Tax-increment financing isn't coming back anytime soon. But the state government hasn't squeezed as much money out of redevelopment as expected. So what happens next? What tools does the state provide to California's local governments to stimulate new development – especially infill development, which the state is trying to encourage through policies designed to decrease greenhouse gas emissions and achieve other goals? The short answer is not much – at least not compared to redevelopment, which at its peak provided local governments (mostly cities) with $6 billion a year for urban projects. But a more nuanced answer would be that the state is now doing lots of little things – some formal, some informal – to try to give the locals some running room. In vetoing the latest tax-increment revival bill (see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3586), Gov. Jerry Brown made it clear – for the third year in a row -- that he has no interest in permitting redevelopment to rise from the grave. There has always been a theory (floated by me among others) that tax-increment revival would be a second-term Jerry Brown thing, but given Brown's animosity toward the League of Cities and his general stubbornness, this seems unlikely. Furthermore, Senate leader Darrell Steinberg – urban development's most effective advocate in the Legislature and one of the few in Sacramento who could go toe-to-toe with Brown – is now termed out, and Redevelopment has no obvious new main legislative champion in the wings. Of course, the Brown Administration is currently ramping up the Affordable Housing and Sustainable Communities program, which will expend the Strategic Growth Council's cut of the state cap-and-trade money. That means $130 million in the first year will be pushed out the door, mostly to fund affordable housing and infrastructure projects that support smart growth goals. (See coverage in this issue.) And the number could go up to several hundred million dollars annually in the out years. It will be the biggest infusion of cash into urban development that we've seen since Brown took office. But it's still just a fraction of the amount redevelopment provided. Meanwhile, the redevelopment wind-down front is settling down a little. The state is actually winning most of the hundreds of lawsuits filed by cities. (See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3575.) The cities have consistently argued that they should regain control over a wide variety of redevelopment projects and tax-increment revenue flows – and they have mostly lost. Even so, post-redevelopment experts say the state windfall of $1.7 billion per year that was expected a couple of years ago simply isn't materializing. In part, that's because successor agencies – guided by AB 1484 – have taken a cautious approach to selling former redevelopment agencies' real estate assets. Instead of taking a "fire sale" approach as originally required by the redevelopment dissolution bill, agencies are now preparing "Long-Range Property Management Plans" that focus on the orderly development or sale of assets over time. This will probably produce substantial long-term benefits for all taxing agencies concerned – including the cities that used to have redevelopment agencies – but it hasn't created a lot of short-term cash. As Nossaman lawyer Rick Rayl said at the California Chapter, American Planning Association, conference, last month: "The assets have produced a lot less than anyone ever thought. If you asked Gov. Brown, he might second-guess the whole decision. I don't think it has accomplished what he intended." That I'm not so sure about. It's not like Brown to admit a mistake, especially a high-profile one. But the bottom line is that if the end of redevelopment isn't producing as much cash for the state as Brown thought, it doesn't really matter. Between an improving economy and the temporary tax increase he secured in last year's election, his problem is not how to cover a deficit. It's what to do with a surplus. Which leads me to think that what's really happening – informally, with a law or an executive order or any formal policy direction – is that the Department of Finance is beginning to ease up on its demands to repurpose ex-redevelopment funds. Yes, the hundreds of lawsuits will continue to drag on – many of them are now pending in the appellate court. Yes, long-range property management plans will work their way slowly – very slowly – through the system. And yes, DOF will continue to drive successor agencies crazy with opacity and resistance every day on issues large and small. But DOF also seems to have figured out that, as a general principle, holding things up doesn't do anybody any good – least of all the state general fund. The greatest asset that former redevelopment agencies had in the bank when the program was killed wasn't real estate owned or cash in the bank. It was the potential upside of pending redevelopment projects then in the works. And the longer those holes in the ground sit there, the less money the state, the cities, and the other taxing entities will get in the long run. I'll tell one war story from my time in San Diego to make my point. At the time redevelopment was killed, Center City Development Corp. and Westfield were working on renovating Horton Plaza Park, outside the famous shopping center downtown. The project got caught up in the redevelopment wind-down and it was literally a hole in the ground with a tarp around it the entire time I worked in San Diego. But during that time, the successor agency and DOF successfully worked through two problems that were holding the project up – first, the transfer of the property from Westfield to the successor agency, and, second, the allocation of additional funds to finish the project when the bids came in higher than expected. At the beginning of redevelopment wind-down in 2012, you might not have seen much cooperation from DOF. But eventually DOF apparently realized that the value of the successor agency's real estate assets – including the park itself and whatever benefit might be derived from a long-delayed renovation of Horton Plaza itself – was likely to increase more and faster if the project moved along. All this doesn't mean that Brown will back off of his resistance to tax-increment financing in his second term, and as I said before it's not likely to end the distrustful dance between successor agencies and DOF. But it does mean that – now that the state has the luxury of focusing on long-term asset value rather than short-term cash --  longstanding redevelopment projects throughout the state will have an easier path to completion.

Here's a roundup of recent land use news items  – San Diego Environmental Lawyer Backs Infill The progressive Democratic community in San Diego has split openly over the question of allowing more density near light-rail stops, especially in mostly white middle-class neighborhoods. In particular, environmental attorney Marco Gonzalez – who stood alongside former City Councilmember Donna Frye in calling for Mayor Bob Filner's resignation last year – has now broken with Frye on the density question. At a forum sponsored by the San Diego Housing Federation recently, Gonzalez – brother of Assemblywoman Lorena Gonzalez – said: "From within the environmental community I thought it was important for us to say, ‘If we're going to fight sprawl, we have to incentivize infill' (dense projects within already-developed areas). So we had to ask ourselves some tough questions, and what I'm doing now at this point in my career is asking those people who used to be my clients, those activists, those community-character-spouting residents, to really address these presumptions." Gonzalez's longtime ally Frye has been a leader in opposing more density in the Clairemont district along the planned Mid-Coast light-rail line. She has been joined by interim Councilmember Ed Harris, a former head of the city lifeguard union, and failed City Council candidate Sarah Boot, both of whom – like Frye – share Gonzalez's natural constituency of coastal environmentalists. City of Marina Opposes Slant Drilling By Water Company The city of Marina continues to oppose an effort by the Cal-American water utility to drill a slanted test well to check if an aquifer under the ocean floor is suitable as a water source for a desalination plant. A news feature in Environment & Energy Publishing quoted local officials and activists as opposing the plan on grounds that the well, once dug, might end up being used for a desalination operation, or might itself worsen saltwater intrusion. The EEnews article linked to comments by the Remy Moose Manley firm on behalf of the Marina Coast Water District, opposing the Cal-Am appeal, alleging in part that the project's Draft Initial Study and Mitigated Negative Declaration failed to consider likely future uses of the well. The Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary's draft Environmental Assessment Report on the project from last June is here . The California Coastal Commission will take up the well proposal at its November 12 meeting. (See Items 14a and 15a at http://coastal.ca.gov/mtgcurr.html.) For more on the history and context of Monterey's water supply plans, see Larry Sokoloff's report at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3598. $5 Billion For A South Pasadena Tunnel? Caltrans and Los Angeles Metro were reportedly contemplating a monster pair of tunnels to extend the 710 freeway for nearly five miles under South Pasadena – at a cost of $5 billion. The LA Times a bit unfairly noted it would be longer than Boston's "Big Dig" . Longer, maybe. But more trouble? The Big Dig was a nightmare of a highway undergrounding job in a densely built 350-year-old city with four seasons and a high oceanfront water table. In the middle of it, Rep. Barney Frank once suggested that, rather than depress the Central Artery, it would be cheaper to raise Boston. So, five miles under the San Gabriel Valley? Technically speaking, could it be any worse? Politically, though, it could be. Neighborhood groups have been fighting the 710 extension since 1965 . In Brief … A big cluster of Strategic Growth Council grant applications fall due in the next several days, mostly on November 13. The League of California Cities has posted the list more or less as distributed by SGC. A generally favorable feature article in the 7x7 arts and leisure magazine alternates eye-candy renderings of San Francisco's futuristic "Transbay District" project plan with brief accounts of some of the project's challenges. The project would build large office and apartment towers and raised public spaces around the city's old bus station in the eastern South of Market district. Developers hope the site also will become a terminal for the Caltrain and High-Speed Rail. It recently hit a snag when the Board of Supervisors and developers turned out to disagree on the tax structure for a "community benefit district" to which the major developers would contribute. The Los Angeles Times reports a motion before the L.A. City Council would begin local implementation of the Legislature's Urban Agriculture Incentive Zones Act, but the Board of Supervisors must approve the idea first. Hudson Sangree of the Sacramento Bee posted news features on increased infill development in Sacramento and on plans by developer Michael Heller to convert the Crystal Ice and Cold Storage plant building to retail and office use. The Monterey Herald reported another in a series of delays is holding up the draft EIR on the "Monterey Downs" plan for a mixed-use development at decommissioned Fort Ord. The project would include 1,280 units of housing and a racetrack. The City of Seaside's page for the specific plan on the project is at http://seasidemontereydownsandveteranscemeteryspecificplan.com/ . The law firm of McKenna Long & Aldridge posted an update suggesting people who follow CEQA law and land use should look into efforts by the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) to update regulatory documents in the Air Toxics Hot Spots Program. See http://oehha.ca.gov/air/hot_spots/Sept2014HotSpotsRags_SRP.html.

