While the Tea Party movement has been trying to "take back America" on the national stage since the election of Barack Obama, Tea Party activists have also turned their attention to taking back California – and, specifically,  Senate Bill 375, the 2008 law that seeks to combat climate change by promoting density in the state's metro regions.  Environmentalists and many fans of cities hail SB 375 as an important step towards both curbing global warming and creating more pleasant cities. But Tea Party activists nationwide have fought against local and regional planning efforts, often invoking the United Nations' "Agenda 21" sustainable development effort as the enemy. In California, Tea Party representatives have increasingly turned up at regional and statewide planning sessions – including a recent SB 375 "One Bay Area" workshop  in Concord, where they disrupted the meeting by challenging its premise. Steve Brandau, head coordinator for the Central Valley Tea Party, did not attend any One Bay Area meetings. But he said that he understood the speakers' skepticism about government-led planning and social engineering.  "We would be suspicious of projects that are built around population control and density control," said Brandau. "We are leery of governmental agencies and their ability, based on the track record, to develop workable solutions."   Brandau said that Tea Party supporters are likely to support the status quo no matter what policies a governmental body would propose. "We'll continue to drive whatever we want to drive until we get a better working model," said Brandau.  Despite its name, the Tea Party is not an official party or even a formal organization and therefore has no membership requirements. But they have been more vocal at planning workshops around the state. At the One Bay Area meeting in Concord, they questioned presentations from the audience. An activist who goes by the username "cvminutemen" posted on YouTube a two-hour video of the entire meeting, with a preface suggesting that One Bay Area is part of a comprehensive, global conspiracy. The preface to the video characterizes smart growth, liveable communities, and social justice as attacks on "freedom," "your prosperity," "your property rights," and "the American dream." And it ironically questions planning that claims to serve "the greater good."   (One Bay Area is the brand name for the nine-county Sustainable Communities Strategy being developed by the Association of Bay Area Governments and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission.) "There were Tea Party activists – and that's very much self-identified – no question that there was a group organized to participate in the meetings," said Randy Rentschler, spokesperson for MTC. He added that videographers by the name of Tea Party TV have filmed meetings. At those meetings, self-identified Tea Party supporters decried nearly every goal of the SB 375 planning process. Speakers criticized the plan for forcing residents into dense housing and impinging on suburban lifestyles. Speakers questioned the notion of regional planning, claiming that top-down planning would usurp local control. These and other objections at one meeting were captured on a two-hour video shot by a Tea Party supporter and posted on the Internet. "The things they brought to the table were: ‘leave us alone; we don't need your land use rules. We don't need people telling us what to do,'" said Rentschler.  At that meeting and others, participants say that Tea Party opinions all but drowned out other views, according to some.   "They were very vocal and in some respects they would get obnoxious," said Joel Ramos, a community planner with the nonprofit group TransForm, who said he attended several meetings in Contra Costa County. "I think that it was ultimately a detractor and that it devalued the overall conversation."  "The hard part with the Tea Party's participation was to get past their own agenda and think out what they want and to ask for it," said Rentschler.    Leaders of Tea Party organizations throughout the state – including the East Contra Costa County Tea Party, the East Bay Tea Party, the California Tea Party, and Tea Party Patriots – were contacted repeatedly for comment for this article over the course of several weeks. Only Brandau made himself available for comment.  Lawrence Rosenthal, director of the Center for Comparative Study of Right-Wing Movements at UC-Berkeley said that the Tea Party's objections to SB 375 are not surprising. Libertarian movements have always been wary of government's use of eminent domain, and Tea Party members may assume that the construction of compact development and the empowerment of local governments to promote compact development will necessarily result in the taking of single-family homes and other private properties.  Supporters of One Bay Area insist that one of the purposes of the regional plan will be to promote density in center cities and at key transit nodes with the effect of preserving the character of many single-family areas, especially exurbs.  "The people who reside in less dense areas would probably have figured out, if they had allowed themselves, that we're not planning on doing anything to Clayton," said Rentschler, in reference to a city on the edge of the Central Valley. "The cities are taking things that you don't want."   The online video suggests that One Bay Area is advancing Agenda 21, a theme that Tea Party activists around the country have promoted. "We didn't even know about the ‘conspiracy' until we were told about it," said Rentschler. "I had to look up Agenda 21."  Agenda 21 is in fact a UN program urging cities to voluntarily promote density, public transit, and other strategies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Whether high-density apartment buildings will be delivered via black helicopter is another matter, say the sponsors of One Bay Area.  Many of the Tea Party's concerns about SB 375 are grounded in far less outlandish concerns. Brandau said that, regardless of the particular concerns or personal inclinations, nearly all members of the Tea Party movement share a fundamental distrust for government. They believe that government actions both constrain civil liberties and fail to generate acceptable returns on investment.  Brandau said that many Tea Party members are inclined to oppose SB 375 purely because they do not trust the state government and regional planning agencies to come up with anything beneficial, regardless of what a plan might actually look like.  "We're not against infrastructure and we're not against what we would call smart planning," said Brandau. "Most of us feel betrayed by planning and these huge projects." Brandau cited high-speed rail and the as an example of planning that is destined to disrupt the livelihood of Central Valley residents in exchange for dubious benefits.  Rentschler noted that the Tea Party's anti-government ethos simply doesn't apply to places where many people live in close proximity and, therefore, have competing interests.  "In some communities there might be (no need for government-led planning).  Maybe that's in Alaska," said Rentschler. "I think that was the hard part in dealing with the Tea Partiers is that the message wasn't subtle to the complexities of the world we inhabit." Many speakers in Contra Costa County claimed that One Bay Area had arisen out of nowhere and was being imposed on an unsuspecting public. The difficulty for MTC and other regional planning agencies, of course, is that they are seeking to implement a state law that was adopted in 2008, no matter whether the Tea Party likes the law or not. Rentschler said that he knew of no Tea Party participation in any public meetings or hearings regarding SB 375 over the past few years.  Supporters of SB 375 say that Tea Party opposition is grounded in ignorance of both planning principles and the public process.  Ramos said that Tea Party supporters' combination of vehemence and ignorance threatens to undermine the public process – and even SB 375 itself.  "I would like to hope that we could move forward," said Ramos. "I've seen horrible things come as a result of politicians being scared of an angry group of loud, vocal minority groups."  UC-Berkeley's Rosenthal said that further debates are unlikely to change Tea Partiers' minds.  "If there were a key to engaging them in a way that got past their dismissiveness of this panoply of issues that they regard as elites trying to shove their fancy ideas down their throats…a great deal of progress would have been made already with the Tea Party," said Rosenthal. "Ideology, by its very nature, gives you the answers when you know nothing about the facts." Despite the seeming frustration of working with such stubborn participants, the sponsors of the One Bay Area meetings say that they welcome all participants and all opinions. The Silicon Valley Community Foundation has sponsored several meetings with the express purpose of expanding participation.   "We feel incredibly positive about the success we've had in terms of the number of people we've been able to engage in discussion and the diversity of people we've been able to engage," said Erica Wood, vice president of community leadership and grantmaking at SVCF. Rentschler said that the participation of the Tea Party, despite some counterproductive rhetoric, is a welcome component of the democratic process.  "If your comment is that climate change is fiction and you're part of a UN conspiracy, I can't do anything about that," said Rentschler. He did say, however, that Tea Party voices offer a welcome contrast the discourse that often dominates discussions in the Bay Area.  "We often get the far left comments," said Rentschler. "It was kind of refreshing to get the far right."  Retschler added that the Tea Party raises an issue on which activists along the entire political spectrum should be able to agree.  Should stakeholders be skeptical of government? "Yes. I am," said Rentschler.    Contacts:  Steve Brandau, Head Coordinator, Central Valley Tea Party, www.centralvalleyteaparty.com Joel Ramos, Community Planner, TransForm, 510.740.3150 Randy Rentschler, Spokesperson, Metropolitan Tarnsportation Commission,  Lawrence Rosenthal, Executive Director, UC-Berkeley Center for the Comparative Study of Right-Wing Movements,  510.643.7237 Erica Wood, VP of Community Leadership and Grant Making, Silicon Valley Community Foundation, 650.450.5400

