Over the past month, California cities have been learning the fate of countless redevelopment projects—touching everything from graffiti-removal programs to nine-figure transit-oriented developments to billion-dollar stadiums. For many, the news is not good – especially now that the California Department of Finance has gotten into the act.  April 15 was the deadline for successor agencies to submit Revised Obligation Payment Schedules (ROPS)—essentially lists of projects and assets that they believe should continued to be funded from the Redevelopment Property Tax Trust Fund even while the state appropriates the remainder of agencies' former tax increments. ROPS replace Estimated Obligation Payment Schedules, which have prevailed since redevelopment agencies officially went out of business Feb. 1.  In an effort to harvest as much funding as possible for the state and other taxing agencies—and, therefore, prevent cities from appropriating more than their fair share of trust fund monies—ROPS's were to undergo several layers of scrutiny. By April 15 all ROPS's were to have been approved by each successor agency's seven-member Oversight Committee, made up of representatives from each respective RDAs' major taxing entities and audited by their respective county auditor-controllers.  The crucial step in the ROPS gauntlet is, however, the review by the Department of Finance. AB 1X 26 requires DOF, along with the state controller, to issue the final say on the validity of items on successor agencies' ROPSs.  DOF has taken a hard line on redevelopment since February – and, in dealing with the ROPS's, has not hesitated to call out items that, in its estimation, runs afoul of the dissolution legislation. DOF has denied tens of millions of dollars worth of projects in many cities; in some cases, denials have totaled in the hundreds of millions. DOF officials seem to be paying particular attention to the many asset transfers that occurred between cities and redevelopment agencies last year in anticipation of the end of redevelopment.  In many cases, DOF has refused to allow high-density or transit-oriented projects to go forward – a move that makes sense in financial terms but seems to run counter to the Brown administration's urban development policy goals. And in at least one case, DOF is asking a local government to kill projects funded by federal dollars. "We haven't done a metric in terms of this many were denied for this, this many were denied for that," said H.D. Palmer, DOF's deputy director for external affairs. But at one point last week, Palmer said that DOF had received 274 ROPS's. Of those, 46 were automatically denied over technicalities such as formatting. DOF issued letters for 164 of them and approved 29 free-and-clear. DOF has taken on extra staff in order to comply with the required three-day turnaround once a successor agency has submitted its ROPS (many did not meet the April 15 deadline and instead turned them in late).  DOF seems to be interpreting AB 1X 26 more conservatively than even successor agencies' oversight boards, which were expected to be conservative themselves insofar as oversight board members represent taxing entities that stand to gain from the freeing up of tax increment funds. As it turns out, many oversight boards have been sympathetic to the agendas of former redevelopment agencies.  "They were in accord on every issue," said David Gouin, director of housing and economic development for the City of Santa Rosa. "The oversight board saw everything as adding value to all taxing entities. They did not take much time to  conclude that they should adopt the ROPS and pass along a positive recommendation to the Department of Finance."  Those accords matter little, however, if DOF disagrees.  "We've heard from our members that DOF is kicking back a substantial number of ROPS submittals, including ones that have been signed off on by the oversight boards," said Patrick Whitnell, general counsel for the League of California Cities. The types of denials that DOF has issued defy easy categorization. Some automatic denials have been over paperwork problems, such as when Santa Rosa's successor agencies have listed multiple funding sources on one line of its spreadsheet. DOF has also questioned many successor agencies' administrative costs.  Most notable is the challenge of interpreting AB 1X 26. Though legislation clearly forbade the signing of new contracts following June 28, 2011, many of the state's 400 or so successor agencies find themselves in gray areas because their respective redevelopment agencies were involved in unique, complex deals that the statute does not explicitly allow or forbid.   Whitnell cautioned that the League has not conducted a formal survey of its members, but initially, many of DOF's objections fall into what he described as "ten different categories." Among them, the largest category is that of unexpended bond funds.  In some cases, DOF would like successor agencies to defease bonds by paying them off early or diverting funds to other projects – and therefore paying off the bonds with other funds. Whitnell noted that many bonds cannot be redeemed early. Therefore, successor agencies would have to pay them off by taking out loans at prohibitively high interest rates.  DOF has also questioned many agreements between cities and redevelopment agencies. AB 1X 26 forbade new agreements as if its effective date, June 28, 2011. These agreements, which often include transfers of assets, joint ventures between public agencies and private developers, and scores of variations thereof.  One major category of obligations that the legislation seems to have missed are those that encumber future property tax funds for deals that do not lend themselves to traditional contracts. On a relatively minute scale, Omar Dadabohy, director of community development for the City of Stanton, said that the Stanton's successor agency must pay for utilities for an affordable housing complex. That obligation is implied but not explicit enough for DOF.  "They're saying there's not going to be a contract in place," said Dadabohy. "Well, there's not going to be a contract in place. I don't have a contract with Southern California Edison. They're not being open or flexible."  Meanwhile, in Santa Rosa, the redevelopment agency is asking DOF to approve a $120 million for the redevelopment of New Railroad Square, a major transit oriented development focused on a commuter rail line scheduled to begin service next year. TIF monies were to be used to fund affordable housing at the site and to do toxic remediation.  "It creates just what the state, county, and city would like to have: higher density uses along a rail station," said Gouin.  