As the new Affordable Housing and Sustainable Communities (AHSC) grant program neared its October 31 public comment deadline, the program was showing a more definite sense of institutional purpose, focused on promoting dense transit-oriented urban streetscapes. Would-be grant applicants may be disappointed if they expect AHSC to focus on maximizing affordable housing construction or promoting healthier living in small inland towns. Housing is a major statutory goal of the AHSC program, and the proposed grant criteria do allow some leeway for use in less dense areas. But this is not the comprehensive housing construction and rehabilitation program that housing and economic justice advocates would like to see the state enact. The Strategic Growth Council's presentation materials released in late October for the current, final round of public workshops on the program were full of reminders about AHSC's narrow focus. The materials said the program is able to make only a few grants -- 13 to 23 in the main part of the program for the coming year. The materials emphasized the goal of transit-oriented density in a look at "the big picture vision" through before-and-after renderings of urban street makeovers. These showed how a street could be made more prosperous and welcoming to visitors through denser, less car-oriented development. "Before" images depicted broad, rough-edged commuter arteries, with sparsely placed businesses, unevenly set back from the sidewalk by parking lots, often using old-fashioned or awkwardly hand-lettered signage. "After" images created a cozier, more prosperous look, using a palette of streetcars, bike lanes, trees, pedestrians, and upscale storefronts in better-kept, taller mixed-use buildings that snuggled right up to their sidewalks. In these images, the likes of International Boulevard in Oakland and El Camino Real in Santa Clara began to look more like the likes of Barcelona. The presentation called attention to a proposed requirement that appears in text surrounding Table 4 of the Draft Guidelines released in September . It would provide that housing developments supported by the program must have a transit station within a "walkable route" of half a mile. They would need to contain at least 100 units in a metropolitan area or 50 units elsewhere. Minimum net density for all-housing buildings would range from 20 to 60 units per acre by type of area; for mixed-use projects, minimum floor-to-area ratios would range up the same scale from 1.5 to 3.0. On two major outstanding questions -- identification of "disadvantaged communities" and definition of a role for regional government entities -- the new materials added little beyond the early-October staff report and SGC hearing discussion . On the belated CalEPA designation of "disadvantaged" census tracts that must be "benefited" by half of AHSC funds, the new materials said the choices "will be available in the next few weeks." The SGC Web site now provides a dedicated Web page for the AHSC program and a separate page for its separately administered farmland fragment, the Sustainable Agricultural Lands Conservation Program (SALC). Workshops seeking to explain and receive comment on the near-final design for the main AHSC program were being held October 23 through 28 , with plans to webcast the October 28 meeting in Sacramento. Workshops on the SALC program were set for October 24 in Oroville, October 29 in Bakersfield, and October 30 in Watsonville . Comments on both program designs are due October 31, respectively to http://sgc.ca.gov/s_ahscwebcommentform.php and ahsc_ag@sgc.ca.gov. The ARB cap-and-trade proceeds page displays 149 comments on the "disadvantaged communities" choice process. Comments submitted to the SGC have not yet been posted online. The late-October AHSC materials said a final draft of the guidelines would be posted December 1 in preparation for the December 11 meeting where the Strategic Growth Council will be asked to approve the whole plan.

The Coastal Commission's October docket in Newport Beach served up a fair slice of Southern California celebrity-involved madness and possibly more items than usual of old business of the it's-never-over variety. The Commission's most widely reported act of the month was to postpone consideration of an appeal on an unpopular proposal by entities linked to U2 guitarist David Evans, known as "The Edge," to build five large new houses in the Santa Monica Mountains. The Malibu Times and LA Times reported the postponement was for lack of adequate notice to stakeholders and the Commission would likely take up the matter again in January. The paper quoted Frank Angel, attorney for the Sweetwater Mesa Homeowners' Association, as calling the continuance "a huge game changer" because the Santa Monica Mountains Local Coastal Plan (LCP) was to take effect the Friday after the October Commission meeting. (On that approval see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3559; http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3474.) In a commentary ahead of the meeting , LA Times columnist Steve Lopez had questioned how Evans managed to get the hearing scheduled just before that effective date. In the staff report , summaries of public comments included celebrity relationship gossip and a mention of a Web site that formerly discussed the project, www.leavesinthewind.com. As of 2011 that site explained the plan as it then stood in some detail, promoting it in terms of environmental responsibility and high-concept design. Rejected in its original form that year, the project has since been reduced and redesigned for a less visible group of sites . The Laguna Beach Independent reported that Mark Christy, proponent of a renovation and rebuilding project at "The Ranch" in Aliso Canyon, brought three busloads of supporters to speak in public comment sessions at the Coastal Commission. It said speakers in Christy's favor included the Mayor Pro Tem and two City Council members. The Newport Beach Independent reported more than 60 supporters of The Ranch appeared, outnumbering participants in the monthly anti-fracking protest. The Commission has had rocky relations with Christy for some time. This month, as reported further at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3595 and in the Coastline Pilot , the Commission determined The Ranch had done unpermitted work on its outdoor landscape, including creation of a 7000-square-foot dance floor. Additional disputes concern whether Christy's proposed additions to the site will cause too much environmental harm, and whether the work he has already done on the mid-century resort buildings constitutes renovation or new construction. And this month the Coastline Pilot published a letter by Christy on an additional issue: the lack of a public trail on the site. He wrote that it wouldn't work for safety reasons because the resort includes a golf course. The Commission granted approval, with conditions , for a plan allowing the City of Los Angeles to sell the last seven house lots it owns on the rim of Potrero Canyon in Pacific Palisades. The plan comes with approvals for filling and grading by the city to stabilize the canyon rim. Proceeds will go into a special restoration fund for the park below the lots. The staff report recounts that the city bought 22 residential lots along the canyon in 1991 following litigation over landslides. Since then the city has been conducting restoration work in the area and selling house lots a few at a time to pay for each next stage of the project. This month's approval allows the city to sell the last seven lots without keeping an earlier promise that it would first complete a new park and riparian "habitat installation." Per the Los Angeles Times ' online archives the original landslide was in 1978 and coverage of city efforts to fix the problem dates back to at least 1985 and 1989 . Caltrans won confirmation of a 2012 approval to move about three miles of Highway 1 inland in San Luis Obispo County near Piedras Blancas. Shoreline erosion and bicycle safety were among the major concerns. The plan also brings the road farther away from a beach that is massively popular with elephant seals, hence decreasing the risk of sofa-sized marine mammals entering the roadway. On reconsideration, the Commission granted permission to the City of Los Angeles to install a seasonal ice rink on Venice Beach . The Commission had denied the permit initially in September because of objections to the city's prior handling of a zipline attraction and maintenance of nearby public bathrooms. San Diego got approval for its LCP amendment to license and regulate food trucks at parks and beaches . The Daily Pilot reported the Commission approved 23 "townhomes" for the former site of a Christian Science church