Sociologist Frederik Polak once said that "the future may well be decided by the images of the future with the greatest power to capture our imaginations and draw us to them, becoming self-fulfilling prophecies."  The organizers the Rethink/LA, an eponymous group consisting of some of the city's creative intelligentsia, seem to agree. The exhibit, on display through Sept. 4 at the Architecture+Design Museum,present bold visions of a future Los Angeles that should challenge the thinking and capture the imaginations of most Angelenos.  This multi-media exhibit includes photographs, interactive displays, short films, sound installations, and a 3-dimensional model. While I enjoyed all aspects of the exhibit, I was most intrigued by the series of 18 images that show what the city could be like 50 years from now.  As a public transit user and a park planner, my favorite piece was the collage by MOCK Studio, which reimagined lanes of the downtown 110 Freeway as spaces for solar powered personal rapid transit, bicyclists, pedestrians, passive and active recreation, and community gardens.  It depicts a future in which Angelenos are not completely dependent on the automobile and thousands of acres of land, including freeways, are for open space linkages, community gardens, and infill development.  This image further prompted me to consider how other auto-related uses, such as gas stations, auto repair shops, and car dealer lots, may be reused in the future. I was also fascinated by XTEN Architecture's vision of the Sepulveda Pass – between the Westside and San Fernando Valley -- which consists of a high speed rail/vehicular tunnel and a mix of cultural, park and recreational, office and related uses above.  This exciting, colorful image offers a striking contrast to the river of automobiles that characterizes the 405 today.  Another memorable image shows the seaside Hyperion Water Treatment Plant transformed into a hybrid desalination plant, water reservoir and recreation center which uses engineered waves as a training ground for amateur and novice surfers.  This proposal is based on the assumption that the Los Angeles Department of Water and Power will be able to meet the city's growing water demands by expanding the treatment facility to include desalination of seawater directly from the Santa Monica Bay. Since I, like probably most other planners, grew up playing or "building" with Legos, I found myself spending considerable time admiring the "Wilshire on Wilshire" exhibit, the result of an interactive planning project facilitated by James Rojas.  This 3-dimensional model is not a miniature version of Wilshire Boulevard as it currently exists; instead, it shows what the corridor could be like in 50 years.   Having participated in a similar exercise previously, I understand firsthand how this approach empowers participants by allowing them to shape and share visions in a supportive environment without the fear of providing a "wrong" answer. Rethink/LA is a wonderful exhibit for all.  Unfortunately, its audience is likely limited to only those with interests in architecture, design, and urban planning because it is housed at a storefront, specialty museum.  To achieve the organizers' goal of generating a significant dialogue with Angelenos regarding the city's future, the exhibit may be more appropriately displayed at a prominent location like the Los Angeles County Museum of Art (LACMA) across the street. Rethink/LA is on display through September 4 at the Architecture + Design Museum, 6032 Wilshire Boulevard, Los Angeles, CA 90036. http://www.aplusd.org/exhibitions-current Clement Lau is a freelance writer and a planner with the Los Angeles County Department of Parks and Recreation.

California's redevelopment agencies have won a minor, but far from permanent victory, in their effort to shield a total of $1.7 billion in tax increment funds from the state.  The Supreme Court of California today agreed to hear California Redevelopment Assn. v. Matosantos  (S194861), which was filed to undo a pair of budget bills that could decimate many of the state's nearly 400 redevelopment agencies. The court pledged to reach a decision by January 15.  The court also  issued a stay of the dissolution of redevelopment agencies and remittance payments mandated by A ssembly Bill 26 X1 and Assembly Bill 27 X1. The stay comes at the request of the California Redevelopment Assocation and League of California Cities, which two weeks ago filed a petition for the court to throw out both laws. The laws would effectively force redevelopment agencies to shut down or to make voluntary payments to the state in order to remain in business. Agencies across the state have been deciding whether to make the payments or not, with most having to go to their respective city councils for approval. Technically, AB 27 X1 calls for payments to come from agencies' parent jurisditions, not from the agencies themselves.  The stay, in effect, prevents redevelopment agencies from being forced to make the payments until the Court rules on the merits of the case.  The court did not, however, extend at stay to the provision of the AB 26 X1 that puts a freeze on redevelopment activities prior to dissolution.   "We're very gratified that the California Supreme Court has agreed to take our case, issued the stay we requested to preserve the status quo, and that it is moving forward on an expedited basis," said Chris McKenzie, executive director, League of California Cities, in a statement. Today's ruling calls on the respondents, which include the State Departments of Finance and the State Controller's Office, to show cause for why the stay should not be granted. They are required to file a return by Sept. 9.  The court outlined the upcoming schedule in the case:  A reply may be served and filed by petitioners on or before Sept.  24. Any application to file an amicus curiae brief, accompanied by the  proposed brief, may be served and filed on or before Sept. 30. Any reply to an amicus brief may be served and filed on or before  Oct. 7. The court does not contemplate extending any time set out above.  The  briefing schedule is designed to facilitate oral argument as early as  possible in 2011, and a decision before January 15, 2012. Justices Cantil-Sakauye, Baxter, Werdegar, Chin and Corrigan voted in favor of the stay. Kennard, J., is of the opinion a stay should not be issued. -Josh Stephens

Assessments for services traditionally funded by property tax have faced an uphill battle after the passage of Proposition 218, the 1996 voter initiative that requires the local governments and special districts to seek voter approval for any proposed new or increased assessment before it could be levied. That hill has gotten steeper in the wake of a recent decision.  The decision from the Third Appellate District in Citizens for Responsible Government v. West Point Protection District suggests that the drafters of and voters for Proposition 218 achieved what they were after: further restrictions on the ability of public agencies to raise new revenue irrespective of the salutary purposes or modesty of the imposition.  The case involves a fire protection assessment approved by 61.8% of the vote cast in a 218 election proceeding in Calaveras County; despite this strong majority, the court ruled that flaws in the way that the measure assessed the property owners' payments made the assessment unlawful.  Formed in 1948, the West Point Fire Protection District derives most of its funding from property tax. But with a rapidly increasing service population, the demands for service outpaced tax revenues.  A study prepared for the district estimated that it would require an additional $146,000 per year (double its existing budget) to keep one full time firefighter/emergency medical technician available at all times. While that sort of service is standard in most urban areas, it can be scarce in rural parts of California.   However, neither the necessity for, nor the cost of the services is relevant to the legal question of whether or not an assessment is valid.  