DOF has thus far refused to fund that project.  In West Sacramento, the redevelopment of property previously owned by Sacramento-Yolo Port District is in a similar state of limbo.  That deal that has already gone through but, like many other deals across the state, it relies on future TIF funds to complete the deal through a "performance pass-through agreement." West Sacramento Public Finance Manager Paul Blumberg said that the contract does not specify exactly how much TIF monies would be needed because the deal involves multiple funding sources and therefore it was not advantageous to indicate specific dollar amounts in the original contract – especially because no one anticipated that redevelopment would soon cease to exist.  Blumberg said that DOF has rejected this deal because it claims that the city and port district are, effectively, one in the same, because the city appoints members to the port commission. Therefore, the deal is considered an impermissible city-agency agreement rather than a permissible third-party agreement.  Also in West Sacramento, the master planned Bridge District redevelopment was to rely on $144 million in redevelopment funds, as well as a combination of other funding sources, including Proposition 1C infrastructure bonds. While the deal was signed before the AB 1X 26 deadline, DOF is questioning whether it actually constitutes a contract.  "These agreements….didn't specify specific amounts going to each element because you've got a number of funding sources," said Blumberg. "All of the commitments have been made to this district that clearly describe the use of tax increment and firmly make that commitment."  DOF has even questioned agreements that including funding from the federal government. Bakersfield Economic Development Director Donna Kunz said that while DOF has unsurprisingly questioned $4.2 million in interagency loans, it is also asking the successor agency to eliminate projects funded by three loans from the Department of Housing and Urban Development. Kunz said that the city would be submitting additional documentation in the hopes of getting that item approved.  Generally, Whitnell said that DOF has erred on the side of questioning those requests that the legislation does not explicitly permit.  "Our take on it, based solely on reports that we've received from our membership…is that DOF seems to be very conservative in its interpretation of AB 1X 26 to the point where in certain instance," said Whitnell. "We're not entirely certain that they're interpreting it correctly." Some officials feel that DOF has been stretching its authority.  "In one respect we weren't surprised," said Stanton's Dadabohy, which got $218 million worth of obligations denied. "We expected that the state would try to challenge every item and take our local tax dollars. And we were surprised by the basis for some of the comments." Dadabohy said that part of his surprise stemmed from the fact that his staff had worked closely with DOF staff to ensure that the ROPS was prepared properly.  This approach, said Whitnell, could mean that the process of approving and denying obligations could effectively extend for years—and get far more contentious than it has been thus far.  "This could lead to some legal disputes down the road with respect to the position that DOF is taking," said Whitnell.  DOF that it is interpreting AB 1X 26 strictly and consistently.  "We're measuring every one of these submissions by the same yardstick, which is based upon what is in AB 26," said Palmer. "Does it fall within the definition of an enforceable obligation or does it not?"   Palmer said that successor agencies have had ample opportunity to understand what DOF's position would be on different types of obligations. As well, DOF staff members have been working directly with successor agencies on their ROPS's in an effort to avoid denials, resubmissions, and confusion.  "Understanding that this is a very complicated process, we have been very forward-leaning in trying to get as much information out there to help successor agencies and oversight boards understand that is permissible and not permissible under AB 26," said Palmer.  Successor agencies have been resubmitting their ROPS's to respond to DOF's comments, and they have been submitting documentation to support items that were questioned or unclear. In instances where it seems unlikely that DOF will approve an obligation, cities have been instructed to simply leave them off their revised ROPS's for the time being so that further discussions can take place.  Henceforth, successor agencies will be submitting further ROPS's every six months. It is assumed that each iteration will include fewer obligations as former redevelopment projects are paid off and wound down. Many successor agencies prepared both 2012 ROPS's simultaneously, as the next submission date is July 1.  For cities, each ROPS carries the fear that DOF may not approve projects that had been considered both permissible under AB 1X 26 and crucial to the city's well being.  "We're anxious about each and every one of them," said Gouin. "Each and every item is important."  Contacts:  Paul Blumberg, Public Finance Manager, City of West Sacramento, 916.617.4575 David Gouin, Director of Housing and Economic Development, City of Santa Rosa, 707.543-3200 Donna Kunz, Economic Development Director, City of Bakersfield, 661.326.3765 H.D. Palmer, Deputy Director for External Affairs, California Department of Finance, 916.445.3878 Patrick Whitnell, General Counsel, League of California Cities, 916.658.8200

When Axl Rose first stepped off the bus from Indiana, took the stage at the Whisky, and screeched out the opening lines of "Welcome to the Jungle," he probably wasn't thinking about parking. But he might as well have been.  West Hollywood's Sunset Strip—home to music clubs, restaurants, and rock star mayhem—offers a chaotic array of parking options along its winding, two-mile stretch of Sunset Bl. Nighttime prices often top $20. Similar conditions prevail a half-mile south along Santa Monica Boulevard, where gay nightlife, boutiques, and restaurants attract visitors from all over the Los Angeles area.  Finding places for all of those visitors to park is the goal of an innovative parking scheme that the city adopted last month. While it is not a comprehensive reform, a new "parking credits" program represents an incremental effort to aid both drivers and local businesses—particularly those that are seeking to change their uses—by cataloging available parking spaces and allocating them collectively among businesses that occupy 10,000 or fewer square feet.  