in Newport Beach. The paper wrote, "The site along the 3300 block of Via Lido isn't far from where the former Newport Beach City Hall is to be replaced by a boutique hotel. Officials hope the move will inject life into the area." The Commission was still planning a workshop for December to consider methods of preserving public access to the cheap seaside family vacation. A cheerful mission at first glance, but conflicts over mitigation costs to developers to preserve low-cost access were less than cheerful through the summer, especially in July (see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3528). The Commission's meeting agenda, annotated with outcomes, is at http://coastal.ca.gov/meetings/mtg-mm14-10.html. News of the Commission during the rest of October was a mix of grants, enforcement actions and appeals. Napster and Facebook billionaire Sean Parker and his wife Alexandra Lenas got the label of "philanthropists" from a Monterey Herald report on their steps to comply with a Coastal Commission settlement. The settlement is in compensation for environmental damage caused at Big Sur by elaborate preparations for the couple's wedding in June 2013. Parker and Lenas agreed to sprinkle $1.2 million among eight environmental and education nonprofits on the Central Coast as part of a $2.5 million settlement payment. Parker also agreed to create a mobile app for the Commission to help coastal visitors to find beach access points. In another resolution of long-running old business, the Commission announced its approval of a "final plan to restore public access" to the Ontario Ridge trail in San Luis Obispo County.  More details from the Tribune here . Commission staff contributed to an Assembly hearing September 25 , primarily on dangers of desalination to sea life. The city of San Clemente got a $90,000 planning grant to work toward finishing its Local Coastal Program (LCP) certification. Newport Beach is applying for a similar grant. More jurisdictions' pending planning grant applications are posted online , awaiting decisions during the next couple of months. KIEM-TV reported the city of Eureka got a $250,000 grant to prepare a risk analysis on sea level rise. The Orange County Register reported Long Beach officials were moving toward approval of the Belmont Beach and Aquatics Center, a pricey remodel of the existing Belmont Plaza Pool for use in diving competitions. Columnist Bob Keisser objected that the new pool would be less ambitious than the old one in the scale of competition events it could host; he was among those calling for a bigger effort to potentially host 2020 Olympic trials. The local Daily Breeze reported the city of Rancho Palos Verdes was working on an amendment to its LCP to comply with a Coastal Commission determination that the current 70-foot flagpole at the Trump National Golf Club violated the existing LCP. San Diego's Friends of the Children's Pool filed suit over the Coastal Commission's decision to reserve the Children's Pool beach for seals during pupping season. Beach access advocates were additionally calling on the city to open sluiceways in the seawall to clean the sand. Sadly for an already-contested resource, the pool was reportedly part of an area closed for safety due to an October 14 sewage spill. The Santa Cruz Sentinel reported that Ross Eric Gibson of the La Bahia Coalition filed an appeal with the Coastal Commission against city approval of a plan to partly replace, partly renovate the historic La Bahia Hotel. The project would convert it from a 44-unit apartment building into a 165-room hotel, conference center and day spa.

The Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF) won two major takings law victories in late October. Clients championed by the property rights organization defeated a San Francisco law on compensation to tenants evicted under the Ellis Act, and managed to undo a coastal easement requirement that the court said was an unfair permit condition. San Francisco city attorney to appeal San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera announced he would appeal a ruling by U.S. District Court Judge Charles R. Breyer that struck down the city's new ordinance on compensation for tenants evicted under the Ellis Act. From its effective date in June until Breyer blocked it effective October 24, landlords who took an occupied unit off the rental market were required to pay their evicted tenants two years' worth of difference between the lost rent rate and the market-rate rent for a comparable unit in the city. The ruling in Levin v. City and County of San Francisco accepted arguments by the Pacific Legal Foundation (PLF) that the ordinance violated constitutional property rights. The PLF victory press release said the lead plaintiffs in the matter would have had to pay $118,000 to the tenant of the duplex where they live in order to rent their extra unit to friends or family. The SF Chronicle 's Bob Egelko has details of the ruling . He quotes Breyer as calling the compensation amount "an enormous payout untethered in both nature and amount to the social harm actually caused by the property owner's action." A copy of the ruling is available on PLF's Web site . Coastal property owners vindicated On October 23, the Second Appellate District reversed itself on rehearing in Bowman v. California Coastal Commission . The court had agreed as of April 15 to depublish its initial ruling in March and rehear the matter. The new ruling is a victory for the PLF's clients, Sandra Bowman and her sisters, who inherited a large San Luis Obispo County property, partly along the coastline, from their father, Walton Emmick. The sisters have been disputing Coastal Commission efforts to enforce a public access easement as a condition for a coastal development permit (CDP) to improve the dilapidated house and barn on a part of the property a mile inland. As discussed at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3452, the court's earlier ruling backed the Coastal Commission in finding that collateral estoppel barred the sisters from repudiating a public access easement that the county initially required of them as a condition for a CDP. The March decision gave a somewhat confused account of the facts, saying Emmick did renovation work in anticipation of that first CDP although it was issued after his death -- hence that he and his successors accepted the CDP's burdens along with its benefits. Accordingly the March court agreed with the Coastal Commission that the sisters could not take advantage of the county's decision to grant their application for a second CDP without the easement. The new opinion accepted the PLF's version of the facts: that Emmick did renovation work on the property only under county permits that were exempt from the CDP requirement because they did not "change the use or dimensions of the structure." It stated Emmick "did not make the repairs for which he sought authorization" under the initial CDP, hence that neither he nor his successors accepted any benefit under it. However, the court's new opinion was not based solely on this fresh understanding of the facts. It also said the easement exaction was unfair: "There is no rational nexus, no less rough proportionality, between the work on a private residence a mile from the coast and a lateral public access easement." The court found it immaterial whether the requirement was the Commission's or the county's fault. Regardless, the court said collateral estoppel doctrine calls for equitable results. Because of both the reinterpreted fact pattern and the lack of nexus between the renovations and the easement, the court found the equity requirement was not met. In a statement in April, the court had requested letter briefing on the standard of review. It said "the parties appear to agree" that the March ruling misapplied the substantial evidence rule to the administrative mandate question, in that it chose to consider only evidence supporting the prevailing party rather than "all relevant evidence even if it detracts from the administrative decision," as called for in La Costa Beach Homeowners' Assn. v. Cal. Coastal Comm. (2002) 101 Cal.App.4th 804. The court asked the parties whether the Commission should be treated as the sole authority to determine credibility of evidence, or, if not, how the La Costa case should apply. In the opinion that followed, the court looked to a phrase in La Costa saying "Courts may reverse an agency's decision only if, based on the evidence before the agency, a reasonable person could not reach the conclusion reached by the agency." It then based the decision on its own interpretation of the facts. The new, currently effective opinion is at http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/documents/B243015A.PDF.