Proposition 218 requires that the assessments be based upon the benefits conferred to those paying the assesments. After reviewing the history behind Proposition 218 and the court decisions which followed, primarily Silicon Valley Taxpayers' Assn., Inc. v. Santa Clara County Open Space Authority (2008) 44 Cal.4th 431 (see CP&DR Legal Digest Vol. 23, No. 8 , Aug. 2008), the appellate court held this assessment to be flawed on several grounds.   The court's initial ruling was that the assessment was only for general benefits, and therefore did not qualify for an assessment. The court viewed the assessment as a general expansion of services which benefitted all properties.  Since the delivery of general emergency services is a non-predictable event, this effectively precluded the existence of special benefits.  While the court's first holding disposed of the case, the court went on to say that even if one could argue that special benefits were found, the assessment was invalid as it failed the proportionality requirement. Relying on the holding of Town of Tiburon v. Bonandur 180 Cal.App.4th 1057 (see CP&DR Legal Digest Vol. 25, No. 2 , Jan. 2010), the appellate court acknowledged that a proportionality determination was based upon the costs as measured by the relative benefits.   In finding that the assessment failed the proportionality requirement, the appellate court noted that the district's engineer had first determined the cost and then worked backwards to establish the amount of the assessments. It was, the court said, an error of oversimplification. The engineer's report also relied upon three categories for assessments:  improved, unimproved and exempt.  Improved properties would be assessed $87.58 per year, whereas unimproved properties paid $45.00.  Exempt properties paid nothing.   The appellate court concluded that this assessment structure was flawed in that all increased services would be "special benefits," with no discount for general benefits.  The formula resulted in disproportionate assessments between improved properties and those unimproved.  In reaching this conclusion, the court relied upon the relative value of the properties (land and improvements) as the metric for analyzing the proportionality of the assessment.  The court also highlighted that the assessment report noted that exempt properties would receive a "major benefit," implying that assessment report authors ought to be more careful in how they write their reports. The Case:  Citizens for Responsible Government v. West Point Protection District No. C061110, 2011 DJDAR. Filed June 29, 2011. Ordered published June 29, 2011.  The Attorneys:  Stephanie J. Finelli and Robert K. Reeve for Plaintiffs and Appellants Nossaman LLP and Stephen N. Roberts for Defendants and Appellants

The process of planning for affordable housing in California just got, inadvertently, more affordable.  Among the many cuts that Gov. Jerry Brown enacted in his effort to balance the budget  is a $1 million hit to the Department of Housing and Community Development Building Equity and Growth in Neighborhoods Fund. That fund supports the department's housing element review activities; with roughly 20 staff members, the housing element review staff will be effectively cut in half.  Cathy Creswell, acting director of HCD, said that the cuts do not signal a change of attitude or policy within the department.  "Those cuts do not reflect any lack of commitment or support for a positive state role in housing policy and in particular in the housing element," said Creswell. "It is a time of tough cuts and tough issues."  Creswell added that the department acknowledges the role that well planned housing can play in combating climate change, as mandated by laws such as SB 375 and Assembly Bill 32. She said that the department is still evaluating its staffing options but insists that the department is open for business and intends to adapt to its financial constraints.  "We are currently evaluating what we can do and what our options are to maintain this important function," said Creswell.  In many ways, the budget cuts could not have come at a better time. The implementation of Senate Bill 375 has pushed back the Regional Housing Needs Assessment cycle for the state's four major metropolitan planning organizations. The RHNA process, which is renewed in five-year cycles, sets the parameters for the amount of affordable housing that local jurisdictions must account for in the housing elements of their general plans.  With this delay in the RHNA process, no housing elements are scheduled to come up for review within the next year.  "For the next year it's manageable, even with less than half the resources," said Creswell.  Whereas many HCD functions fund themselves through special funds and fees associated with programs that HCD administers, the housing element department relies entirely on the General Fund operating budget granted to it by the Legislature and governor. In the era of extreme cost-cutting, the department is being forced to take its share of the pain. Legislators had proposed a stopgap measure by which funds from Proposition 1C, an affordable housing bond measure, would be dedicated to housing element review.  Brown vetoed that provision even though cities are required by state law to produce and abide by housing elements. HCD review is intended to ensure that housing elements comply with Regional Housing Needs Assessment allocation provided by the Council of Governments.  "The whole state-mandated planning system provides a counterweight to local parochialism that can sometimes affect the backbone of local elected officials and their staff," said Michael Rawson, co-director of the Public Interest Law Project.  HCD plays a consulting role, reviewing housing elements and helping cities determine if their housing elements conform to their respective MPOs' RHNA prescriptions. If housing elements appear to be out of compliance, HCD will offer recommendations—and is the only public entity with this authority. HCD, however, does not enforce compliance; ultimately, lawsuits – often brought by affordable housing advocacy groups – are the typical method by which housing elements are found to be lawful or not.  If the cuts extend into 2013, however, it may be a different story.  As the RHNA process gets back on track, a deluge of city housing elements that is expected to come in. The jurisdictions of the Southern California Association of Governments alone are expected to produce 197 housing elements.  "That is, under the best of circumstances, a huge amount of housing elements due out of one region basically at the same time," said Douglas Williford, deputy executive director for plans and programs at the Southern California Association of Governments. Rawson called it "more of a juggernaut than a rolling series of reviews."  Presumably, however, a shortage of staff and financial resources could impede the review process, or even mean that some housing elements go unreviewed. Review is not technically required for cities to adopt housing elements and implement them. However, reviews can go through multiple rounds if a draft housing element is off-base, and that process often leads to substantial changes.  "I've experienced the full gamut between it sailing through with only minor comments that you could address literally within a few days, all the way to months and months of discussion, negotiation, and meetings," said Williford, who praised HCD for being very accessible during SCAG's RHNA process.   Even cities that are diligent can wind up with noncompliant draft housing elements in part because RHNAs offer significant room for interpretation and variations among cities.  "It is arcane detail and often does require a lot of discussion. And it can somewhat differ from city to city because every city is unique," said Williford. "That is why it's not always so easy as checking the boxes." Moreover, advocates fear that the governor's refusal to fully fund housing element review could send the wrong messages to cities, especially those that are reluctant to plan for affordable housing.   It could also mean that faulty housing elements go on the books and thus become ripe for lawsuits.  "If there seems to be a creeping recalcitrance because of a perception of a diminishing state of review, that will cause more advocacy on the part of the advocates," said Rawson.  HCD is doing some advocacy of its own. Creswell said that the department will be reaching out to jurisdictions to assure them that housing elements will get reviewed while also asking for their assistance.  "We're going to be putting out a memo to all the communities we are working with to let them know that this will not affect anybody we're currently working with," said Creswell. "If they've got a housing element in with us, it will be done in an appropriate amount of time." Contacts:  Cathy Creswell, Acting Director of the Department of Housing and Community Development, (916) 445-4782  Michael Rawson, Co-Director, Public Interest Law Project, 510.891.9794 Douglas Williford, Deputy Executive Director for Plans and Programs, Southern California Association of Governments, 213.236.1800