This means that the city will keep track of the number of available spaces in the area and will issue credits rather than force businesses to identify specific spaces, either onsite or off-site, to fulfill their parking requirements.  The program is a response to a perceived stagnation among local businesses.  "(The city) realized that Sunset Boulevard, the rock n' roll capital of the world, was filling up with vacancies, and so were the avenues of art and design," said Mott Smith, whose firm Civic Enterprises consulted with West Hollywood. "People couldn't satisfy their parking requirements." The program will start by allocating only public spaces, but West Hollywood Public Works Director Oscar Delgado said the city intends to include private spaces as well. The first area of the city where the program will go into effect is a triangle encompassing the western end of Santa Monica Boulevard and Melrose Boulevard. Delgado said that the Sunset Strip is the next likely participant.  In total, the city has identified 12 potential districts, ranging from roughly four blocks to ten blocks long, that it intends to institute in the coming years. They will cover roughly 25% of the 1.9-square-mile city.  City officials contend that many parcels had been effectively locked into their uses because of parking requirements. Retail spaces that wanted to convert to restaurants had to find more parking. Meanwhile, landlords of restaurants often felt locked in, because to de-intensify would mean either giving up scarce spaces or hanging on to, and paying for, spaces that they didn't need.  "We're not having everybody be responsible for providing their own parking, especially when we have surplus parking," said Delgado.  Many businesses in the city have gotten used to paying what consultant Mott Smith described as "extortion" prices from places like office garages and car washes that leased surplus spaces so that businesses could fulfill their city-mandated requirements. Scholars such as UCLA's Don Shoup have noted that these requirements are often arbitrary and too crude to create finely detailed places. Currently in West Hollywood, retail requires 3.5 spaces per 1,000 square feet while, at the upper end, nightclubs require 14 spaces per 1,000 square feet.  "People wring their hands about what should the right parking requirements be for particular uses— ‘I think mortuaries should be 3.2 spaces per coffin' and so on and so on," said Smith. "And you never get to the right number." Moreover, in West Hollywood at least, many businesses' patrons never even used the spaces that businesses have been paying for.  "They're paying often $100 per month for fake spaces that nobody ever parks in," said Smith. (That monthly fee is, of course, on top of the rate that patrons pay to park.) By creating a flexible system that pays attention to the actual number of available spaces and to actual parking patterns, the program is ultimately intended as an economic development tool. City officials hope that it will allow properties to be put to their highest and best use rather than be constrained by the old parking requirements.  The business community has so far welcomed the program.  "We're very excited about it," said Genevieve Morrill, president of the West Hollywood Chamber of Commerce. "It's something that the city has been needing to do for a quite a long time. We're such a dense community, it just makes sense that people may park once."  Delgado and Smith both said that the key to the program is the biannual parking counts that will determine how many spaces are being used at any given time.  "With the parking credits, you're selling how much parking is available versus how many striped spaces there are," said Delgado.   Delgado said that this program will, in the long run, promote a more vibrant, pedestrian-oriented commercial neighborhoods.  "We're promoting park once and walk around," said Delgado.  This program arises at a time when cities across the state have been forced to develop new strategies to promote development and economic development now that their redevelopment agencies have been shut down.  Though not every city attracts rockers, gay club-goers, and art aficionados in quite such high numbers—much less spaces that cost $100 per month—any city with complex parking problems in dense commercial areas could stand to benefit from adopting a similar program.  "Where it's ideal is cities that have a built-in mixed use," said Delgado. "Let's say they have a lot of office space during the day and at night they have vacancies. It allows them to intensify and change their uses during the evening."  The hope, for the city, is that parking credits can make West Hollywood, and others, less like jungles and more like paradise cities.  Contacts:  Oscar Delgado, West Hollywood Public Works, 323.848.6375 Geneveive Morrill, West Hollywood Chamber of Commerce, 323.650.2688 Mott Smith, Civic Enterprise Associates, 213.403.0170

California's relentless, ever widening budget deficit has claimed another victim: redevelopment's affordable housing funds.  Released today, Gov. Jerry Brown's revised draft  (pdf) of his 2012-13 budget addresses a deficit that has risen to an estimated $15.7 billion, up from an estimated $9.2 billion at the beginning of the year. The May appropriates all remaining cash assets that had been held by redevelopment agencies. This move effectively does away with funds that many had hoped--and expected--would be preserved even as redevelopment itself had been dissolved. Roughly $1.4 billion currently sits in the former redevelopment Low & Moderate Income Housing Fund.  Senate Bill 654, sponsored by Senate Pro Tem Darrel Steinberg (D-Sacramento), would have restored the housing fund to localities that had sponsored redevelopment agencies. It is currently is under consideration in the legislature, having passed out of committee but failing to win urgency designation. SB 654 had received widespread support from both cities and affordable housing activists. Preservation of affordable housing had been considered by many to be the one part of redevelopment that had to be salvaged.  If adopted, the budget revise would appropriate all monies in the trust fund, thus rendering SB 654 moot.  As Bill Fulton reported in March, Steinberg recently said, "I don't know what the May revision is going to say about the state's revenue. If May keeps us stable, then boom – aggressive all the way to the governor's desk and I think he would likely sign the bill. If however growth is slow, we're going to have difficult decisions to make." It would appear that those difficult decisions are in the offing.