News Item: the Los Angeles City Council has rescinded a long-standing ordinance requiring all high-rise buildings in the downtown area to have rooftop helipads . When the ordinance was in effect, all downtown buildings were flat-headed in design to accommodate the helipads. The result was a skyline of monotonous uniformity and "architectural mediocrity," according to the New York Times . There is only one way to provide an adequate commentary on this situation: A Greek tragedy. SCENE: LATE NIGHT IN DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES. A GREEK CHORUS, MADE UP ENTIRELY OF FLAT-HEADED BUILDINGS, CHANTS IN UNISON. CHORUS OF FLAT-HEADED BUILDINGS: Oh, misfortune! Our reign has come to a sorry end. Gone is our skyline, unique in all the world, of uniform flatness. Gone, alas, are the days when ‘copters swarmed us The way butterflies swarm poppy fields. No more to hear The sweet sound of chop-chop-chop-chubba-chubba-chop-chop. Goodbye, copters! Goodbye cops! Farewell, first responders in MedEvacs! For the Chief Fireman has said, in his annoying nasal voice,    ‘Go not to rooftops any more, oh thou office workers of LA! People in emergencies should stay put, and wait for help.'  What kind of poppycock is that? Does this mean That choppers are never more to land on our flat, bald heads, Each with a target for helicopters marked "X" in the center,  Seen by none but birds, planes, God and Google Earth? No more will high-rise buildings look like us, the flat-headed tribe. The next generation won't have that special look -- that is to say, The look of a bunch of wooden boards at the hardware store, Standing upright, that nobody has bought. Enter THE TRANSAMERICA TOWER, a famous pointy-headed building from San Francisco. TRANSAMERICA TOWER: Oh, go ahead and moan, you inane band of overgrown cigar boxes. Snivel, if you want. You're through. The future belongs to sharper shapes. Just as skyscrapers with syringe-like tops were the toast of Manhattan In the Golden Age, so once again pin-head buildings will come to rule Your snoozefest of a skyline. FLAT-HEADED BUILDINGS: Insult added to injury! You pyramidal monstrosity, come to torment us Just when we're feeling totally like we can't deal. TRANSAMERICA TOWER (being really obnoxious) But deal you must. This is progress, enlightenment, artistic freedom! Face it, anvil-brains, you don't stack up when compared with Tokyo Or all those Chinese cities with their pointy tower things. Boring, boring! FLAT-HEADED BUILDINGS: You can laugh and scorn, you irresponsible pinhead! You, who never shouldered any social responsibility. Our very heads spoke of preparedness. TRANSAMERICA TOWER: Yes, and for that reason, you get no standout buildings by the Starchitects, Those favorites of Zeus and Hera, who got them jobs with the other gods. FLAT-HEADED BUILDINGS: What bosh! Know ye not that we are of the International Style? Just as the Seagram Building by Mies van der Rohe, and its wife, the green-skinned Lever House by Skidmore Owings Merrill, The legendary New York pair that gave birth to all the office buildings that came after them, were both flat of brow? What say you of that, you much-derided pinhead! TRANSAMERICA TOWER: Don't remind me of my poor reception when first built! Though I stand by the Bay, I was by designed by an Angeleno, The hard-partying Bill Pereira. Now I am a symbol of San Francisco! Take that, you derivative clump of banalities! ENTER the Heydar Aliyev Cultural Centre, a recent building in Baku, Azerbajian by Zaha Hadid. This exquisite building, widely portrayed in published photos during recent months, is elliptically curved in profile. HEYDAR ALIYEV CULTURE CENTRE (with a slightly husky voice): Hey boys, stop fighting. You're not just wrong, you're stuck in the past. Look at my beauty and be struck speechless as Buster Keaton. Flat, pointed, who cares? It's irrelevant. FLAT-HEADED BUILDINGS: You look like a woman in a head-scarf Standing in a strong breeze. I think we are in love. TRANSAMERICA BUILDING (to HEYDAR ALIYEV CULTURAL CENTER) You call us irrelevant? You're from Azerbajian, for crying out loud. The client is a dictator who builds what he wants, regardless of cost. Plus, you're a cultural center, not an office building, so you don't count. And you were designed by Zaha Hadid. Her office buildings On the whole, have flat tops! HEYDAR ALIYEV CULTURAL CENTER: All true. I'm just making a point, you pecan-brained dinosaurs. The future can be flat, pointed or free-form like me. The point is that LA can enjoy some variety, and catch up With the skyline of a second-tier Chinese city, maybe, if it tries. As for Tokyo or Dubai, however … oh, just give up now.  CHORUS OF FLAT-TOP BUILDINGS (highly offended): You decadent hussy! Irrational product of extravagance and waste! HEYDAR ALIYEV CULTURAL CENTER: Don't try to fluster me with your bluster, bub. Like the song says, you ain't so big, you're just tall, that's all.