Attorney General Kamala Harris took the unusual measure of pre-emptively voicing her official opposition to the lawsuit that was filed two weeks ago to overturn the budget bills that force redevelopment agencies to either disband or pay a total of $1.7 billion in "remittances" to the state. The suit was filed by the California Redevelopment Association and the League of California Cities in the state Supreme Court; the petition calls on the court to declare the actions unconstitutional in light of Prop. 22. Though the court has not yet indicated whether it will hear the case – or whether it will grant a requested stay – Harris staked out her position in the form of an "Informal Opposition" <.pdf, 1.4 mb> . In a brief filed with the court last week, Harris affirms what her office considers to be the state's prerogative to support, or disband, redevelopment agencies according to the 1945 legislation that first gave rise to them.  Her brief supports Gov. Jerry Brown's longstanding contention that, by capturing property tax increment, redevelopment agencies are essentially hoarding funds that are needed in light of the state's fiscal crisis. To the central question of whether the dissolution of redevelopment would violate Prop. 22, Harris' brief claims that precedent in California is to defer to the Legislature unless an act is expressly prohibited by the constitution, so that " f there is any doubt as to the Legislature's power to act in any given case, the doubt should be resolved in favor of the Legislature's action." The brief also notes that, while Prop. 22 forbids the direct or indirect transfer of funds from redevelopment agencies to the state, it does not address the Legislature's power to create or dissolve the state's redevelopment system. The brief states, "had the voters intended such a sweeping limitation on the Legislature's power, they certainly could have so indicated in a clearer or more direct fashion." Harris also interprets the two redevelopment budget bills not as a matched pair but instead as independent pieces of legislation. As such, they do not constitute a "Hobson's choice," which is how the petitioners characterize cities' and counties' options to either disband their agencies or pay a remittance fee. Harris contends that the Legislature first eliminated all redevelopment and then "then offered cities and counties that wanted to continue to pursue redevelopment goals an alternative and voluntary mechanism" in the form of the "Voluntary Alternative Redevelopment Program" enacted by AB1X 27. Harris opposes the stay requested in the petition. Virtually only point on which she does agree with the petitioners is that the Supreme Court should exercise its original jurisdiction and rule as swiftly as possible.  --Josh Stephens

A thorough analysis of building codes and local ordinances applicable to seismic hazards provides the substantial evidence necessary to uphold a city's revised environmental impact report, the First District Court of Appeal ruled in Oakland Heritage Alliance v. City of Oakland. In successful challenges under the California Environmental Quality Act, the petitioner generally has a second bite at the apple by challenging the return of the writ. If a petitioner is successful in its challenge to an EIR, the trial court issues a writ of mandate that requires the agency to bring the EIR into compliance with CEQA. Once the agency has complied with the writ of mandate by "fixing" the EIR, the agency files a return of the writ with the court. If the court finds that the city has satisfied the writ of mandate, the court discharges the writ.  In this case, developers Oakland Harbor Partners, LLC, Signature Properties, Inc., and Reynolds & Brown proposed to develop the "Oak to Ninth" project, a development of approximately 64 acres along the Oakland Estuary and the Embarcadero. The development would convert a maritime and industrial area into residential, retail/commercial, open space, and marina use.  Building heights would range from six to 24 stories. The EIR for the project noted a risk of seismic danger, especially because the bay-adjacent site is vulnerable to liquefaction.  The city certified the EIR and adopted mitigation measures with respect to seismic hazards. Community group Oakland Heritage Alliance filed the suit, claiming numerous CEQA violations including that the EIR did not properly mitigate for seismic hazards. The Alliance alleged the city had violated CEQA by certifying the EIR and adopting CEQA findings although the mitigation measures would not reduce the effects of ground shaking, liquefaction, and earthquake-induced settlement to a less than significant level. The trial court granted, in part, and denied, in part, the petition for writ of mandate. The court directed the city to void its certification of the EIR, CEQA findings and statement of overriding considerations, and the approval of the project, and remanded the matter to the City.  The trial court then discharged the writ of mandate after the city submitted a revised EIR. The petitioner, Oakland Heritage, appealed the trial court's discharge of the writ on the grounds the city had still failed to adequately analyze and mitigate seismic impacts. The appellate court disagreed and upheld the trial court's discharge of the writ. Petitioner's challenge focused on three areas relating to seismic impacts: (1) the significance threshold was improper; (2) the mitigation did not adequately mitigate to a less than significant level; and (3) the mitigation constituted an improper deferral of mitigation. Although the petitioner had failed to mention the significance threshold argument during the trial court's proceedings on the return of the writ, and was therefore barred from bringing it up on appeal, the appellate court addressed the issue and found that the significance threshold used to evaluate seismic impacts was proper. The court based its conclusion on two grounds. First, contrary to petitioner's assertions, the city was not required to formally adopt a significance threshold that differed from the threshold listed in Appendix G of the CEQA Guidelines. According to the court, CEQA Guidelines section 15064.7 encouraged the adoption of the standard thresholds of significance, but did not require it. Second, the threshold of significance used by the city "was effectively coextensive with the CEQA Guidelines" Appendix G, and therefore, petitioner's argument had no merit. In relation to the second issue of adequate mitigation, the two mitigation measures adopted by the city required that the buildings comply with all applicable state and local regulations. They also required that the buildings comply with the final design parameters and building recommendations that would be included in the geotechnical investigations for each building site. The appellate court found that substantial evidence supported the city's determination that the mitigation reduced seismic impacts to a less than significant level.  The court cited Tracy First v. City of Tracy (2009) 177 Cal.App.4th 912, which found that the incorporation of state energy efficiency standards into the project constituted proper mitigation. In this case, the thorough discussion of the building codes and local ordinances, as well as the duties of the geotechnical engineer, constituted substantial evidence that the mitigation would reduce impacts. The added discussion provided the required "why" discussion, explaining how code compliance operates as effective mitigation. Like the second issue of proper mitigation, the court disagreed with petitioner's final argument that the two mitigation measures for seismic impacts constituted an improper deferral of mitigation. The court found that the mitigation measures properly included performance standards that had to be met in order to insure that the project impacts would be mitigated. Therefore, the city did not improperly defer mitigation. In the end, the petitioner's attempt to further delay the project and require additional analysis by the city failed. This case provides a good example of the information that agencies should include in the CEQA document when the mitigation involves adherence to state codes and local regulations. A thorough explanation of the state codes and local regulations referred to in the mitigation goes a long way to providing substantial evidence in the record. The Case:  Oakland Heritage Alliance v. City of Oakland (2011, Case No. A126558) 2011 Cal.App.LEXIS 60