Ahoy there! Weary of California? Exhausted by redevelopment battles, EIR lawsuits, lack of transit, lack of money, the impossibility of getting anything done in Sacramento? We have a solution for you: Live on the ocean!  No, we're not talking about a cruise ship, nor a well-appointed yacht, nor even a party boat stocked with poppers and wine coolers.  This idea is infinitely better: an entire city floating by itself in the middle of the ocean!    Balderdash, you say? Stuff and nonsense? Ah, foolish one, you're mistaken.  This is a serious proposal—serious, that is, as Biosphere II and Newt Gingrich's proposal to rebuild colonial Jamestown on the moon. Take a gander at the press release: The Seasteading Institute, it says, is a "nonprofit organization that works to enable sea-steading communities." These floating cities in international waters will "allow the next generation of pioneers to peacefully test new political and social systems."  The founders are Peter Theil, billed as a "technology entrepreneur and philanthropist," and Patri Friedman, described as a "social entrepreneur/political theorist."  Mr. Friedman is also the grandson of Nobel Prize-winning economist Milton Friedman, the idiot who claimed that workers are free agents who can negotiate their salaries with employers as equals.  I guess sound social theory runs in the family.   Anyway, back to the blue waves: "The first seasteaders," says our release, "will likely be entrepreneurs operating single-purpose businesses on ships just outside territorial waters, where they will be free to explore new opportunities outside the jurisdiction of coastal governments." Such as defending themselves against Somali pirates, drug smugglers or any warship that decides to board their floating atoll of self-congratulatory enlightenment. Remember, they're drifting in international waters, so there's no Coast Guard to call.  But there's no place for cynics in seasteading:  "…(T)he Institute's primary objective over the next few years is to support the formation of seasteading businesses that can eventually scale up into thriving autonomous ocean communities."  Naturally, these floating islands will be utopian communities. "The most successful can then inspire change in governments around the world," says the release. Please note that this utopia is based neither on any political or economic theory, but simply the choice of terrain, as if living on the sea by itself will make us better people. And why not? Coleridge's Ancient Mariner experienced moral improvement while at sea, so why not you? Frankly, dear, you could use some moral improvement. Now, every great idea deserves a conference, even one with an admission price of $715. Accordingly, the Seasteading Institute is sponsoring a conference, from May 30 to June 2, intended for "entrepreneurs, investors, engineers, ocean law experts, maritime professionals and other forward-thinking individuals who want to learn about where they fit into the future of seasteading," says the press release. The same source promises a  "landmark event for the development of oceanic cities across the globe." Why a landmark and not a "seamark event." Such as a buoy, perhaps? Or maybe that floating island of trash in the Pacific, reportedly the size of the state of Maine? If you seasteaders are still serious, this land-based mammal offers you a challenge: When you can make cities on dry land work properly, and put an end to traffic congestion, overcrowded housing, land-use disputes between developers and home owners, unemployment, massive waste disposal issues, or the tension between rich and poor, then – and only then-will I allow you to take an ocean voyage on a floating city that has no reason to exist.  Otherwise, you are simply running away from your urban problems in a fantasy that psychologists call the "flight to wellness." Except when the sea is high, and your wellness turns into a sleepless night of nausea. But don't try limping back to San Francisco: We've converted your old house--to a seafood restaurant. "When you sip our world-famous Clam-tini ®," says the menu, "you'd swear you were on a floating island in the middle of the sea."  For more information, visit: http://www.seasteading.org/conference2012 . Or watch a few episodes of Battlestar Galactica and you'll get the idea.

The transit activists, it seems, are storming the gates in the Bay Area.  Their target for the 2012 election season is the open District 3 seat on the Bay Area Rapid Transit, and a victory could signal the maturation of an insurgent trend years in the making.  In an era dominated by Tea Party challenges to the political establishment, it is instead transit activists who are battling against BART's status quo.  Activists have become increasingly frustrated over the last decade with BART's focus on system expansion and job creation through dubiously justified construction projects than with improving core services and keeping up with runaway structural deficits. The genesis of the conflict can be traced back to the  Oakland Airport Connector  (OAC) project.  Studied since the 1970s, BART dreamed of connecting the nearby Oakland Coliseum station with the Oakland Airport.  The $130 million project was sold to Alameda County voters in 2000 as part of the Measure B half-cent sales tax.  But the OAC went through as series of gross mutations, shedding system features while ballooning in cost.  By 2010, the cost estimate for the OAC had more than quadrupled to $550 million.  The system would no longer connect to BART, requiring riders to switch to an adjacent station and ride on a pulley-operated tramway.  The overhead tramway would run slower than the existing AirBART bus shuttle system while the fare would cost twice as much.  The ridership projections over the existing system were viewed dubiously, as were the claimed job-creation figures. Promised stops along the economically depressed Hegenberger Corridor, a major element in selling the project to the public, were removed from the plans due to cost overruns.  The much cheaper, and faster, dedicated-lane Bus Rapid Transit option was tabled for primarily political reasons. With core services being cut back on the BART system, a fleet of train cars nearly 40 years old, and fabric seating that was found to contain  dangerous viruses, bacteria, and fecal mater , transit activist groups like  TransForm  and  Urban Habitat  swung into action against what they saw as a wasteful, duplicative project.  The most visible opposition to the Oakland Airport Connector came from a cadre of young blogger-activists, often writing under pseudonyms: the now-shuttered ABetterOakland, run by  Vsmoothe  (Echa Schneider);  Future Oakland  &  The DTO , both run by  DTO510  (Jonathan Bair);  Living in the O , run by  Oakland Becks  (Rebecca Saltzman);  TransBay Blog , run by  Eric C. ;  Systemic Failure , run by Drunk Engineer; and many others. Vocal opposition to the OAC turned into a Title VI civil rights complaint with the Federal Transit Administration, leading to the  withdrawal of $70 million in stimulus funds .  Opposition further coalesced around the candidacy of urban planner and former Executive Director of the East Bay Bicycle Coalition,  Robert Raburn .  While incumbent Carole Allen Ward, a staunch OAC proponent, trumpeted her role in using BART for job creation, Raburn focused on transit service, access, and equity.  