In brief California land use news this week: Curbed and the LA Times reported that the legendary La Mirada Avenue Neighborhood Association and attorney Robert Silverstein may have reversed the opening of a 22-story, 299-unit residential development in Hollywood. Because of the neighborhood challenge, developer CIM group may have to displace the first 40 tenants who have moved into its Sunset/Gordon tower. A judge found CIM's construction permits invalid after the association objected that demolition of the prior building on the site was improper. Potential applicants for HUD's $1 billion in resiliency money may be interested in a large, varied calendar of webinars discussing the program and its goals. For prior notes on the program see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3587. Environment California held an event in Santa Cruz to remind the public of the November 14 comment deadline on EPA's "Waters of the United States" proposed rule. The comment deadline on the proposed rule has already been extended twice . If approved, the EPA's proposal would extend the definition of waters that the Clean Water Act regulates to include smaller bodies of water and even wetlands. The EPA has given the proposed rule its own Web page at http://www2.epa.gov/uswaters. The Cupertino General Plan is nearing final approval. A recent Mercury News item lays out the remaining short timetable and (unsurprisingly) notes density levels in the housing element as an outstanding issue. Los Angeles County's running conflict over large solar arrays flared up in the San Fernando Valley. The LA Times reported a lawsuit was filed by PHL LLC and Foothill Solar, LLC  alleging the North Valley Area Planning Commission unfairly rejected a project application as incomplete. The San Luis Obispo Tribune reported a conflict over airport zoning "derailed" the city's General Plan update process this week. Two City Council members held up the plan by refusing to join a vote overriding the local Airport Land Use Commission's "safety zone" limits on development at the south end of the city. The General Plan itself can't pass until a deal is reached or the Council changes membership -- but that membership may change at the upcoming November election. The Tribune had editorialized that the airport body was inexplicably over-limiting construction in "the logical place for residential development to occur." The Tribune also reported that environmental advocates sued the Cambria Community Services District under CEQA, alleging the district tried to build "a permanent desalination plant intended for long-term operation under the guise of a temporary emergency facility." In another case of what seem to be frequent small-airport control issues lately, the city of Ontario was in litigation with the City of LA and its Los Angeles World Airports (LAWA) entity. The Bakersfield Press-Enterprise reported Ontario alleged LAWA was neglecting the Ontario airport's marketing but also wouldn't cede control to local managers. The SF Business Times reported Mayor Ed Lee has a "housing working group" trying to negotiate incentives to get private developers to add affordable housing to the city. Also this week in San Francisco, the Chron reported the developer of "what will become the highest condo tower west of the Mississippi River" agreed to pay $1.26 million per unit rather than build 11 units of below-market-rate housing. Last summer in San Francisco the MonkeyParking app startup was cease-and-desisted , parodied , and finally left town . Now it's having a similar time in LA County. The League of California Cities spotted news that Santa Monica and Beverly Hills banned the app, which helps people to sell the news that they're about to leave a public parking space. West Hollywood was considering a ban , and the LA City Council's transportation committee has voted to draft an ordinance banning private sales of public parking. The LA Times quoted Councilmember Mike Bonin calling it "the stealing economy masquerading as the sharing economy." Large-scale San Francisco housing development has finally branched out into the low-rise residential Inner Sunset neighborhood. J.K. Dineen reports in the SF Chronicle that Westlake Urban of San Mateo has proposed to replace the 86-unit Kirkham Heights apartment complex with 460 units of housing likely to serve medical staff and students from nearby UCSF. Sacramento Bee water writer Matt Weiser visited the Carlsbad desalination plant for a news feature on the project as a test case. He writes that it's being widely watched to see if its physical, environmental and financial challenges can be met in ways that work for the rest of California. His article makes a helpful companion piece to an earlier, more legalistic Latham and Watkins review of the Carlsbad project as "a case study of permitting and approvals." The Metropolitan Water District raised incentives for SoCal water agencies to recycle, recover or desalinate water. It's now offering $340 per acre-foot . (Item via League of CA Cities.) The Santa Barbara Independent reports the Arroyo Toad may soon no longer be officially endangered. The San Diego U-T reported the city of Escondido rejected a shelter for immigrant children "for reasons including traffic, safety, parking and community character." The San Francisco Planning Commission is expected in November to continue review of a Reasonable Modification Ordinance for disability accommodations. The measure would create a process for an individual with a disability to request reasonable modification to a building to remove a barrier to fair housing access. The LA Daily News reported the City Council gave Anschutz Entertainment Group "an additional six months to find a football team to play in the developer's proposed downtown stadium." Per most recent glance at the CalEPA Environmental Justice page , there's still no word on the designations of "disadvantaged" census tracts that were due by the end of September. As we've noted before, it's a tough, highly political decision . Early this month the Santa Rosa Press Democrat published a thoughtful extended news feature on The Sea Ranch and its lasting effects on regulation of California coastal development.

A new template for land use and preservation is forming across some 1,800 square miles of Los Angeles County's high, dry northeastern backlands. Its first increment could establish some key development permissions by mid-November, especially affecting the large Centennial new-town design, other construction plans, and solar energy arrays. The Antelope Valley (AV) Area Plan is tentatively scheduled for a vote by the LA County Supervisors on November 12. That approval, if granted, will be significant -- especially for the currently rural site along Highway 138 where the Tejon Ranch Co. has for years been laying regulatory groundwork to build a master-planned town it calls Centennial. There are also General Plan revisions afoot in two areas that affect the AV Plan area most: changes to boundaries and rules for Significant Ecological Areas (SEAs) and a renewable energy ordinance. (A plan to develop transit-oriented districts (TODs) is part of the same General Plan update process but affects more urban areas. The north edge of its "overview map" is in Pasadena.) The Antelope Valley plan area (see map ) covers rugged northeastern Los Angeles County, from the southeast-slanting San Andreas Fault to the Ventura, Kern and San Bernardino County lines, excluding incorporated areas around Lancaster and Palmdale, and applying as a limited overlay to federal property such as Edwards Air Force Base. It extends south of the fault to include the whole mass of the San Gabriel Mountains (including the new San Gabriel Mountains National Monument ), and the north half or so of the Angeles National Forest above Santa Clarita. The Centennial site is near the current northern limit of suburban development that looks toward Los Angeles. Above it are mountain ridges that, for the present, occupy a gap between the footprints of greater Los Angeles and greater Bakersfield. Mark Child, deputy director of advance planning with the L.A. County Department of Regional Planning, said the proposed SEA designation and governing ordinance changes would most affect the Antelope Valley area rather than other parts of L.A. County, especially now that sensitive habitats in the Santa Monica Mountains are being separately regulated by the new Santa Monica Mountains Local Coastal Plan and, farther inland, the Santa Monica Mountains North Area Plan. He said some SEAs are affected in the San Gabriel Valley and Puente Hills, but they are small in comparison to the Antelope Valley. Environmental and community activists' concerns have included keeping rural places rural, ensuring "heavy agriculture" upzoning doesn't allow solar arrays as of right (Child said it doesn't), and, especially, limiting density in three "Economic Opportunity Areas" (EOAs) that the AV Area Plan designates for concentrated development. They have also questioned whether enough big-picture environmental regulation is in place to avoid harmful cumulative effects. Major affected landscapes include the western tip of the Mojave Desert with its wild poppy fields and Joshua trees, and the knot of the Coast, Transverse and Sierra Nevada mountain ranges, including condor habitat, where I-5 climbs over Tejon Pass toward LA from the foot of the Central Valley. Landowners, from owners of single-house lots to managers of mining and ranching concerns, have been asking nervously how certain they can be of future requirements under tiered processes that the program-level rules are designed to set up but not resolve. In addition to Centennial and other housing developments, major affected industries and projects under the AV Area Plan and General Plan amendments include aggregate mines, cattle ranchlands, oil and gas wells, and solar energy businesses. For L.A. County's rural lands at present, it isn't easy to parse what will be decided where, how conclusively, and when. There are multiple rulemaking tracks; there are tiering provisions in the proposed rules that defer major decisions selectively, and there's uncertainty yet to resolve on how the new rules will take up the threads of older planning processes. The AV Area Plan and Centennial As previously reported