Here we go again.  In 2009 the redevelopment agencies of California, represented by the California Redevelopment Association, filed suit to block the state's requisitioning of over $1 billion of tax increment financing. That suit failed.  In Nov. 2010 voters passed Proposition 22, which was backed by the CRA and League of California Cities, to forbid the state from demanding such payments in the future. Facing a $26 billion budget deficit upon coming into office in January, Governor Jerry Brown made an end-run around Prop. 22 by seeking the dissolution of all redevelopment agencies.  With the passage of Assembly Bill 1X 26 and Assembly Bill 1X 27, a pair of budget bills that force agencies to shut down unless their parent jurisdictions – cities and counties – pay a total of $1.7 billion to the state by Jan. 15, 2012, the CRA and League have yet again filed suit.  Same objective. Higher stakes. Different law.  The suit, which was threatened from nearly the first moment that the governor announced his plan, was filed July 18 in the California Supreme Court. The plaintiffs' petition for writ of mandate asks the court to find AB 1X 26 and AB 1X 27 unconstitutional on the grounds that they violate Prop. 22 and Prop. 1A. The petition refers to the options to pay or shut down as a "Hobson's Choice" that amounts to no choice at all.  The petition also asks the court to stay the implementation of the laws no later than Aug. 15 so that agencies can await the suit's verdict before mustering funds or commencing shutdown proceedings. Otherwise, agencies could dismantle themselves to such an extent that they would not be able to reconstitute themselves if the suit succeeds.  "We think we've shown the court that if the redevelopment agencies are dissolved as of October 1 in those jurisdictions…and then the bills are later invalidated that that would be a terrible situation," said Steven Mayer, an attorney at the firm Howard Rice, who is representing CRA and the League.  "Once the egg is broken it's very difficult to put it back together again. " Prop. 22 outlaws both the "direct and indirect" transfer of tax increment funds from redevelopment agencies to the state. Plaintiffs argue that the elimination of agencies constitutes an illegal indirect transfer.  "The governor and Legislature have blatantly ignored the voters and violated the State Constitution," said League executive director Chris McKenzie in a statement. "We must now go to the Supreme Court to uphold the voters' will and the Constitution by overturning this unconstitutional legislation."  The state's defense rests on the claim that even if TIF funds are protected, agencies themselves are not. Though the state's lawyers have yet to be named, they will likely argue that Prop. 22 does not obligate the state to support or allow redevelopment agencies.  "Prop. 22 did not address the broader, fundamental underlying issue of the existence of RDAs," said H.D. Palmer, deputy director for external affairs at the California Department of Finance.  Moreover, Palmer notes that AB 1X 27 requires payments not from redevelopment agencies but rather from their parent jurisdiction. Therefore, the state may argue that cities and counties are choosing to give up funds in exchange for the opportunity to sponsor redevelopment agencies. But TIF funding need not contribute to their voluntary payment.  "If redevelopment is to continue, then the parent agencies – whether it's a city or a county – makes a payment for schools," said Palmer. "It can come from revenue from base property tax, sales tax, or vehicle license fee – or any combination thereof. It does not specify or require that that money, should they choose to continue redevelopment, come from tax increment." The petition rejects both of these positions.  The petition notes that the amounts that cities and counties "nominally" would have to pay the state are "apportioned according to RDA revenues, and the money used to make them will inevitably come from the RDAs' tax increments." Furthermore, it contends that redevelopment agencies "fulfill…constitutional and statutory responsibilities" to invest in blighted areas, per the original 1954 legislation that established them.   Whether the court will agree to hear any of these arguments remains to be seen. The petition entreats the Supreme Court to hear the case as an original matter because the petitioners consider the matter "of statewide importance" and because a Superior Court would likely be unable to rule in a timely manner.  Mayer said that the $1.7 billion that is at stake gives petitioners "a reasonably good claim on the court's attention." If and when the court agrees to hear the case, Mayer said that the parties will be entering uncharted territory. He noted that because Prop. 22 is less than a year old, "obviously there are no court cases that interpret what that particular initiative means."   In the absence of prior rules, Mayer said that precedent calls for the court to construe the law according to its stated purpose. On that count, Mayer believes that his side has the advantage.  "The purpose of Prop. 22 is plainly stated to stop the state from interfering with local government revenues," said Mayer. "If the court construes the measure according to its purpose, hopefully we will prevail." Joining the CRA and League in the suit as petitioners are the cities of Union City and San Jose. The cities of Brentwood, Oakland, Modesto, West Sacramento, and Guadalupe also filed declarations in support of the suit. Mayer said that the plight of those cities illustrate reasons why the Legislature's scheme will be costly to cities and devastating to projects that agencies' are pursuing.  "They tell, each in its own way, a variety of stories about the way that the redevelopment bills will affect various cities," said Mayer. "I think they are compelling narratives."  "We're very proud to be part of the lawsuit," said Union City Redevelopment Agency manager Mark Evanoff. "We have a good story to tell. We can document how the local community, how the region, and how the state are going to be hurt by these disastrous new laws." Union City joined the suit in part because, according to Evanoff, it offers a particularly compelling tale of hardship. The agency has invested $56 million in projects around its BART station that are designed to support Senate Bill 375 by clustering development around a transit hub. Either dissolution or the remittance could cripple these projects.  "We're also doing what the region has called for, which is to focus 90 percent of new growth around our local transit hub," said Evanoff. "We're implementing the goals of the State Legislature to reduce greenhouse gases by having housing and jobs around the transit hubs." CRA spokesperson Kathy Fairbanks said that the CRA does not have authoritative information on the number of the state's nearly 400 active redevelopment agencies that might fold, but reports indicate that the vast majority are prepared to make the payments. But merely staying in business does not, according to many officials, mean that agencies will be able to conduct business as usual. Under the laws as passed, agencies would have to notify the Department of Finance of their intentions by Oct. 1; remittance payments would be due Jan. 1.  "Since the budget bills passed, many redevelopment agencies have notified us that they cannot afford the ransom payment and will cease to exist," said CRA executive director John Shirey in a statement. "And those agencies that are planning on making the payment tell us that it will greatly diminish their ability to pursue vital local projects." Barring a stay, Palmer said that the Department of Finance will be preparing to receive word from agencies about their intentions. He said that the final amounts of each jurisdiction's remittance payments will be calculated and made public by Aug. 1.  If the suit succeeds and the state receives neither remittances nor TIFs recovered from defunct agencies, then—regardless of the economic benefit of intact redevelopment agencies— Sacramento will have another budget headache on its hands.  "If revenues are not going to be part of the equation, then we're talking about extremely deep and difficult reductions above and beyond those that have already passed," said Palmer.  Contacts & Resources:  Text of CRA/League Petition <.pdf> Mark Evanoff, Redevelopment Manager, Union City Redevelopment Agency, 510. 675.5345 Kathy Fairbanks, California Redevelopment Association, 916.448.8760 Steven L. Mayer, Director, Howard Rice Nemerovski Canady Falk & Rabkin PC, 415.434.160 H.D. Palmer, Deputy Director for External Affairs, California Dept. of Finance, 916.445.3878

How much can one park do? That is the implicit question that environmental advocacy group Santa Monica Baykeeper posed regarding a combination passive recreation area and storm water retention facility planned in the City of Malibu. Sited near the iconic Surfrider Beach, the 15-acre Legacy Park would include a detention basin designed to capture three days' worth of storm water before diverting it to a treatment plant. Despite the city's hope that Legacy Park would be "the centerpiece of (its) commitment to water quality and the environment," Baykeeper has said that the park will not do enough to keep bacteria and other effluent out of the notoriously polluted area and filed suit under the California Environmental Quality Act.  In a decision handed down in April, the Second District Court of Appeal disagreed.  Baykeeper initially challenged the project alleging the EIR failed to analyze 1) construction-related project impacts; 2) the impact of using treated effluent from the adjacent Malibu Lumberyard; and 3) the cumulative groundwater impacts. In 2009 Baykeeper had filed suit to halt construction of the park, but in December 2009 a Los Angeles County Superior Court found in favor of the city, and then, in July 2010, a three-judge panel denied Baykeeper's request to halt the project while it filed its appeal. At that point, the park's construction was well underway; the park was, in fact, completed in October 2010, and yet Baykeeper forged ahead with its suit.  On appeal, the city argued the case was moot because the project construction was completed during the pendency of the appeal. The Court of Appeal found that the case was in fact moot as to the first issue of construction-related impacts. But it disagreed on the second and third issues. The appellate court upheld the trial court's denial of the writ with respect to the second and third issues, finding that Baykeeper failed to demonstrate the city had abused its discretion by approving the project. Legacy Park Project and Administrative Process Legacy Park was designed to reduce pollution impacts and improve water quality in Malibu Creek, Malibu Lagoon, and Surfrider Beach, all impaired water bodies under the Clean Water Act.  