Raburn unseated Ward in an upset in 2010 � campaigning primarily on a platform built around his opposition to the Oakland Airport Connector.  But even with the election of an anti-OAC board member, the Oakland Airport Connector project simply refused to die.  While he convened an inquiry on the OAC, Raburn found that BART staff  had plowed so much money into the project  so as to make it nearly impossible to shutter without a massive financial loss.  Raburn grudgingly acquiesced, pivoting focus to service issues.  He helped steer budget surpluses towards  replacing bacteria-infested seating  rather than temporary fare reductions, getting BART to prioritize  replacing their 40-year-old fleet of passenger cars , and had a hand in the ouster of  OAC-supporting BART manager Dorothy Dugger . With a new election cycle upon us, another transit activist tested in the gantlet of the Oakland Airport Connector is running for the BART Board.  This time it is  Rebecca Saltzman , author of  Living in the O , who is a main contender for the District 3 seat.  This election should see less acrimony than the last, as District 3 incumbent Bob Franklin is stepping down to run for a seat on the Oakland City Council (a seat being vacated by Councilwoman Jane Bruner in  her  run at Oakland City Attorney). Saltzman is from the new school of transit advocates, more concerned with service enhancements, improving headways and hours of operation, system upgrades, and transit equity than she is with system expansion.  BART staff and longer-tenured board members, however, are still looking outwards rather than in.  BART had a recent  groundbreaking for their system expansion to San Jose  (the projections for which have been  roundly criticized in the past ), and is in the process of pushing through an expansion plan to the  suburban/exurban community of Livermore   (criticized for its  freeway-median alignment and low ridership projections ). What this all means for the future of BART has yet to be determined, but we may look back on this coming election as a tipping point in how Bay Area leaders think about transit, and the future role that transit advocates will play in making those decisions. Christopher Kidd was the founder and former writer of the LADOT Bike Blog.  He currently works as a planner at Alta Planning + Design in Berkeley.

I live too close to Century City and Beverly Hills to objectively report on the what is shaping up to be the most bitter land use battle in California: that of uber-wealthy Beverly Hills versus uber-ambitious Los Angeles County Metropolitan Transportation Authority. Here's my best shot at an update.  Last week the Metro board gave an historic go-ahead to the  westward extension  of the Los Angeles Purple Line subway. Though environmental and engineering documents for the subway have been certified for the entire 9.6-mile extension—which would pick up at the line's current terminus, two miles west of downtown, and extend roughly to the 405 Freeway – the segment that was approved stops short of that long-sought western reach. A beleaguered, marginalized, forlorn hamlet stands in its way.  For the past two years, this entity has claimed that Metro is imposing itself on a powerless little town. Civic leaders have described it as David vs. Goliath, with Metro as the Goliath. Residents who are confined to 10,000 square-foot mansions and condemned to navigate Los Angeles traffic in such mean conveyances as Maseratis and Aston-Martins have launched all manner of epithet against the transportation authority because of a plan that could, they say, blow up, or cripple, Beverly Hills High School.  Though it is in the 90212 zip code, in the city's humble southern portion, Beverly Hills High School is nonetheless one of the finest public schools in the region, so much so that generations of students have faked Beverly Hills addresses in order to gain admission. But, according to the Beverly Hills City Council, the Beverly Hills Unified School District board, Metro poses a grave danger to future Brandons, Brendas, and Andreas. The community is irate about Metro's preferred alignment ( link to map), which would put a station at Constellation Boulevard, in the middle of Century City, run the line directly under the school. Beverly Hills would prefer a station on Santa Monica Boulevard and a subsequent alignment that would run under Santa Monica Boulevard. School board president Brian Goldberg thinks that future pupils should fear for their lives. "We don't feel that MTA (Metro) has done their due diligence with respect to uncovering potential safety concerns with the number of abandoned oil wells, methane gas, saturated soil, the impact that it may have on 80-year-old buildings on the high school site," said Goldberg. The city has requested a special hearing in front of the Metro board before the alignment is approved. It will take place May 17. Back on campus, junior class president Jason seems more concerned about getting an education than fighting one of the biggest infrastructure projects in the nation. "I feel as though hysterics have been a factor here," said Jason. "People are blowing this issue out of proportion, giving it more attention than it deserves." (I agreed to obscure Jason's name because he is a minor, and probably doesn't want to be associated with what he considers an embarrassing spectacle.) For the past two years, debate about the subway has been the loudest conversation in Beverly Hills since the trial of Lindsay Lohan. Though Metro has held innumerable public meetings on the proposed subway dating back to at least 2006, it wasn't until late 2010 that civic raised concerns that some of the 17 alignments that Metro had published in its Alternatives Analysis might pose a problem. Originally, the most clear and present danger – articulated by then-School Board President Lisa Korbatov – was that terrorists would use the subway to blow up the school.  This premise assumes that these terrorists have no access to a motor vehicle and have never seen Shannen Doherty's early work in "Heathers." The debate has since shifted to less fanciful grounds. "We're not asking MTA to mitigate terrorist attacks," said Goldberg. Many in Beverly Hills believe that the Constellation station is a conspiracy instituted by Century City developer JMB Realty. Or it could be that JMB is one member of a loud chorus that thinks it's silly to put the station at Santa Monica Boulevard, immediately across the street from a golf course, rather than in the middle of the second-largest office district in the city. There's discussion about earthquake faults too, with dueling seismic analyses, that seems unlikely to be resolved. Goldberg said the school board has narrowed their protests down to two main concerns: things that would blow up if underground excavation takes place, and things that would not get built if underground excavation does not take place. School officials simply do not trust Metro to construct tunnels safely and, in particularly, avoid igniting underground pockets of methane gas. "If we're in control…we would be able to manage that process and we will be the ones that are responsible for mitigating, not MTA," said Goldberg. "I'm not going to leave the safety of our students in the hands of an MTA board whose only goal is to tunnel underneath the high school." Goldberg stressed that the city does support the subway—just not the tunnel under the school. A video produced by the PTA rendered some of these outcomes in gripping "A-Team"-era special effects.  