at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3587, the Regional Planning Commission approved the AV Area Plan September 27. Its accompanying Draft EIR remained open for comment until October 6 -- viewed as procedurally possible because the Commission's action September 27 was only a recommendation to the Board of Supervisors; the Supervisors bear responsibility for definitely approving the plan and certifying its EIR. which will probably occur at the same time. (Sitting as the Airport Land Use Commission, the Regional Planning Commission approved the plan's compatibility with relevant airport plans.) The AV Area Plan, updating the existing 1986 General Plan component for the area, has been under review since 2008 in what has also been labeled the "Town and Country" planning process. However, new versions of the plan, and an extensive new Draft EIR, were published on a brisk schedule this summer, with the DEIR Notice of Preparation (NOP) posted June 12, revised planning documents posted July 23 and August 22, and the extensive DEIR documents posted August 22. (Comments on the AV Area Plan leading up to the September 27 hearing are labeled as "correspondence" and "supplemental package" documents as part of the meeting materials .) The new plan would encourage the proposed Centennial development by establishing policy statements in favor of upzoning at the intended town site. However, it would not allow building permits to be granted for the new densities as of right. Centennial's proponents would still have to bring a more detailed proposal through a full specific plan review process -- and it's not clear when they will decide the time is ripe for them to follow through. According to Child and Supervising Regional Planner Susan Tae, out of the three "Economic Opportunity Areas" (EOAs), only the west EOA, which includes the Centennial site, has a strict provision to ensure future review is coordinated. Any proposal to build more than five units of housing in the west EOA would trigger a requirement to begin a full specific plan coordinating infrastructure and environmental protections for the whole area. The county could also choose to begin a community plan there in the next five years. The published summary of September 27 changes to the AV Area Plan says affected properties in the west EOA are those of two particular owners: the Tejon Ranch Company and Bruce Burrows. In the west EOA, the AV Area Plan sets as general policy the possibility of zoning levels up to maximum caps described in the Plan's Map 2.1 . The green-veined yellow patches of H5 zoning (five housing units per acre) as shown in the map's upper left corner would be defined as generically appropriate for the east half of the proposed Centennial development site. Later on, the actual zoning changes would need to be adopted legislatively as part of a future specific or community plan, and their exact values would depend on the overall design of the project as then proposed. (In a choice that confused some activists, the DEIR's Figure 3.7, at Page 27 of Chapter 3 , sets out the lower A-2-10 "heavy agriculture" densities that would apply without a specific plan.) The Center for Biological Diversity has objected starting at the NOP stage to the use of any H5 zoning on the Centennial site. As of a Tejon Ranch Co. amended 10-K filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission last March, the company was still discussing plans for 23,000 units of housing at Centennial. County planning staff say the maximum buildout under zoning envisoned by the AV Area Plan would be less -- more like 17,000 units -- but either would be a long way from the site's current population of zero. The Tejon Ranch Co. as of its March report held a 72.83% interest in the project's proponent entity, Centennial Founders, LLC, with minority partners Tri Pointe Homes (formerly Pardee Homes), Lewis Investment Company and Standard Pacific Corp. . (For prior discussion of Tejon Ranch real estate plans in the context of the Kern Water Bank EIR ruling see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3597.) SEA boundaries changing by stages Proposed new SEA boundaries are important for Centennial and for the AV area plan in general. Although the new SEAs are larger, it's disputed whether they actually increase environmental protection. Where former SEAs required buffer zones to surround them, the new approach is to expand the defined boundaries to include buffer zones within them. Similar changes were already adopted in 2011 for the Santa Clarita Valley area, which includes the Newhall Ranch planned-town site. (See http://planning.lacounty.gov/sea/proposed.) The Commission's September 27 action removed the SEA designation from a major area of the Centennial town site, between its east boundary at a farm road incongruously named "300th Street", and the west branch of the California Aqueduct, which forms a north-south divider across the site. (A separate SEA pullback limited barriers to development in the Central Economic Opportunity Area southwest of Edwards. For details see the September 27 summary document .) Child wrote that the west EOA changes "aim to strike a balance between habitat conservation and environmental protection, and economic development that is important to the Antelope Valley and Los Angeles County as a whole. As the most valuable habitat and habitat linkage within this landholding is on the western end where the SEA designation remains, the area removed seems not as critical to the overall viability of SEA protections in the area." But Greg Medeiros, vice president of the Centennial Founders LLC development entity, asked the Commission on October 8 to also remove SEA status from the area west of the Aqueduct, saying, "Both commercial and residential land use remain within the SEA overlay within the west EOA boundary. This commercial development is critical in developing a balanced community that can provide necessary services and jobs." He assured: "Removing the SEA designation does not mean that biological resources will be ignored. Project-level environmental review during site design within the EOAs will require avoidance and mitigation if necessary to comply with both CEQA and Fish and Wildlife permitting requirements." Countywide, the proposed SEA changes have been divided among three different regulatory calendars: Some SEA boundary revisions that form part of the AV Area Plan will be before the Supervisors for approval November 12. SEA boundary changes elsewhere in the county go to the Regional Planning Commission as part of a General Plan update item December 10. Revisions to the current Draft 6 of the SEA Ordinance, which calls for protective measures to be determined in part by environmental reviews of each building site, were taken off calendar as of the Commission's October 8 meeting to allow more discussion. The issues taken off calendar as "ordinance" matters include issues such as whether existing uses will be grandfathered. For example, at the October 8 hearing, Jeff Mace of ERA Energy asked if his company's 3000 acres of oil and gas wells and grazing land would be subject to new SEA requirements with effects such as new fencing requirements. Some landowners saw the proposed environmental review process as a source of uncertainty. At the hearing, land use consultant Peter Gonzalez said he couldn't clearly advise a landowner on building rights in an SEA zone if a county biologist's review still had to determine each parcel's level of sensitivity under the proposed SEA ordinance. Marta Golding Brown, representing the Building Industry Association for Los Angeles and Ventura Counties, told the Commission that the proposed mitigation ratios were excessive in requiring up to four acres open space for one acre of disturbed land, and the SEA boundaries themselves were oversized: "The SEA expansion virtually walls off all unbuilt or remaining lands in the jurisdiction. As a result, future population growth will need to be accommodated by dramatically increasing densities in the existing developed areas." She urged the Commission to combine SEA and CEQA mitigation processes in a single procedure and closed with the comment, "Please reduce the SEA overlays in the county to those areas having biota to protect." Environmental advocates weren't happy with the proposed SEA ordinance either: some said it had the unintended effect of elevating mitigation into a first choice for developers instead of encouraging them to avoid doing harm in the first place. Gary George of Audubon California told the Commission, "It's kind of a free pass straight to compensatory mitigation." Another environmental concern was whether single-family homes ought to be exempted from SEA requirements, or whether they, too, should be required to reduce their footprints. High SEAs A perennial concern in northwestern LA County has been whether the SEAs in the high desert and mountains provide sufficient "connectivity" or "linkages" for wildlife to travel among the several types of habitat that converge in the area, especially where I-5 traverses the Grapevine. (A slightly dated but informative "connectivity and construction" map from April gives a sense of the principles guiding SEA designations.) Child said a key purpose of updating the boundaries was to allow for linkages -- not necessarily to maintain land in "pristine" condition, but to allow for wildlife movement -- for example, by maintaining a corridor of grassland that might not itself be valuable habitat, but that would allow wildlife to move between developed areas. For the Centennial site an added uncertainty for activists is whether currently envisioned planning processes will make use of the work already done in an SEA-related environmental advisory process on a prior Centennial specific plan effort that was begun in 2008 but then deferred. As suggested by a 2008 Center for Biological Diversity press release , the SEATAC was sympathetic to critics who questioned not just how development might be made more eco-friendly at Centennial, but why any new project had to be built on the site.  