The project, as originally proposed, included: 1) stormwater detention and treatment; 2) habitat restoration; 3) a public park and 4) wastewater treatment. The purpose of the project was to provide an integrated plan for the city's Civic Center area that would protect the water quality at nearby beaches and lagoons from nitrogen runoff and pathogenic degradation and provide opportunities for restoration of native/sensitive habitats and public recreation. The project site is located at the terminus of the Malibu Creek watershed where Malibu Creek drains into Malibu Lagoon. A draft EIR for the project was prepared and circulated. After the DEIR was circulated, the city eliminated the wastewater treatment portion of the project because draft studies demonstrated the percolation capacity of the project site was insufficient. Insisting that the treatment plant be salvaged, Baykeeper appealed the project, but was rebuffed by the City Council. Baykeeper thereafter sought a petition for writ of mandate. Construction-Related Project Impacts Baykeeper argued the EIR's analysis of construction impacts on hydrology and water quality from erosion, sedimentation, and potential release of hazardous materials was deficient because it failed to determine the level of significance. The city argued that the issue was moot because by then construction had already been completed. The appellate court agreed, distinguishing the case from Woodward Park Homeowners Association v. Garreks, Inc. (2000) 77 Cal.App.4th 880 (see CP&DR Legal Digest March 2000 ) where the court ordered the preparation of an EIR for a car wash, even though the construction of the car wash was completed during the pendency of the action.  The Woodward court based its decision on the fact that the ruling could still have a practical impact: for example, the project could be modified, torn down, or eliminated. (Id. at p. 888.) The Baykeeper court noted that in Woodward , the petitioners had attempted to avoid CEQA review all together, whereas the EIR at issue in Baykeeper included extensive mitigation measures to address construction phase impacts. The court went on to explain that Baykeeper failed to maintain the status quo by seeking an injunction or stay, citing to Wilson & Wilson v. City Council of Redwood City (2011) 191 Cal.App.4th 1559, where the court blamed plaintiffs for the claims being moot because plaintiff had failed to seek a stay or other preliminary relief pending the outcome of the case. Lumber Yard Wastewater The Legacy Park project proposes to use the treated wastewater produced by the separate Lumber Yard Project, in combination with treated stormwater, to irrigate Legacy Park. For two months out of the year, excess effluent from the Lumber Yard will be percolated to groundwater. The draft EIR initially proposed that treated stormwater would be reused to the extent possible for irrigation and or dispersal via underground perforated piping. The draft therefore identified groundwater mounding hazards because the depth of the groundwater within the project area was shallow (mounding is the disruption of the groundwater flow caused by shallow re-injection or other surface recharge method). The draft EIR concluded the impact was significant, but after the mitigation calling for a hydrologic assessment, it would be less than significant. The subsurface dispersal was eliminated from the final EIR, as was the discussion of the hydrologic assessment. The EIR instead states that there will be no seepage into groundwater. Baykeeper argued that neither the draft nor final EIR discussed the fact that the effluent from the Lumber Yard project would be discharged on the site and cause mounding, and that the EIR improperly relied on a future study to mitigate groundwater mounding. The city argued that the only impact on groundwater at the Legacy Park would be from the previously approved Lumber Yard, which was approved in 2007. Further, the project would virtually eliminate the existing subsurface discharge of treated wastewater from the Lumber Yard because it would use it for irrigation. The court found the EIR adequately addressed the use of the Lumber Yard treated wastewater because the dispersal was subject of prior environmental review that was not challenged and thus a challenge is time-barred. The court found the EIR discussed the scientific studies conducted for the Lumber Yard project and, based on those studies, concluded the portion of treated wastewater not used for irrigation is within the percolation capacity of the site. Importantly, the court noted that Baykeeper does not cite scientific evidence in the administrative record to contradict the studies. Finally, the record supported the conclusion that no treated stormwater collected pursuant to the project would be discharged onto the Legacy cite. The EIR establishes that any groundwater mounding which occurs on the Legacy Park site will result from treated wastewater from the separate Lumber Yard project, not from the Legacy Park project itself. Cumulative Groundwater Impacts Baykeeper claims that the chapter on cumulative impacts failed to analyze the Lumber Yard. The city responded that the Legacy Park does not discharge anything into the groundwater, and therefore makes no contribution to cumulative groundwater impact. The court agreed with the city.  Writing for the court, Presiding Justice Norman L. Epstein wrote, "the net effect of the Legacy Park project will be to improve, rather than harm the environment."  Conclusion This case is one of a number of cases in recent years emphasizing Petitioner's duty to point to evidence contradicting the substantial evidence put forth by agencies, a trend giving some hope to developers and public agencies defending their CEQA decisions. (See also Tracy First v. City of Tracy (2009) 177 Cal.App.4th 912; California Native Plan Society v. City of Rancho Cordova (2009) 172 Cal.App.4th 603.) The Case:   Santa Monica Baykeeper v. City of Malibu (2011) 193 Cal.App.4th 1538. The Attorneys: For Santa Monica Baykeeper, Law Office of Rose M. Zoia and Rose M. Zoia  For the City of Malibu, Jenkins & Hogin, Christi Hogin and Gregg Kovacevich  Legacy Park Official Website

To its minimal credit, Borders Books & Music always had a a few shelves where the works of Jacobs, Mumford, Kunstler, Whyte, Florida, and others resided.  But, judging by the financial and aesthetic bankruptcies of, respectively, Borders and many American cities, it seems that copies of Life and Death (or anything else) weren't exactly flying out the door. If the public's understanding of urban economies even began to rival its fascination for gossip, self-help, and vampires, Borders never would have arisen in the first place. And its creditors wouldn't have had to put a stake through its heart .   I, for one, am glad to see it go.  On the one hand, America inches ever more towards illiteracy. Borders stores, while far from cozy, were pleasant and reasonably stimulating, relative to, say, big boxes and supermax prisons. For countless thousands of bibliophiles and starving students who found their first jobs there, Borders sure beat McDonald's. I should know. One of my first jobs was at Barnes & Noble (same difference). What I found working my (short) stint at B&N -- and I'm sure that Borders was much the same -- is that the mega bookstores treat books like any other commodity. Borders stores are sterile, corporate places where art, ideas, and information rot on the shelf. As I once noted in a Planetizen  book review of Stacy Mitchell's Big Box Swindle, the big bookstores share far more in common with Walmart and Best Buy than they do with the independent stores that populate Main Street. Or that used to.  Along with the other mega-retailers who benefited from perverse incentives in planning, zoning, and tax laws, Borders assisted in the gutting of American retail streets and the decimation of a proud entrepreneurial and intellectual tradition. In my hometown, I have already shed enough tears for Dutton's, Wilshire Books, and others. I, unlike Borders'  fans , am all tapped out.  But I'm hopeful about what could arise after the demise of Big Book.   The U.S. government bailed out the auto and finance industries because, so the argument goes, the economy depended on them. But that's only half the reason. The other half is that those industries have incredibly high barriers to entry. If you want cars and banks, you have to stick with the ones you have. You can't design and build cars or a banking system overnight.  You can, however, set up a bookstore in pretty short order. (In downtown L.A. one opened up from nothing a few weeks ago.)  I want to believe, as Jacobs' famous title implies, that the pendulum can swing back. In fact, the conditions could not be better for a revival of independent retail.  Borders, with 399 remaining stores on death row, collapsed because it had too few customers to support hundreds of enormous stores. But that doesn't mean that there aren't enough customers to support smaller stores in equal, or even greater, numbers.  