initiative" to allow construction of a headquarters for Netflix, see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3443 on the dispute over signature gathering that preceded the measure's placement on the ballot. Marin county's Measure B would create permanent structures for a farmers' market at Frank Lloyd Wright's historic Marin Civic Center building. The Marin IJ supports the measure and recounts some history of the prior referendum that led to strict voter-approval requirements for changes around the Marin Civic Center building: http://www.marinij.com/editorial/ci_25687438/editorial-marin-farmers-market-needs-permanent-home. See also http://www.smartvoter.org/2014/06/03/ca/mrn/meas/B/ and a snarkier appraisal of the plan (with some cinematic history of the complex) at http://www.northbaybiz.com/Columnists/Only_in_Marin/Organically_Grown.php. Also in Marin County, a coding error that placed the Measure A library parcel tax on ballots outside the library district was going to cost the county $100,000: http://www.marinij.com/marinnews/ci_25702340/coding-error-marin-s-june-primary-ballot-will Meanwhile, Del Norte County voters will have a chance this June to express dissatisfaction with southward parts of California in a highly traditional way: a referendum on secession to form the 51st state of Jefferson. For a current view on the measure, see http://www.sacbee.com/2014/04/26/6354931/viewpoints-siskiyous-political.html. For some history on the sometimes genuinely edgy Jefferson movement, which dates from 1941, see this account, written on the occasion of a separate Jefferson secession vote by the Supervisors of neighboring Siskiyou County in fall 2013: http://www.redding.com/news/2013/sep/03/live-tweets-siskiyou-county-supervisors-discuss-se/

As the California Legislature moves into spring horse-trading season, here's a review in links of some state-level legislation we're following that's relevant to land use, housing and the environment. In addition to the links provided here, the "Bill Information" section at http://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/ has status updates and texts for all bills and helpful legislative analyses for most. AB 2493 (Bloom) - Post-Redevelopment funds retention This bill by Assemblymember Bloom, D-Santa Monica, would return some $750 million to successor agencies to finish redevelopment projects. By the end of April it had passed two Assembly policy committees and was headed into Assembly Appropriations. For Bloom's comments in the local Santa Monica Lookout see http://bit.ly/1jwkF9e. The League of California Cities, which supports it, has a tracking page and support letter at http://bit.ly/Q8J612. SB 1129 (Steinberg) - Post-Redevelopment SB 1129, a post-redevelopment cleanup bill with League of Cities support, would give cities' successor agencies more authority in several areas, notably to enter contracts. It was heard May 5 in Senate Appropriations and placed on the suspense file. for an endorsement statement by the City of Glendale see http://bit.ly/SvBvvz. The League's comments on this and a crop of other March-introduced bills on the Redevelopment wind-down are at http://bit.ly/1igufww. AB 2280 (Alejo) - Re-create some elements of Redevelopment Per the League of California Cities, which supports it, the Alejo bill (Discussed at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3480) has reached the Assembly floor, was read a second time May 1 and goes to a third reading May 8: http://bit.ly/OUOtRg SB 33 (Wolk) - Remove voter approval for post-Redevelopment IFDs SB 33, which would remove the requirement of a popular vote from infrastructure finance districts, was among the post-Redevelopment bills that remained formally dormant but still informally under consideration, as discussed at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3480. Although it has officially gone nowhere since September 2013, SB 33 is on the "Hot and Priority Bills" list of the League of California Cities at http://www.cacities.org/Top/News/News-Articles/2014/April/2014-League-Hot-and-Priority-Bill-List. AB 1404 (Leno) - San Francisco Redevelopment housing backlog The San Francisco-specific SB 1404, originated by the city government, passed the State Senate Committee on Governance and Finance, its second committee, per Legiscan's entry at http://legiscan.com/CA/rollcall/SB1404/id/361266 .The measure would both require and allow the successor to the city's redevelopment agency to replace over 5000 units of affordable housing that were destroyed during 1955-1975 "urban renewal". See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3480. AB 