Articles

The Interstate10 corridor southeast of San Bernardino has served as a relief valve for Los Angeles metropolitan growth during recent years. But the recent real esate slowdown has hit the Beaumont-Calimesa-Yucaipa area hard, partly because of developer bankruptcies and other financial troubles, and partly because of questions about water.

The feds influence planning and development in California only indirectly. Environmental regulation such as the Endangered Species Act and the way money is spent, especially on transportation, help shape the landscape.

It has been a long time since that influence has changed. But in the next 12 months, two federal bills are likely to chart the federal course for the next decade or longer.

After five years, a planning effort for a new growth area in south San Jose has halted because a coalition of developers has ceased funding the effort. Coyote Housing Group, which includes Shapell Homes, Citation Homes and other developers, announced in mid-March that it would suspend funding for work on the Coyote Valley specific plan. The group cited the "extremely complex planning process" and complications with existing industrial entitlements in North Coyote Valley.

An air pollution fee on new development in the San Joaquin Valley has been upheld by a Fresno County Superior Court. Judge Donald Black rejected numerous arguments against the fee in a lawsuit filed by the California Building Industry Association (CBIA), the Modesto Chamber of Commerce, Valley Taxpayers Association and affordable housing developer Coalition of Urban Renewal Excellence.

The California Supreme Court has accepted a case of considerable importance to regional park and open space districts. The court will review a decision by the Fourth District Court of Appeal, which ruled that the Riverside County Regional Park and Open Space District could not sell about 80 acres to a community college district without voter approval.

Park districts say the Fourth District ruling, if upheld, would require districts to conduct elections not only for the sale of land, but also for routine matters such as land transfers and boundary adjustments. One upshot would be a reluctance to acquire new parkland, the districts warn.

The Coastal Commission's ability to prevent development by designating environmentally sensitive habitat areas appears to depend on the existence of a certified local coastal program (LCP).

In a case from Sand City, the First District Court of Appeal said the Coastal Commission could not overturn Sand City's approval of a 495-unit housing project based on the Commission's conclusion that the site is an environmentally sensitive habitat area (ESHA). The court said that because Sand City's LCP did not designate the site as ESHA, the Commission could not do so during an appeal of the housing project. However, in a case from Los Angeles County, the Second District Court of Appeal ruled that the Commission could reject a landowner's coastal development permit in part because the site is not covered by a certified LCP.

A controversial 225-square-mile annexation of territory in San Mateo County by the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District has been upheld by the First District Court of Appeal. The court rejected annexation opponents' arguments that the San Mateo County Local Agency Formation Commission's approval of the annexation was flawed.

Although the state's mounting budget deficit is expected to predominate in Sacramento for many months, 2008 could be a blockbuster year for land use legislation. Scores of bills related to planning, the California Environmental Quality Act, redevelopment, housing, the Subdivision Map Act, and other land use matters have been introduced during the first two months of the year or remain leftover from 2007.

This month's news roundup: The Legislative Analyst's Office has recommended that state lawmakers take charge of the Salton Sea restoration efforts; Stockton makes progress in court; the Coastal Commission runs a marathon; Santa Monica's mall closes for an overhaul.

A key document in the evolving methodology for evaluating development's impact on climate change has been released by the California Air Pollution Control Officers Association.  

Called "CEQA & Climate Change – Evaluating and Addressing Greenhouse Gas Emissions from Projects Subject to the California Environmental Quality Act," the white paper is lengthy (more than 140 pages), detailed and highly technical.

The city of Dublin in Alameda County bears little resemblance to the English countryside of the late 1800s. The scene is not sylvan, to put it mildly. Instead of a landscape of mills, farms and contented cows, we see one of the Bay Area's fastest growing cities, proliferating with enormous apartment blocks and office buildings. Although there are easily accessible, undeveloped hills rising just beyond the west and east sides of Dublin, it's doubtable that Constable, the painter of lowing herds and hayricks, would have memorialized the town on canvas.

What Dublin and the English countryside of 100 years ago have in common, however, are carefully planned villages that attempt to combine city living, including factory work and shopping, with the healthfulness of open space and farms.

Although redevelopment often seems like a never-ending process, redevelopment of Old Town Monrovia is nearly complete. The city is now switching its focus to redevelopment of an 80-acre area about one mile south of Old Town and studying how to tie together the two areas.