Metro officials contend that fireballs and carnage are not exactly in their best interests either.  "If we did anything that was unsafe, not only would it undermine that project but it would undermine everything that this agency is trying to do," said Jody Litvak, community relations manager for Metro. (Disclosure: Litvak and I both serve on the board of a local civic organization.) Litvak also pointed out that the agency has constructed dozens of underground miles in the county without incident. She said that some of those tunnels run under schools, as do segments of Bay Area Rapid Transit. Goldberg's second major contention is that the tunnel—the top of which would be a full 50 feet below grade, even accounting for the campuses sloping topography—could impede future building projects to expand and modernize the school. He explained that the Division of the State Architect must approve any school development plans, and he feared that the presence of the tunnel could make the State Architect balk. Metro officials say that they are more than willing to collaborate with the school district to try to accommodate future development. If only the district would collaborate with Metro. "I'm sure we could and I'm sure we would be willing (to collaborate), but we're in a situation right now that makes it difficult because we were told some time ago that all communications between Metro staff and school district staff had to go through attorneys," said Litvak. "There's been a fair amount of saber-rattling leading one to infer the likelihood of lawsuits." Jason, the junior class president, would prefer that all the adults in Beverly Hills quit their drama and let the subway take its course. He said that most of his schoolmates—they being the children that everyone wants to protect—likely feel the same way. He even conducted a Facebook poll to find out. "The majority of the people who answered my poll said they didn't care, which to me translates as they're not really interested in our school putting up the fight that it is," said Jason. He has clearly been learning lessons that the school board has not approved. "Subways run under all over metropolitan areas. They go under commercial buildings….they go under other public buildings," said Jason. Meanwhile, he continued, "the likelihood of a fatal automobile crash is very real, despite the safety precautions and airbag regulations designed to protect us. However, we drive anyway. To fight the subway is to drive away modernization." In the course of raising hell against Metro, no one in Beverly Hills seems to have the patience to listen his point of view. "I feel as though this issue is highly political, governed by homeowners and businesses," said Jason. "Regardless of what I say…the board responses to its voters, so that's where the power is." Editors of the school paper, the  Highlights , did not respond to requests for comment. Neither did Gabrielle Carteris.  Goldberg was quick to point out that Beverly Hills itself is not as powerful as some might think.  "We don't have private citizens that are writing checks to BHUSD," said Goldberg. "The perception that somehow we have wealth and means--maybe individual families who send their kids to our schools have that—but the district is suffering." A version of this article appeared on  Next American City's  daily blog.

Since the passage of the Clean Water Act in 1972, when the Environmental Protection Agency told a property owner to jump, in some cases the property owner's only possible response was "how high?" No so anymore.  Last month, in Sackett vs. Environmental Protection Agency , the United States Supreme Court issued a ruling that places a limitation on how far the EPA can go to compel property owners to comply with the Clean Water Act.  To enforce the act, EPA officials often issue "administrative compliance orders" to property owners whom it determined were discharging pollutants or otherwise harming wetlands on their property. Chantelle and Mike Sackett had been cited for doing just that and received a compliance order halting their construction of a home near Priest Lake, Idaho. Refusal to follow the order would have come with a fine of $37,500 per day.  Plaintiffs claimed that EPA policies unfairly prevented property owners to contest these fines.  "Our main objection was that the EPA was imposing the threat of ruinous fines and even criminal prosecution without any proof of violation or an opportunity to be heard," said Reed Hopper, principal attorney with the Pacific Legal Foundation, which represented the plaintiffs. "There was simply no accountability." On a 9-0 decision, the Supreme Court held that a compliance order--and the threat of fine--could be subject to a suit because, according to the justices' decision, the agency treated the order as a "final ruling" without any other procedural remedies for the property owners. This ability for a property owner to now sue for a "pre-enforcement review" may give EPA officials pause when issuing compliance orders in the future.  "I think it's a great step forward for property rights and the rule of law and due process," said Hopper.  How large a step it really is--and what practical impact it will have--is debatable.  On the one hand, the ruling is arguably the most significant land-use related ruling since 2005's Kelo vs. New London decision, which upheld the right of governments to invoke eminent domain for the purposes of economic development, and 2006's Rapanos v. United States, which narrowed the scope of waterways and wetlands that were protected under the Clean Water Act.  (Not coincidentally, some of the ambiguity in Sackett stems from the Rapanos ruling; the Sacketts' property is not technically a wetland but rather falls under the more ambiguous category of "waters of the United States.") Thus far, Sackett does not appear to have far-reaching legal impacts.  Many observers note that the ruling was intentionally narrow and applies only to the specific type of compliance order that was at issue in the Sackett case.  "The decision was very narrow and leaves open to EPA the ability to enforce the law either using  the same mechanism, but also being prepared to go to court, or using different mechanisms and slightly different approaches," said Devine.   The has not announced any new policies as a result of the decision.  "EPA will of course fully comply with the Supreme Court's decision, which the agency is still reviewing," said Bill Keener, spokesperson for the EPA's San Francisco office, relaying a statement from EPA headquarters.   Notably, the Sackett decision does not place any new constraints on the EPA. The burden remains on the landowner to object to EPA compliance orders through litigation.  "There's nothing in this decision, as I read it, that limits EPA's ability to warn dischargers when the agency believes someone is violating the Clean Water Act," said John Devine, staff attorney in the Natural Resources Defense Council. "If the EPA wants to use that approach, it needs to be prepared to spend the resources to litigate the issue of the discharger's liability under the law when it issues the order." Hopper, however, said that just that threat of litigation may be enough to prompt the EPA to issue compliance orders more conservatively, or to do more research before issuing orders.  "What we're after was to try to make, for the first time, the EPA accountable for its enforcement action," said Hopper. "The agency is going to have to do more than just a drive-by type evaluation." Even so, Hopper said that the ruling is likely to affect only a few of the roughly 3,000 compliance orders that, according to CNN, the EPA issues each year.  "It will have no effect on that whatsoever," said Hopper. "The only cases that are going to be brought to court are going to be those in which the agency is acting at the margins." However it affects the EPA's practices, the Sackett decision seems unlikely to rile activists in either the property-rights movement or the environmental movement. Though the Kelo decision did not actually set new legal precedent, it still galvanized property-rights advocates and spawned a slew of new state laws meant to restrict the use of eminent domain. Because the Sackett ruling restricts government power--albeit only slightly--no such response is expected.  "Here we have a decision that struck down governmental power, so there's nothing for people to react to," said Sean Hecht, executive director of the Environmental Law Center, UCLA Law School. "Government just has to decide how it's going to change how it does business as a result. No one's going to get up in arms about an abusive power based on a decision like this." Though the EPA issues Clean Water Act compliance orders all over the country—3,000 per year, according to CNN—California poses a particular challenge to EPA officials because of the diversity of the state's wetlands, which do not always adhere in reality to the federal definition thereof. Nonetheless, there appears to be little reason to believe that the ruling would affect California any more or less than it would any other state. If anything, fewer opportunities to issue compliance orders may arise in the first place.  "The wetlands there tend to be small, vernal pool types….water features that are only questionably subject to control under the Clean Water Act," said Hopper.

Today, on the eve of the 20th anniversary of the Los Angeles civil unrest, my sense of frustration remains intact with all parties: the Los Angeles Police Department and former Chief Darryl Gates; the looters who torched and ransacked small businesses in my former neighborhood in West Adams; and all-white juries in suburban communities, with their curious reluctance to convict policemen accused of using excessive force.  Even more frustrating, however, was the failure on the part of both business and government to acknowledge the deepest, fundamental cause of the riots, which was institutionalized racism. This type of racism took the form of "red-lining" by banks and insurance companies, which often refused to make loans or underwrite businesses in "undesirable" or "high-risk"  (i.e. minority) areas. This resulting economic devastation of red lining can be found can be found in African-American communities throughout the United States.  African-American communities are poor not because black people are somehow lacking in enterprise but rather because major lenders have denied them capital.  Let's be very clear: institutionalized poverty, made possible by red lining, was the real cause of the Rodney King riots.   Also frustrating, if well-intentioned, was the effort of private, non-government groups like Rebuild L.A. to attract both capital and businesses to the riot area. Remember that riot area stretched from Long Beach to Pasadena. (Like everything else in Los Angeles, the riots took a linear path, along major thoroughfares, in cars.) I was skeptical then, and remain so now, that private enterprise was somehow more able than government to break down the colossal edifice of racism, poverty and blue lining.  Rebuild LA eventually wound down a few years later with few tangible achievements; perhaps the organization should be credited with providing good public relations and a positive push to lenders to support the development new shopping centers and some new housing in South Central.  In fact, working class people spend much of their disposable income, more so than everybody else does, on food and retail goods. Retailers often do well in working class neighborhoods (although some supermarkets have complained in the past that pilferage has made some stores unprofitable and driven up food prices in poor neighborhoods.) Yet South Central in general and the LA in particular are better off now than they were 20 years ago.  The reasons, ironically, may have little to do with the King riots. The first reason is the rapid growth of the African-American middle class, and the slow realization on the part of corporate America that the majority of African-Americans are middle income wage earners, not scowling gangbangers with gold-plated cocaine spoons dangling from their neck chains.  Although grotesque and bigoted, this misperception of the Black community continues to hold sway in many parts of the country.    A second reason was the �SoHo phenomenon,' or the fad of buying cheap industrial buildings or outdated office buildings in downtown areas for conversion into fashionable "loft" housing. In the late 1990s and early 2000s, the widespread popularity of this type of real estate investment increased the comfort level of lenders who would have shunned such deals even a few years earlier.   (In fairness, this loft-conversion mania was largely market-driven, even though local agencies, such as the late LA Community Redevelopment Agency, had spent decades advocating for downtown housing, with limited results.) A third reason is the rise of ethnic retailing, with shopping centers designed for specific populations--notably Latino and Asian communities.  The success of these businesses, and their corporate "depth" of capital, has increased their popularity among both shopping center owners and the lenders who review all their leasing decisions.  Money is the common factor among all these reasons for recovery.  Urban areas�and that includes the suburbs�depend on steady infusions of capital to attract new residents and new employers while maintaining property values.  When new investment came to South Central, the community improved, if only a little.   And yet, a few years ago, I covered a story of a new charter school on Vermont Avenue, not far from the intersection where the riots started.  The architects explained to me that the building lacked transparent windows, to protect students from the possibility of targeted shootings. The neighborhood is better for having the school, but the defensive character of the school building is a reminder that social conditions remain much the same as they were before the Walpurgisnacht of 1992.  Finally, a word of thanks to Warren Olney and his producer and my long-time pal Frances Anderton at  "Which Way LA?" on KCRW-FM, in Santa Monica, for producing an excellent, five-day documentary on LA before and after the Rodney King riots. Also, in a shameless plug, the present writer can be heard in an interview about the impact of the riots on the built environment is featured on the Wednesday show. (Archive of the entire five-show series is available on www.kcrw.org.)