2292 (Bonta) - Freight Rail, redevelopment sites AB 2292, per the Assembly Local Government committee's analysis, would "allow an infrastructure financing district in the Oakland Army Base, Howard Terminal or Coliseum City in the City of Oakland to finance public capital facilities or projects that include freight rail." All three sites are subjects of major redevelopment planning; the latter two are competing sites for pro sports stadiums. (See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3476.) Per the author's statement in the analysis, "we need to include freight rail as an eligible expense for IFDs" to improve the city's transportation capacity and emissions reduction through rail use. AB 2549 (Ridley-Thomas) - Milpitas post-redevelopment The full Assembly has passed AB 2549, to create a local commission to address Milpitas' especially deep post-Redevelopment funding losses. It now goes to the State Senate. SB 391 (DeSaulnier) - Affordable housing via recording fees SB 391, which would raise funds for affordable housing with real estate recording fees, remains formally on the Assembly suspense file, having passed the Senate last year. SB 1132 (Mitchell, Leno) - Fracking restrictions This anti-fracking bill (see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3475) passed the State Senate Environmental Quality Committee 5-2 on April 30 per a statement (at http://bit.ly/RiQt7c) by State Sen. Holly Mitchell, the measure's cosponsor. The Los Angeles Democrat has expressed concern for her district as close to "the largest urban oil field in the country" in Inglewood. AB 2417 (Nazarian) - Recycled water AB 2417, on "purple pipe" distribution of recycled water, passed the Assembly Natural Resources Committee April 28. It would create an exemption from CEQA for new or existing recycled water pipelines of less than eight miles. The Associaton of California Water Agencies (ACWA), which backs the measure, said it goes next to the Appropriations Committee. See http://www.acwa.com/news/state-legislation/acwa-sponsored-ab-2417-clears-first-committee. AB 1739 (Dickinson) - Groundwater management Another ACWA-backed bill, AB 1739, passed the Assembly Water, Parks and Wildlife Committee April 30 and moved on to Assembly Appropriations. Per the water committee's legislative analysis it would require "sustainable groundwater management in all groundwater subbasins determined by the Department of Water Resources... to be at medium to high risk of significant economic, social and environmental impacts due to an unsustainable and chronic pattern of groundwater extractions exceeding the ability of the surface water supplies to replenish the subbasin." See http://www.acwa.com/news/groundwater/assembly-committee-approves-groundwater-legislation SB 1077 (DeSaulnier) - Tax per vehicle miles traveled Another item, this one "supported in concept" by the League, is SB 1077, which calls for a tax based on vehicle miles traveled. The Southern California Association of Governments has been talking it up (see http://bit.ly/1nkxKTG) but the measure was questioned last fall on privacy grounds (see http://lat.ms/1jwnuHj). the measure is through its State Senate policy committees and is set for hearing May 12 in Senate Appropriations. SB 1439 (Leno) - Ellis Act restrictions State Sen. Mark Leno's Ellis Act restriction measure, SB 1439 (discussed previously at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3477) now has a heavy weight of tech industry endorsers behind it (see http://beyondchron.org/news/index.php?itemid=12611). The measure goes to hearing May 6 in the State Senate Judiciary Committee. Assemblymember Tom Ammiano's AB 2405, which would have limited the Ellis Act more strongly and provided tenant litigants with other procedural protections, failed to clear the Assembly Judiciary Committee on April 29. SB 1451 (Hill & Roth) - CEQA procedural restrictions A widely shared commentary by the Miller Starr Regalia law firm at http://bit.ly/1q9qPkX is arguing for SB 1451, which would limit the ways petitioners could place allegations of CEQA violations on the record. Principally, it would exclude allegations from court review if the alleged violations were known, or could have been known with reasonable diligence, during the public comment period, but were brought to the agency's attention at another time. The legislative summary and the Miller Starr essay describe the measure as designed to stop use of "document dumping" as a tactic to delay a decision or preserve a record. The bill has passed the State Senate Environmental Quality Committee and goes to hearing