The September 8, 2008, minutes of a SEATAC meeting on Centennial, still available on the county's site , shows a level of concerned review that gets literally into the weeds. The board discusses protection of grasslands, creekside habitat, watersheds and linkages, concerns about "leapfrog" developments surrounded by open space, the fortunes of species including badgers, lizards, owls, pumas, and the Tehachapi Pocket Mouse, a request to hear more about the futures of antelopes and raptors, and possible relocation of the Pacific Crest Trail onto the Tejon Ranch lands. Child wrote: "The future level and scope of environmental/biological review in this area would not be less careful than the review by SEATAC in 2008. The project is still subject to CEQA requirements and the County's consultation with responsible and trustee agencies would ensure that the project identifies and mitigates for any and all potential environmental impacts, including biota. Comments received from SEATAC regarding the project specifically, and the general region as important habitat land, would still be applied in the review of the project." Tae wrote that where SEATAC review is currently required for all SEA Conditional Use Permits (CUPs), the new ordinance would direct some projects to the county biologist, and others to SEATAC, with SEATAC "considered the higher review". Centennial's design was publicized more specifically before about 2008. The project stressed its environmental smart growth aspirations, discussing ways the project could be environmentally responsible and partly self-contained, even if residents commuted to jobs elsewhere. Now Centennial's main link from the Tejon Ranch Web site is a "Coming Soon" placeholder page. More detailed prior materials on the plan , including previews of the town's design , have been taken offline since last September . The Centennial Scout, a weblog formerly maintained for Centennial Founders, LLC by its community development manager, last posted in August 2011. It remains uncertain when the Centennial Founders management may decide the time is right to go ahead with their specific plan. So it's clearly enough in the project's interest to lock in as many permissions as possible for the 20-year duration of a General Plan update. In the meantime, the Ranch's interest sounds warmer with respect to its more recently proposed Grapevine development in Kern County. The Tejon Ranch Co.'s amended 10-K as filed in March 2014 stated, "California regulatory dynamics may impact the future ability to entitle new development so we began the land planning and entitlement process for Grapevine during 2013 to take advantage of the existing favorable pro-business and political climate in Kern County." The Tejon Ranch is the subject of a 2008 settlement in which five environmental groups, including the Sierra Club but not the Center for Biological Diversity, agreed not to oppose future development on the ranch in return for a conservation program affecting much of the Tejon Ranch land. Opposition to Centennial and other projects has been less widely expressed in the six years since then. The March amended 10-K stated, "The Conservation Agreement we entered into with five major environmental organizations in 2008 is designed to minimize the opposition from environmental groups to these projects and eliminate or reduce the time spent in litigation once governmental approvals are received. Litigation by environmental groups has been a primary cause of delay and loss of financial value for real estate development projects in California." Solar up next On a slower schedule, hearings are expected this winter on a renewable energy land use ordinance for projects such as solar arrays. Tae wrote that the draft EIR would likely appear in November, with the Regional Planning Commission to take it up in January. Tae and Child wrote that the ordinance has to reach the Supervisors by March to help the county qualify for a grant out of the Renewable Resource Trust Fund related to Assembly Bill X1-13. Child said there had been anxieties that a large-scale upzoning of about 190,000 acres to A-2, "heavy agriculture," in the Antelope Valley Area Plan would allow large solar arrays as of right. In fact he said that while A-2 zoning is a prerequisite for solar arrays, the ordinance would regulate such approvals and they would require conditional use permits to go through. The county's public tally of proposed utility-scale renewable energy projects to date shows most such projects are solar; there have been a few wind turbine schemes. The renewable energy ordinance review will need to interact with the California and federal EIR/EIS for the Desert Renewable Energy Conservation Plan , which was posted for review September 26. Major solar energy developers are among the commenters on early stages of the energy ordinance.

In brief legal news this week: The State Supreme Court confirmed a victory for high-speed rail by declining to review the Third District's ruling in California High-Speed Rail Authority v. Superior Court (Tos) . The case upheld the High-Speed Rail Authority's authorization to issue bonds for the project. The Sacramento Bee had details on immediate reactions. For details of the ruling see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3546. Planetizen has more context at http://www.planetizen.com/articles/node-71723 . Prominent developer-side firms had asked the State Supreme Court to order publication of Save Our Heritage Organisation (SOHO) v. County of San Diego , but the high court refused . What remains on the record is only the Fourth Appellate District's unpublished ruling in favor of the EIR to replace a city-owned historic warehouse building with mixed-use development. The State Supreme Court denied requests for both review and depublication of the Fifth District's ruling in North Coast Rivers Alliance v. Westlands Water District . That ruling upheld the application of a grandfathering rule to exempt a two-year interim water contract from CEQA review because its predecessor contract was set up in 1963, before CEQA was invented. For details of the Fifth District decision see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3539. (And in separate news, the LA Times ' Bettina Boxall wrote a stemwinder of a water feature on a proposed deal to let the Westlands Water District off from a $360 million debt to the Bureau of Reclamation for its part in the extension of the Central Valley Project.) Judge Timothy Frawley confirmed his rejection of both of the CEQA lawsuits against the Sacramento Kings basketball arena project. For prior recent moves in the case see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3599. Local coverage in the Willits News celebrated the North Coast Rail Authority's CEQA exemption victory last month over two environmental groups who opposed increased use of an existing rail system. The paper reports the First District appellate decision (see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3584) may allow lumber to be shipped from Willits by rail for the first time since the 1990s. Encinitas homeowners Thomas Frick and Barbara Lynch, whose effort to build a seawall has been blocked by the Coastal Commission and the Fourth District state appellate court, have now requested review from the California Supreme Court. The attorney filing their appeal was Paul J. Beard of the Pacific Legal Foundation. Beard told the San Diego Union-Tribune , "We are asking the California Supreme Court to hear this case so that these homeowners, and all property owners along the coast, can be protected from the Coastal Commission's obsessive crusade against seawalls." For detailed coverage of the Fourth District's decision, see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3572. The Fourth District's online docket shows it denied a request for rehearing in September. The landlord of the "Friendly Village" mobile home park in Milpitas has appealed the city's federal court victory (see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3567), which blocked it from raising rents by 50 to 90 percent. The Mercury News reported the city has already approved $30,000 for attorneys' fees to fight the appeal before the Ninth Circuit. (Item via League of CA Cities.)

With the American Planning Association National Conference arriving in Los Angeles tomorrow, it's likely that more planners than usual will not just be attending lectures and idly networking but rather will be actively, and sometimes desperately, trying to remain in the profession.  Gov. Jerry Brown's decision to eliminate redevelopment agencies has not only sent cities into a frenzy and threatened thousands of projects, it also may be sending thousands of planners, and other land use professions, into a dismal job market. Although many planners are hanging on as staff for successor agencies, as 2012 progresses, many expect that competition for scarce planning jobs will grow ever more intense.  Just before redevelopment agencies had to shut down Feb. 1, the California Redevelopment Assoc. conducted a survey to roughly determine how many staff members of redevelopment agencies would be laid off.  "At the time, we estimated 2,500-3,000 employees of redevelopment agencies would be laid off as a result (of elimination)," said CRA interim executive director Jim Kennedy.  As recently as a year ago, redevelopment had appeared to be one of the most secure career paths for urban planners, even amid state- and city-level budget crises. The passage of Prop. 22 had ensured that agencies would be fully funded, until the governor and legislature eliminated them entirely. Many redevelopment planners are expected to seek refuge with municipal planning offices, but many of them have also downsized because of budget cuts.  "It's pretty financially constrained these days," said Kennedy. "We're not engaged in a high level of hiring activity.  I would suspect that it's a buyer's market." Ironically, the elimination of redevelopment could heighten the need for capable planners in cities across the state—if only cities had the money to hire them.  "Redevelopment helped fund many local services, including planning efforts for urban areas that were in the greatest need," said Kevin Keller, a planner with the Los Angeles Dept. of City Planning and president of the California Chapter of the American Planning Association. "The removal of this tool actually increases the need for planners to fill this void, but the public sector job market will likely remain flat for the immediate future."  