For a little while, in cities where Borders already drove out all the independents, those customers will be out of luck. But then they should start raising hell. Perhaps a few of them will even found stores of their own. The next wave of startup bookstores will face competition from neither Borders nor other independents. The same recession that has depressed consumer spending has also depressed commercial rental rates. Vacant storefonts in Main Streets and in strip malls alike are there for the asking. You could probably buy a truckload of gently used books for what it costs to air condition a single Borders for a month. These new stores will, I suspect, instantly gain the loyalty -- and money -- of legions of customers who formerly thought that Borders was the ne plus ultra of retail. They will quickly learn the error of their ways. They will also make cities better. People on the extremes, who are both cynical of and rapturous about the free market, forget that some forms of commerce have intrinsic social benefits. Payday advance places and Hot Topic, for example, probably do not. But bookstores do. They are lively places, ideally with something for everyone. They bring people together and give them something to talk about. They foster the exchange of ideas that make cities great, and wealthy, in the first place. Cities with half a brain will throw out the tiresome manual that says that economic development depends on factories and infrastructure. They should, instead, seize this moment and promote entrepreneurship.  A bookstore-centric economic development plan probably makes little sense. But just as cities have lured big boxes for all the wrong reasons, they can probably figure out ways to make their storefronts and urban neighborhoods more inviting to entrepreneurs.  Most antiques don't get a second chance. Sure, some folks still ride horses, and fewer still take the hotrod out on Saturday night. The market for ironic vintage fashion is bigger than ever. But the demise of Borders does not mean that books have become antiques. They have survived for 600 years. As a human innovation, they are bested only by cities themselves. When something has been around that long, it doesn't easily turn into an anachronism. It is, in fact, an institution. The bookstore is dead. Long live the bookstore.  --Josh Stephens This piece also appears on Josh Stephens' blog on Planetizen's Interchange.

The Governor's Office of Planning and Research occupies an unusual place in California planning. Even though planning is an intensely local function, part of OPR's mission is to convey Sacramento's planning agenda to the local level. At times when that agenda has been ill-defined, OPR has nearly withered. But now that Gov. Jerry Brown has articulated support for Senate Bill 375 and for a host of smart growth principals, OPR may regain prominence. This task falls to attorney Ken Alex. Alex, who served under Brown in the attorney general's office, is Brown's senior policy advisor and director of the Office of Planning and Research, as well as chair of the Strategic Growth Council. In the attorney general's office, Alex specialized in environmental cases, and before that he led numerous settlement negotiations against power producers that collectively resulted in over $5 billion in settlements. As OPR director, however, Alex will see no such windfall. With a small staff and constrained budget, Alex spoke with CP&DR about his goals as OPR director and the future of California planning under the Brown administration. What are your and Governor Brown's goals for OPR? Some of the highest priorities for the governor are to promote the conversion to renewable energy and to think about it in local terms. One way to think about that is distributed generation. We are considering how to site not just rooftop solar, but also solar facilities that are more modest in size than some of the large-scale projects out in the desert. You might think about a 20 megawatt system that can go in fairly small areas. Ground-mounted tends to be cheaper than roof-mounted; they're easier to install and easier to take care of. And there are a lot of possibilities for where they could be sited: on utility right of ways, on freeway right of ways, and along the California Aqueduct. OPR is trying to help local jurisdictions figure out where some locations might be and then to think about what sort of barriers might exist for those projects: How do we streamline permitting so that we are sensitive to environmental issues but don't slow down the project to the point of making it nearly impossible? As former governor and mayor of Oakland, infill development is something that Governor Brown has been interested in for decades. So we're thinking about what strategies can promote infill development and do it in a way that's good for urban areas and brings people back to downtown areas in ways that we've seen in places like Oakland. Then one of the things that OPR has some statutory obligation to do, but hasn't spent a lot of time doing, is looking at the state of the environment every four years or so. I'd like to do that in ways that think about different measures of the environment that may not be traditional, such as air quality and water quality. Those are important. But how is public health? How are we doing on crime? How are we doing on other measures of the broader environment? What is California going to look like as we look towards 50 million people in the state? There's a lot of things that go into evaluating the state of the environment. What role does the Strategic Growth Council play in OPR's work? Right now the SGC is focused, in significant part, on doing its various grants. There are three rounds of grants: one set for urban greening and another set for planning and, in particular, for sustainable communities. The Strategic Growth Council has a very small staff. It actually has one , and she just hired a second staff member, and we're trying to get her a third staff person. But they really have very minimal capacity to do much beyond the grant process when the grants are in action. So the first priority is to receive the grant request applications and make decisions about them. What role can OPR play in implementing Senate Bill 375? Then SB 375 requires metropolitan planning organizations to evaluate and plan in a regional way, particularly for transit oriented development. We're trying to help the MPOs with some of that process on the planning side. More importantly, for me, is the question of how we get the local jurisdictions—which are not obligated to follow those plans—interested in meeting up with those plans and working in a regional way, which I think will help how we grow in California. One of the challenges that the metropolitan planning organizations have is to do modeling to evaluate what different strategies and scenarios mean and what are the impacts if they develop in certain ways as opposed to developing in other ways. We can help with the modeling. We can help with different scenario plans. We are trying to get the different MPOs to talk to each other, to coordinate, and to use the extraordinary amount of work that's been done in this area on transportation planning, on modeling, on design work on transportation-oriented development. SGC awards some highly coveted grants for local planning. What can cities expect from those grant programs? The criteria were put out to bid pretty much when I came into being chair of the SGC. I think the criteria haven't changed much in the past year. Obviously on the Urban Greening Grants, they're supposed to be primarily urban, so they're areas of high density, and there are various possibilities for how communities can go about, not just planting trees, but also creating places that are going to be relevant to downtown areas and to communities that have very high densities. SGC, as I noted, has a limited staff. But the grants themselves are actually looked after by the Resources Agency and by the Department of Conservation. Looking after those grants and making sure that the money is used properly, appropriately, and effectively is quite relevant. We're going to be doing some auditing and ensuring that the money is being used properly. Oversight is always an important issue, but even more so given the current economic times. How does the potential demise of redevelopment affect OPR's work? That's a fair question, and I don't really have a good answer at the moment. We don't even know which bills are going to the governor's desk, and which he may or may not sign. And when the smoke clears, where are we going? I would expect that there will be something to replace the current system but what that's going to be, I don't know. It has a lot of potential impacts for everything that OPR is doing. Like you and your readers, I am very curious to see what happens next. Are these incredibly trying times to be in your position right now? At the outset it's very exciting. We have a half-dozen new staff people who are excited to be there and have many, many ideas. We have almost no budget. But that's OK. We're interested in trying new ideas. What is difficult is that local governments in their planning departments have been decimated, so how do we help them without many resources ourselves? Some governors