May 6 in Judiciary. SB 69 (Roth) and AB 1521 (Fox) - Restore Vehicle License Fee revenue These two somewhat different measures, both supported by the League (and discussed previously at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3464), would restore features of the 2004-2005 budget deal's "VLF-property tax swap" and transfer back vehicle license fee income to local jurisdictions, undoing the work of 2011's SB 89, which repurposed the vehicle license money to help with "realignment" additions to the functions of county carceral systems. (Compare http://www.cdcr.ca.gov/about_cdcr/docs/realignment-fact-sheet.pdf.) The two current bills would especially help recently created municipalities such as Jurupa Valley. Per the most recent AB 1521 legislative analysis, "SB 89 had the effect of eliminating over  $15 million in the Motor Vehicle License Fee (MVLFA) revenues in 2011-12 from four  newly incorporated cities (Menifee, Eastvale, Wildomar, and Jurupa Valley)." SB 69 passed the Senate last year, but in a different form focused on education funding. It was amended to substantially its current form in September 2013, then sat with formally unchanged status until a couple of weeks ago. It was amended in the Assembly Rules Committee on April 21. Meanwhile, AB 1521 passed the Assembly Local Government committee April 30. The legislative analysis showed no opposition on file. AB 2175 (Daly & Ting) - Renters' rebates This bill would grant renter's rebates to tenants at heftier rates than the current renter's credit, with payments ranging from $250 to $347.50 on a sliding scale for annual incomes at and below $42,588. Introduced in February, the measure passed the Assembly Revenue and Taxation Committee on Apriil 28 and now moves on to Appropriations. AB 1513 (Fox) - Residential property: possession by declaration The California Association of Realtors was sponsoring a measure, also supported by the California Police Chiefs Association, described as meant to assist landlords, security companies and police in removing squatters from vacant properties. It would allow a landlord to declare ownership of a property, register it as vacant, and challenge allegedly unauthorized occupants to obtain or present proof of a right to remain within 48 hours. Some tenant activists had begun campaigns against the measure because they argued it could create an extrajudicial eviction process, giving landlords an end run around the more procedurally complex and time-consuming procedures of the standard California "unlawful detainer" eviction. (See e.g. http://bit.ly/RjmiN5 and http://killthebillcoalition.com/about/) The Assembly Judiciary analysis of April 28 set out the dispute carefully. Opponents it listed included the statewide Tenants Together group and the Western Center on Law and Poverty. The measure has passed the Assembly Rules and Judiciary Committees and has been referred to Appropriations. And further -- The League of Cities' "Hot Bills" list was stating generally conservative positions on public records measures and on regulatory measures for bills involving massage businesses and marijuana dispensaries Here's just a little from ACWA on the water bond bills, which are a whole other subject: http://www.acwa.com/news/water-supply-challenges/three-water-bond-bills-advance-assembly-sb-1250-put-over-until-may-13

The Fitch Ratings service on May 1 announced it was ready to take a sunnier view of tax allocation bonds (TABs) administered by successor agencies in California's redevelopment dissolution. The changed view could affect both the sale prices of existing bonds and the interest rates available to successor agencies when they refinance their existing debt with refunding bonds. The announcement said, "Fitch will now consider California TAB liens to be closed and surplus housing revenues to be available for non-housing TAB debt service, as applicable. These changes likely will result in a moderate number of California TAB upgrades." It said that in the first days after California dissolved its redevelopment agencies, the service "considered the legislation's negative effects on credit quality, but excluded potentially positive effects." But on review, analysts had found two things to like about the successor agencies' wind-down role. First, if the successor agency's 20% housing set-aside of the tax increment is more than enough to make currently due payments on housing-related bond debts or other "enforceable obligations", then the overflow can now be used to pay off non-housing bonds. Second, because successor agencies are barred from increasing their bond debt, no additional