Articles

For planners, developers and local government officials, Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's budget proposal for 2005-06 might be as important for what it does not contain as for what it does contain.

An animal shelter project in the City of Long Beach that was partially funded by the city was not subject to the prevailing wage law for public works projects that was in effect at the time, the state Supreme Court has ruled.

Legend records that the dying Julius Caesar looks up to find his friend Brutus among his assassins. "Et tu, Brute?" (And you too, Brutus?) is his pathetic and much-quoted response. This tragic scene from the stage has nothing to do with land use politics in Santa Monica, of course - except for the smell of opportunism and something approaching betrayal of Santa Monica residents by their own city government. >>read more

For a variety of reasons, ranging from real estate prices to market demand to planning trends, New Urbanist projects are becoming more common in California. But the execution of these projects - the on-the-ground-reality - is spotty.

As two recent economic efforts illustrate, some job-creating projects require large public subsidies, and others do not. The public agencies running a former military base in San Bernardino and a reserve base in Moreno Valley waged a campaign involving millions of dollars in public subsidies in an effort to attract a DHL cargo sorting and shipping hub. March Air Reserve Base in Moreno Valley won the competition in December.

Everything about the federal government's newest endangered species recovery plan is big. It took nearly 10 years to complete. It addresses 33 types of plants and animals scattered across the length and breadth of California. It's 593 pages long.

Behold the common skateboard, a machine that can give new life to parks, especially those areas that previously seemed unusable. Little more than a plank of wooden laminate, this machine is shaped like a surfboard.

Orange County has approved a plan to develop what many people see as the last important piece of the county's urban development puzzle. The Rancho Mission Viejo Ranch Plan, approved by the Board of Supervisors in November, proposes 14,000 housing units on 23,000 acres on the largest privately owned tract of land remaining in the county.

Is this any place to build a resort? The Chemehuevi Indian Tribe Reservation in San Bernardino County is a vast field of parched, brown earth where temperatures can reach 120 degrees in the summer. To the southwest is the impressive desert landscape of the Whipple Mountains, a fine place to observe raptorial birds and wind-carved canyons, perhaps, but not a major tourist draw.

For the first time ever, San Joaquin County became the focus of ballot-box planning in California during the November election. Voters in Stockton sent mixed messages about growth, but the electorate in the south-county city of Tracy delivered two solid blows against development.

Imperial County is experiencing an unprecedented housing boom, with at least 1,000 new units a year going up. Depending on who is counting, somewhere between 12,000 and 20,000 additional units are in the pipeline - in a farming county with a population of only 155,000.

A plan by Santa Clara County to build a concert theater on a portion of the county-owned fairgrounds in south San Jose has drawn the ire of the City of San Jose and the downtown merchant community. Opponents of the county's project say a new performing arts venue belongs downtown, not in the mostly residential area where the fairgrounds is located.

After years of false starts and stumbles, the federal government has renewed its commitment to the troubled California Bay-Delta Program, breathing new life into the ambitious effort to fix the troubled centerpiece of the state's water system.

A final rundown of city- and county-level ballot measures from all over the state.