In municipal planning departments, many planning functions that used to be conducted in-house are now being outsourced to private firms, meaning there are fewer permanent staff positions than ever.  "As governments have downsized, they're starting to look to more outside help for what they consider interim needs," said Phil Carter, president of PMC, a Rancho Cordova-based consulting and placement firm that specializes in public sector, land use-related careers.  Those jobs that are available may not be considered dream jobs. Many planning departments consider long-term planning and vision-setting positions to be the most expendable.  "We're seeing a continued slowdown in the demand by local government for certain types of planners, mostly those who are working on larger-scale design-type projects: urban landscapes or downtown plans," said Carter.  Meanwhile, Carter said that those jobs that are available tend to focus on relatively mundane administrative tasks, such as the processing of development applications.  The Los Angeles planning department is one of few agencies that intends to hire new employees in the foreseeable future. It may be an anomaly, however, because its funding is coming from grants rather than from sustained revenues or contributions from the city's general fund.  For planners on the job market, flexibility and geography may offer keys to success--as long as job-seekers are determined to remain in planning. Kenny Lousen, president of the Associated Students of Planning at Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, said that some graduating students who have studied redevelopment have resigned themselves to exploring other lines of work.    "A lot of the students are focusing on whether they should go to grad school first or if they should start somewhere that's not their forte," said Lousen.  Eva Yuan-McDaniel, deputy director of planning at the Los Angeles planning department, said that lack of experience should not necessarily deter applicants. The department hires, in large part, according to an applicant's score on the city's civil service exam.  "You are not discriminated against just because you got out of school…or because you left school two decades ago," said Yuan-McDaniel.  In fact, graduating students may not, however, have the hardest time on the job market. Because applicants need to be flexible, Carter described something of a sweet spot for job seekers: a few years of experience, but not so much experience that they have committed to a particular function.  "Certainly someone with 3-5 years of a good urban planning background has a leg up on someone coming out of school," said Carter. "At the same time, we'll run into people who have been in the business for 10-15 years and they have locked themselves into a way of doing things that a younger person hasn't yet." Even though redevelopment agencies had been located in cities throughout the state, Carter recommended that job seekers be willing to relocate to increase their chances of landing jobs. He noted that development activity is likely to pick up in cities far more quickly than it will in rural  areas and in outlying areas that experienced housing booms in the early 2000s.  "There are huge geographic voids in the state," said Carter. "The more urban settings are more active." Contacts:  Phil Carter, PMC, 866.828.6PMC Kevin Keller, California Chapter, American Planning Association, www.calapa.org Eva Yuan-McDaniel, Los Angeles Dept. of City Planning, 213.978.1244

Gov. Jerry Brown's successful effort to shut down the state's now defunct redevelopment agencies has taken another casualty: the California Redevelopment Association.  In a statement released today ( pdf ), CRA officials and board members announced that the organization, absent its raison d'etre, would soon begin the process of shutting down, pending a vote of its membership. The venerable organization had led the fight to preserve redevelopment. Along with the League of California Cities, CRA drafted and promoted Prop. 22, the 2010 ballot measure that was designed to protect local funds, such as redevelopment monies. It then took on Gov. Brown and ultimately filed suit to overturn the legislation that forced agencies to shut down if they refused to make payments to the state. That legal effort turned disastrous for CRA, as the state Supreme Court rendered a ruling that eliminated the payment scheme and condemned all the state's RDA's.  Since the court rendered its decision in December, CRA has been helping agencies navigate the dissolution process.  In a letter from CRA President and Alhambra City Manager Julio Fuentes, and CRA Interim Executive Director Jim Kennedy reads, in part: "(W)e are confronted with the unfortunate reality that the years of incredible success with redevelopment – building affordable housing, creating jobs, cleaning up and reusing contaminated sites, and revitalizing communities – have now come to an end due to a policy choice of the State of California to address its fiscal imbalance in part by dissolving redevelopment agencies. As a result, cities and counties in California will, at least for a time, have to address community revitalization needs without this incredibly powerful tool. "With the dissolution of local redevelopment agencies as of February 1, it has become clear to the board and executive staff that the business plan for CRA is no longer sustainable.  (T)he CRA Board of Directors has now concluded with great reluctance that it has no other prudent choice but to initiate the dissolution of the association." Fuentes and Kennedy explain that the League of California Cities has already taken a leadership role in discussing the future of any "next generation" local community revitalization tool:  "The League of California Cities has already convened a Next Generation Task Force to assist in these discussions. The imperative for California's communities to continue addressing their infrastructure, affordable housing, jobs/economic development, brownfield reuse, and military base reuse challenges remains." CP&DR will provide updates as they become available.

Nearly two years ago I wrote an article  that pondered the effects of legalized marijuana on California's cities. The options, for those cities that didn't forbid cannabis entirely, seemed to range from stoner wastelands to magical communities of mellowness.  Back then, the state was on the verge of transcending the medical marijuana movement and in fact legalizing recreational use for all adults. Oakland's Oaksterdam "University"--which teaches about the cultivation and sale of cannabis--and its proprietor Richard Lee were at the center of this movement, claiming that legalized marijuana would be good for everyone: good for patients who needed relief, good for adults who needed the occasional mental vacation, and--not insignificantly--good for taxing entities that could finally cash in on an enormous, but previously untaxed, portion of California's economy.  My article traced, in part, the potential effect that legalization would have on the urban environment. If you've been to the real Amsterdam, you know that coffee shops figure prominently in the streetscapes of some neighborhoods, to the delight of tourists. Though I am personally ambivalent about marijuana, I figured that enterprising cities might attempt to replicate Amsterdam's success (minus the canals and Rembrants), and Oakland seemed like the leading contender (with Eureka not far behind). This week, the federal government--with apparently no backing or cooperation from local officials--lodged its objection to this notion.  Agents of the DEA, IRS, and federal marshalls raided Richard Lee's home Monday, with the intent of shutting down his legally operating business. Reports indicate that "dozens" of agents took part in the raid and used such devices as battering rams and power tools to breach Lee's defenses. Lee is a wheelchair-bound paraplegic; he uses marijuana to control his pain. Now his institution seems all but  defunct . At nearly the same moment that the feds were busying themselves with weed -- and a 10-minute drive away -- seven people at another institution of learning, Oikos University, lost their lives  at the hands of a disturbed, but apparently stone-cold sober, criminal.  When I wrote on the legalization two years ago, I spoke with Rebecca Kaplan, the Oakland City Council member who has long championed the legalization, regulation, and taxation of marijuana. She spoke of the value of legal cannabis in no uncertain terms. Oakland has already cashed in, levying a significant city tax on what has been, in large part, a peaceful economic activity. And, by some accounts, the city has benefited. Oaksterdam has already become something of a neighborhood hub, in an area between downtown Oakland and Lake Merritt. I'm not going to posit whether or not this is a good thing--that should be up to the people of Oakland--but I will point out that the forces of urban development often work in strange, unpredictable, and fascinating ways. Great cities are great in part because they house diverse peoples. They allow like-minded groups to congregate and create communities, often for everyone's benefit. So far, I haven't heard any reports indicating that Oakland is any worse off.  The forces that bring people together and subsequently shape neighborhoods are economic, cultural, and ethnic. But they can also be legal. Certain laws, some with no particular mind to land use, have profound impacts on the urban environment. In California's case, the legalization of cannabis allows cannabis enthusiasts to congregate. They can share ideas and gain a sense of dignity that many of them--especially those for whom marijuana is truly  medically necessary --may not have experienced heretofore. If this openness gives rise to coffee shops, cafes, and even "universities" where well meaning patients and users can cease to be marginalized, so be it.   In a city that has suffered riots, racial strife, chronic unemployment, and all manner of derision (cf. Gertrude Stein), it's hard to say that Lee, Kaplan, and law-abiding cannabis enthusiasts don't know what they're doing.  We can be fairly certain that Oikos shooter One L. Goh was not in his right mind. Whether the DEA was, and whether Oakland will be better for it... that's probably an open question.