liens are being created to compete for funds, hence "All TAB liens have been effectively closed." Susan Bloch, a partner with Burke, Williams and Sorensen who works on redevelopment wind-down, housing, and public finance issues, explained that since the existing housing set-aside funds would be either already redistributed or already encumbered, the new Fitch view mainly addressed the continuing influx of tax-increment funds. Referring to the semi-annual Recognized Obligation Payments Schedule (ROPS) process, she said, "Now all the money is in one pot and it gets allocated to the successor agencies twice a year to pay for enforceable obligations including the debt service." Property tax specialist Marty Coren of HdL Coren and Cone said housing construction would not be affected because the 20% housing requirement was already lifted by the dissolution of Redevelopment. For Tom Hart of the California Redevelopment Association, the new policy was "bittersweet because if the legislation... would've been more defining, Fitch wouldn't have had to downgrade in the first place and a lot of these issues about the bonding would've not materialized." Noting the large number of lawsuits over post-redevelopment financial disputes, he said the dissolution legislation "really put successor agencies in a bad position, and then you have the Dept of Finance making administrative decisions that could've been perceived as outside the legislation, and that's why there were so many lawsuits." At least one effect of the new Fitch policy is already visible: on May 2, citing the new policy among other factors, Fitch upgraded a subordinate bond issue by Oakley Redevelopment Agency from 'BB' to 'BB+' and changed its outlook from 'Negative' to 'Stable', while confirming existing ratings and outlooks for some of the city's higher-rated Redevelopment TABs. The authors of the Fitch report, analysts Scott Monroe and Yueping Liu, noted in an interview that the major benefit of savings on refunding bonds would flow to the overlapping taxing entities, which receive tax increment funds not needed for the successor agencies' approved "enforceable obligations". Since the only purpose of a successor agency is to wind down and close out redevelopment functions, they said it would be hard to define what benefit a successor agency would receive. Liu said the change probably wouldn't speed up the wind-down process unless it generated significant savings on a bond issue's interest obligations, or unless the debt was structured to be paid off faster. On the other hand, Monroe and Liu said issuers that had lower ratings might see a benefit in reduced insurance costs. Coren pointed to a separate new interpretation that could also affect ability to repay bonds. A DOF letter, dated April 2, suggested that the end of Redevelopment had also brought an end to a limitation that applies in project areas created before the AB 1290 reforms took effect in 1994. In those older project areas, bonds have been subject to limits on the total amounts of tax increment income that may be collected from project areas. According to the April 2 letter, the DOF "advises county auditor-controllers to not apply tax increment caps to bar payment of Finance-approved enforceable obligations" if those caps had not been reached as of Redevelopment's dissolution. DOF's interpretation, if correct, removes one possible barrier to paying off bonds for older project areas. However, Coren wrote that "The release of the Dept. of Finance letter triggered a discussion of the issue by the Technical Committee. The bond counsel members of the committee expressed reluctance to rely on the Finance letter as it has no force in law." Some question remained whether a successor agency might still need to set aside funds in escrow to be sure of meeting payments as of scheduled deadlines. The Fitch analysts said they rated refunding bonds issued by the Morgan Hill successor agency in November. They mentioned a privately placed issuance and another in progress that they could not discuss by name, and noted that Standard & Poor's has rated several more. Several large municipal successor agencies have now issued refunding bonds, including a pooled effort by Los Angeles County to coordinate several city-level successor agencies' reissues. Links: BusinessWire press release on Fitch TAB ratings: http://dlvr.it/5XxSbc BusinessWire announcement on Oakley: http://dlvr.it/5YRjBC On the LA County bond refunding program: http://ceo.lacounty.gov/RDD/122413%20Program%20Update.pdf ; http://ceo.lacounty.gov/rdd/Bond%20Refunding%20Program.pdf The DOF April 2 letter is attached.