have embraced OPR, as Jerry Brown did in his first stint, others have not. How does Gov. Brown approach OPR this time? He was a big fan of OPR the first time around when he was governor. He understands that it has great potential to do good things. He is supportive of the idea of land use planning. He knows very intimately the issues that local jurisdictions face. I feel like we have a very supportive governor for what OPR is about, but the challenges we've identified are small staff and small budget. He has also made it clear that his government is going to run under a very slim budget and we have to live with that. That's life and we'll deal with it. How has your time in the attorney general's office influenced your approach to OPR's work? It's an interesting change from going from being an attorney and thinking first about litigation and how you use legal tools to being in a policy position. I think having some sense of how the laws are used, and sometimes misused, is a huge advantage. In many conversations, I have a sense of the legal issues, and as I learn some more of the policy questions I can bring some of that knowledge to bear. It's very interesting to approach these problems and start thinking about, "OK, as a lawyer you might use the law in a particular set of ways." And now we have to think about what are the problems created by how the law is used? And are there ways to reform or modify or give some guidance to make things easier and better.  I actually am enjoying that very much. You have a unique perspective on CEQA having worked on some landmark CEQA cases in the Attorney General's office. How do you think the relationship between CEQA and greenhouse gas emissions is going to evolve? What we found at the AG's office is that it was a new area some years ago. And it really needed to develop. The AG's office was very much a part of that development. Sometimes the development occurs through litigation and negotiation. But OPR has some very interesting tools, like technical advisories and guidelines and information letters, and I'm interested in seeing if we can use some of those tools as well. It's a positive development, and I think both tools are relevant. And I think working with local jurisdictions to figure out the challenges they have and to use OPR in a way that there's no threat of litigation--because we're not going to sue anybody--has some advantages. And I think sometimes the AG's approach has some advantages. Hopefully, there will be some ways to make progress on all fronts and come to the point where some of the very difficult questions raised by GHG emissions are less contentious and more sophisticated. How do you feel about the prospect of reforming CEQA? I think that CEQA has been perceived as a hindrance in certain instances. Whether that is objectively true in some ways doesn't matter, because perception is on some level, reality. I think it's fair and appropriate to evaluate what kind of changes may make sense. Is it just CEQA? I think it's fair to say that there are a lot of reasons why infill development is difficult. Some of them are straight economics. There are legal impediments. There are actions that can be taken under CEQA that can make development more difficult. So, fine, that's where we are, and I think that it's fair and appropriate to evaluate CEQA and see if it's time to make some changes. I know that the governor is interested in doing a very serious process to evaluate that. And at OPR we are working on possibilities of thinking about infill CEQA streamlining. We're evaluating whether some sort of best practices approach might make some sense where projects that meet a set of criteria would then have a very streamlined environmental review. That's an area where I think there's a fair amount of promise to make some possible changes. So we're convening some discussions on that topic with a lot of interested folks from a lot of different perspectives: environmental, builders, chambers of commerce, etc. I'm hoping that we can make some proposals in the not-too-distant future. What's your approach to the age-old challenge of coordinating different governmental units in California? The very first thing that we are doing is to get a sense of what the various interfaces between government agencies and local governments are on urban issues. It's not always obvious. There's quite a few of them. What Gov. Brown has emphasized with his cabinet secretaries….sometimes the agency jurisdictions are relevant, and they certainly are for budget purposes, but, in his view, it's one government, and we need to work together. I think OPR is part of making that happen. I want to find where the interfaces are and I want to get these entities to talk together and coordinate and figure out what works for local jurisdictions. We're doing that already. We're particularly focusing on renewable energy. We have programs at the Energy Commission, Air Resources Board and Public Utilities Commission, and we are meeting with these various departments and agencies trying to figure out what resources are available. How do you encourage cities to take health into consideration, on top of all the other factors that go into land use planning? I think that's a fair observation: cities have a lot of things to deal with. But I think for everybody at the state level and the local level, health issues are central. At the state level, we're working on something called Health in All Policies through the Strategic Growth Council, which is an attempt to integrate health into all sorts of decisions at the state government level: infrastructure spending and regulatory issues. What policies affect health and how do we ensure that decisions that are made that do affect health do take into considerations those impacts. The Health in All Policies work group has just identified 11 such impacts and are now working on a program to integrate those 11 identified issues into state policy. When we're done with that, we're going to integrate some of that into general plan guidelines for local governments. It'll be on a voluntary basis. But we want to try to help those jurisdictions that are interested in integrating heath into their planning decisions. We're going to introduce some informational processes to try to get some buy-in at local levels. For jurisdictions that may not have the capacity to have thought about this in an extensive way, they might be able to use some of the material, and say, ‘here's something off the shelf that we can do that might make quite a bit of difference.' For others, some of the jurisdictions are very sophisticated and it will be a reinforcement. As usual in California, there are all different sizes and shapes and we're trying to help as best we can. Photo of Ken ;Alex speakingat a UCLA / Berkeley Law forum May ;23 in Sacramento courtesy of the UCLA School of Law. Photo by Tia Gemmell.

OK, nothing surrounding redevelopment is much "fun" these days. But let's try to lighten the mood. In case you're wondering what exactly could get eliminated, the Senate Committee on Governance & Finance has compiled a list of the most salient facts from a recently released draft annual report, for FY 2009-10, compiled by the Office of the State Controller. This report was based on data reported by the agencies themselves, so some of the facts probably should be taken with a grain of salt. (For instance, if anyone knows exactly how to measure "jobs created," I want to hear about it.) There are 425 community redevelopment agencies, but only 399 are active Every city with a population over 250,000 has a redevelopment agency 94% of the 174 cities with populations over 50,000 have redevelopment agencies 81% of the 480 cities have redevelopment agencies 31 of the 58 counties have redevelopment agencies There are 750 redevelopment project areas 65 redevelopment project areas cover 50 acres or less 34 redevelopment project areas cover more than 6,000 acres Frozen property values were $164 billion; incremental values were $544 billion New construction fell to 12.5 million square feet, the lowest level since 1995-96 New construction of public buildings boomed from 222,000 to 1.4 million square feet Rehabilitated construction was down in every category except industrial buildings Redevelopment agencies created 36,000 jobs, more than double than in 2008-09 Agencies' total revenues & other funding fell to $8 billion, down from $8.3 billion Property tax increment revenues were $5.4 billion, 5% less; first drop since 1995-96 Pass-through payments were $1.2 billion, about the same as in 2008-09 Pass-throughs & other aid to K-14 schools was $315 million, down from $328 million Agencies spent $943 million in Low & Moderate Income Housing Funds Of that amount, 20.7% went for administrative, professional, planning, & design costs Low & Moderate Income Housing Funds' total revenues were $712 million Of that amount, $552 million came from property tax increment revenues Agencies' equity fell by $1.4 billion to $16.5 billion Agencies had unmatured long-term debts of $29.8 billion Agencies issued $825 million in tax allocation bonds Agencies' unmatured tax allocation bonds totaled $19.1 billion Source:  Draft Community Redevelopment Agencies Annual Report, Fiscal Year 2009-10. John Chiang, State Controller.  Released to the Legislature on July 7, 2011. --Josh Stephens