The California Legislature's post-Redevelopment landscape is in a state of crumble and tentative growth. Like sprouts on a redwood stump, bills have crowded the space left by the 2011 abolition of local redevelopment districts and their tax-increment financing structures. The sprouts have begun variously to strengthen, clump together, or falter, but with little coherence: some of the most vigorous stems are tending in different, possibly incompatible directions. It's uncertain which if any will become new main trunks. The whole effort proceeds in a state of nervous awareness that Governor Brown has used veto power to shape post-redevelopment legislation to his liking -- mostly, to date, in the direction of Infrastructure Finance Districts (IFDs). Picture him surveying the new growth day by day, pruning shears in hand. In the current political moment, before the best-nourished saplings shoulder out the rest or the pruning shears descend, what's happening on the broad stump of Redevelopment is a quiet, nerdy debate about the proper functions of government and the reasons why redevelopment districts were created in the first place. It's an opportunity to reconsider what approaches to municipal structures and services are equitable and useful -- one that seems surprisingly little discussed among political activists or the larger public. The following seems to be the picture, based on reviews of the public record and conversations with Capitol insiders, most of whom asked not to be identified. Two dominant tendencies appear among the bills: one is to follow signals the Governor gave in January and February that he would look favorably on efforts to expand use of IFDs. The other main approach, which has many supporters other than the Governor, would re-create Redevelopment-like agencies under other names in diminished, restricted forms. The two approaches are in some tension but may not be mutually exclusive. Among the minor tendencies, SB 1260 uniquely seeks to hedge bets by replacing Redevelopment's old 20% affordable housing set-aside, plus a bit more. It would impose a 25% affordable housing set-aside requirement on either Redevelopment-type or IFD tax-increment districts. Then there are a handful of bills proposing special laws for local circumstances, including in Oakland, Milpitas and San Francisco. And there are breakaway efforts to meet traditional Redevelopment goals by other tax or debt mechanisms entirely. Two anxious bass notes could be heard under the experts' rapid-fire technical summaries. One was fear that none of the proposed approaches would really gather sufficient tax increment funds fast enough to fund needed (or wanted) projects. Another was fear that, since IFDs do not require any showing of disadvantage in a project area, the IFD approach might not include any requirement for poverty relief to replace Redevelopment's long-misused "blight" requirement. Infrastructure Structures As CP&DR has described previously (see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3429, http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3433, and Bill Fulton's February Insight column in CP&DR's PDF issue), Governor Brown indicated in January that he was willing to see the previously little-used IFD device expanded as tax increment financing -- but subject to limits: an exclusion from affecting school budgets, a "finding of completion" and wrap-up of all repayment disputes involving the sponsoring local government's former redevelopment agency, and a requirement that each IFD be approved by a 55% vote in the proposed district. On February 18, to the surprise and relief of some, Brown signed Speaker-elect Toni Atkins' AB 471, which allowed IFDs to overlap with former redevelopment districts. However, he did not budge on the requirement to first pay off all ex-Redevelopment obligations to the state's satisfaction. The many local governments that are in litigation with the Department of Finance over ex-Redevelopment money may thus have to compromise their existing claims in order to use the new funding sources. The Governor's abbreviated January thoughts on the subject appear at pp. 133-135 in his budget summary at http://bit.ly/1rzfckp (3.4MB PDF). His trailer bill expanding those thoughts, dated February 21, is on the Department of Finance site via http://bit.ly/1hCRcFN. Through a reference to existing code, the trailer bill says the requirement to approve an IFD would be a 55% vote that would vary according to the district's nature: if more than 12 registered voters lived there, they would decide on the ordinary basis of one person, one vote. If there were fewer resident registered voters, then the vote would be taken among the landowners, on a basis of one vote per acre or fraction thereof. Criticisms of these restrictions, and more fundamentally of the IFD model as envisioned to date, appeared in March from the Legislative Analyst's office at http://bit.ly/1mSq4YJ and in notes by the staff of the state Senate's fourth budget subcommittee at http://bit.ly/1itqyFp. SB 33 by Sen. Lois Wolk, D-Davis, would revoke the requirement of a vote for an IFD. However, Wolk told CP&DR in January (at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3433) that last year she held back SB 33 from the final Assembly vote that would have sent it to the Governor because his office "gave clear signals... that he wasn't read to sign it." As of late April there was no indication of any signal received to the contrary. But SB 33 was being mentioned as part of the picture. Dan Carigg, legislative director for the League of California Cities, said his organization supported it. He was not alone in suggesting the vote requirement made IFDs difficult to use in populated areas. On the other hand, the appearance of the trailer bill and the signing of AB 471 have been taken as indicators that Brown is willing to have more of a "conversation" about IFDs this spring than previously. Bills to expand IFDs in specific ways include AB 229 (Perez), for military base reuse and for other environmental and public-works projects in addition to standard IFD purposes; AB 243 (Dickinson), which would carry Brown's 55% vote requirement, somewhat expand standard IFD purposes, and also grant a 25% housing set-aside; and SB 628 (Beall), which would expand IFDs for transit and transit-oriented development, with a 25% housing set-aside. Some of these are formally inactive but all have been mentioned as part of the continuing discussion. Redevelopment Redux The measures that could re-create redevelopment districts are at some risk of a veto, but they were discussed as of late April as live bills that could possibly be brought forward for passage. The main such bills include SB 1, by Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento, a bill emphasizing transit-oriented "smart growth" that has been on inactive status since September, and AB 2280, introduced this February by Assemblymember Luis Alejo, D-Salinas. Likely anticipating the Governor's objections, both SB1 and AB 2280, like the IFD bills, would require a finding of completion from the Department of Finance before the contemplated type of new district could be formed. SB 1 as of last September's legislative analysis had support from several local governments and associations of local governments, labor groups, the Natural Resources Defense Council, and the Western Center on Law and Poverty. Its primary emphasis is less on relief of traditional "blight" than on transportation, environmental and health problems to be remedied by meeting transit and sustainability goals. There is, however, a 25% affordable housing requirement. Carigg emphasized the League's support for AB 2280. (The League was opposed to Redevelopment's dissolution in the first place.) He did not consider it contradictory to support a redevelopment-type measure alongside IFD-related legislation, but called on the Governor to allow "a variety of tools in the toolbox". It might be possible, he suggested, for one city to create "an Alejo district" for a poorer area of town, "an SB1" for a transit-oriented project on a rail line, and "on the edge of town there's some new project or something" suitable for an IFD. As of an early-April legislative analysis, AB 2280 had support from several public employees' associations, the California Building Industries Association, the Western Center, California Rural Legal Assistance and the California Coalition for Rural Housing, in addition to the League. As of that date -- a little over two months past introduction -- it was a smaller list of endorsers than SB 1. Carigg highlighted provisions in AB 2280 that were meant as safeguards against aspects of redevelopment agencies that became notorious in the past. He said the League had worked extensively with Alejo on "accountability" protections because "it doesn't do anybody any good" to restore the "tool" of redevelopment-type financing only to have "some issue in the newspaper or something" that would lead to legislative re-restriction. The current AB 2280, which includes Speaker Toni Atkins among its coauthors, would create "Community Revitalization and Investment Authorities" on a restricted Redevelopment-type template. The simplest restriction would exclude school funding from the tax increment arrangements automatically. In response to redevelopment districts' histories of finding "blight" in unlikely places, AB 2280 would define "blight" partly by local statistics tending to indicate disadvantage, though partly also by the presence of two conditions that seem open to definitional hair-splitting: "deteriorated or inadequate infrastructure" or "deteriorated commercial or residential structures". In partial response to old and deep urban grievances over "urban renewal" removals of communities of color, AB 2280 would provide for two of five members of an authority's governing board to be local residents. Additionally it would grant local residents and landowners an opportunity every ten years to revoke the authority itself, if they could navigate a difficult double procedure resembling labor union certification: in order to qualify for an election to revoke the authority, opponents would first have to organize a "majority protest", which would be achieved "if protests have been filed representing over 50 percent of the combined number of property owners and residents, at least 18 years of age or older, in the area." A proposal not exactly in this category, and not itself having much of a chance, but drawing some related heat from property-rights activists, is the Rutan & Tucker "Jobs and Education Development Initiative". This is a statewide initiative measure that, if qualified for the ballot and approved, would restore redevelopment agencies wholesale, but with a lower housing set-aside. The Legislative Analyst's Office analysis is at http://www.lao.ca.gov/ballot/2013/130773.aspx. Opponents and skeptics have derided it as the "Return of the JEDI". (See e.g. http://ij.org/california-redevelopment) Hedging Housing SB 1260, by Sen. Mark DeSaulnier, D-Concord, would apply a 25% affordable housing set-aside to either a Redevelopment-type or an IFD-type district, or to both side by side if need be. Like some of the piecemeal IFD bills mentioned above, it addresses the fear for affordable housing that follows from the lack of poverty-relief provisions in IFD law. A "Fact Sheet" from the Senator's office said it "harmonizes the housing provisions of redevelopment law (as proposed to be amended by SB 1 (Steinberg)) with those of Infrastructure Financing District law." Further, it sets requirements within the affordable housing requirement for targeting to moderate-, low-, and very-low-income residents. As of an April 2 legislative analysis the measure had formal support from California Rural Legal Assistance and the Western Center. The Santa Monica Mirror reported the Santa Monica City Council endorsed SB 1260 in March. http://bit.ly/1h2QZfr Carigg of the League of California Cities criticized the IFD end of the bill. He said an affordable housing set-aside could make a pro-IFD ballot measure more difficult to pass where affordable housing is unpopular, and if an IFD is intended for a small discrete project such a sewer line update, the housing set-aside could create enough extra complication to stop the mechanism from being used at all. City-Specific Bills A few city-specific bills are stating geography-based claims amid the political morass. San Francisco's city government is the driving force behind Sen. Mark Leno's SB 1404, which, per a "fact sheet" from Leno's office, would "provide a remedy for the destruction of low- and moderate-income housing units in San Francisco during urban renewal (1955-1975) that were never replaced." The bill is based on an argument that, owing in part to a bill by then-State Sen. John Burton in 2000, San Francisco's redevelopment agency effectively owes the city 5,947 units of unreplaced housing for Urban Renewal's wholesale destruction of densely populated housing, which would have been largely in the Western Addition and in the Yerba Buena region South of Market. The bill would allow tax-increment financing for such housing to continue to flow from six defined redevelopment project areas. Supporters listed in addition to city government figures are local and regional housing organizations. The Senate Local Government Committee's published legislative analysis is mildly skeptical. Another bill based on a claim of special crisis is AB 2549, brought by Assemblymember Mark Ridley-Thomas on behalf of Milpitas, which is embroiled in especially high-stakes litigation with Santa Clara County and the state over large, allegedly improper transfers of assets from the redevelopment agency to the city government that created it. An early version of the bill puts the loss at $39 million in local tax revenues with more money sought in the lawsuit. As of April 24 the measure was amended to refer generically to "recent losses of local funding" and "a lack of economic development tools." The meat of the bill hasn't changed, such as it is: it calls for creation of a commission of local dignitaries and area representatives to figure out what can be done about it, and especially how to continue encouraging "economic activity" in "the McCarthy Ranch area of the city near the Newby Island landfill". Assemblymember Rob Bonta, D-Oakland, has introduced a little-known economic development measure, AB 2292, that does not claim any crisis, but would provide for additional projects at three hotly debated Oakland locations: the former Oakland Army Base, Howard Terminal and Coliseum City. The first of these locations is the site of the much-debated Oakland Global development. The latter two locations are candidates for a proposed pro sports stadium complex. (See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3476; http://oaklandglobal.com/index.php/project/history-of-site; http://thealamedan.org/news/development-report-meanwhile-oakland .) Assemblymember Bonta's office referred inquiries on the bill to a staffer who had not responded as of this writing. New Territory Some legislative plans for purposes that might once have used redevelopment money are moving into other kinds of political territory entirely. SB 391, by DeSaulnier, would fund housing with a statewide $75 recording fee for real estate documents -- see http://lat.ms/1eYa86W. The more technically ambitious AB 2729, by Assemblymember Jose Medina, D-Riverside, is titled "Infrastructure Financing" but refers to an entirely separate funding scheme. The bill, which is still in a discussion phase, would expand use of the California Infrastructure and Economic Development Bank, or "I-Bank", to finance more infrastructure surrounding shipping in all its forms, including airports. What Next? It's unclear when a break may appear in the current state of uncertainty about which post-Redevelopment bills are possible. The May budget revisions, with their news about the April tax season, could create an occasion for the Governor to announce a changed position, but nothing at that stage is certain. Which leaves the Legislature tending their respective bits of unevenly verdant regrowth, reaching neighborly accommodations as to gardening in some matters, but mainly waiting for the man with the shears to go to work.