Joel Kotkin is just thinking about the children. Too much, if you ask me. As you may recall, two weeks ago it was Wendell Cox who used the Wall Street Journal opinion pages to herald the "war" that California's urban areas are launching on the suburbs. For whatever reason, the Journal really has it cut out for California, because Kotkin's piece—which isn't actually an op-ed but rather a sycophantic quasi-interview  by Allysia Finley—levies similar criticisms of California's land use policies, but with some even more strained logic and offensive biases. I'd rather not make a career out of responding to erroneous analyses  of California's demise. But, as a loyal Californian and fan of truthfulness, I can't ignore this latest volley of claptrap. Cox and Kotkin both claim that policies that discourage suburban development and/or encourage dense urban development are undermining the notion that California is the promised land. This myth of the California dream is particularly powerful for Kotkin, who contends that California used to be "God's best moment." This is the blithe vision that none but the most daft have ever believed. The only cliché about California that is more abiding than sunshine is that of noir (itself a ponderous metaphor, but we'll go with it). Well known scholars such as Mike Davis has covered that ground extensively, as has almost every other honest student of California. So, to base public policy on a myth—or, more accurately—one half of a myth makes little sense. Does California have its prosaic problems? Sure it does. In fact, I conducted an insightful, cordial interview with Kotkin about two years ago in which he lucidly described some of California's demographic challenges. Let's look at those that Kotkin identifies this time. Kotkin's central claim is that the four million people who have reportedly left California in the past ten years have done so for two interrelated reasons. Restrictive local land use policies have made coastal areas unattainably expensive. So, rather than consign themselves to miserable outer suburbs, families are up and moving to states like Texas and Nevada because of low taxes. This trend has rendered urban areas like San Francisco and West Los Angeles "boutique" cities that cater only to the wealthy. I couldn't agree more with Kotkin's implication: a more diverse range of residents should be able to live in lovely places like San Francisco and Santa Monica. By all accounts, Kotkin should be overjoyed by Senate Bill 375. If all goes as planned, it will enable more people to live in expensive places near the coasts while relieving pressure on single-family home prices. Except, according to Kotkin, the policies that would promote housing—and de-boutiqueify these cities, by a) enabling more people to live in them, and b) creating more places like them—carry the air of a Stalinist plot. "Things will only get worse in the coming years as Democratic Gov. Jerry Brown and his green cadre implement their "smart growth" plans to cram the proletariat into high-density housing," writes Finley. Let's overlook the rhetoric of socialist class struggle and focus on supply and demand. If the coasts are such nice places, then it would stand to reason that, if offered sufficient housing stock, people would willingly live in them rather than subject themselves to "cramming." Alternatively, if those cities don't increase their density, then the only way to make them more diverse, and suitable for the middle class, is to kick out the rich and let families squat in their mansions. Viva la Revolucion! And good luck figuring out the espresso machine. It's clear, then, that Kotkin's objections to smart growth are not reasoned policy analyses. They are ad hominem attacks against a class of people whom he finds icky. According to Kotkin, if you're not rich then "your chances of being able to buy a house or raise a family in the Bay Area or in most of coastal California is pretty weak." You can't raise kids in multifamily dwelling in coastal California? Who does Kotkin think he is, Dr. Spock? I'd like him to tell his theory to my mother -- and to the millions of other parents who have raised perfectly decent children in tight quarters. On this point, it's worth quoting Kotkin in full: What I find reprehensible beyond belief is that the people pushing themselves live in single-family homes and often drive very fancy cars, but want everyone else to live like my grandmother did in Brownsville in Brooklyn in the 1920s. (This is the moment when, if I was John Stewart and this was The Daily Show, I'd be looking plaintively into the camera and stuttering, "But...he...just..said....") Let's make this clear: Kotkin is claiming that the reprehensible people who are unbelievably supporting SB 375 are the very same single-family-home dwellers whom he venerates. This would be contradictory at best--but it also happens to be wrong. In fact, the current governor (who had nothing to do with the passage of SB 375) famously lives in a multifamily building in Sacramento. Granted, the former governor lives on a property in–where else?—West Los Angeles that could comfortably fit several extra families. And that's just in his carriage house. (How convenient for him.) Regardless, who's the one who's making land more expensive? As for the legislature, I have no idea where they all live. Probably in one big houseboat on the American River. But I do know that SB 375's author, Sen. Darrel Steinberg, represents Sacramento (which is a city, last time I checked). And I know that, on average, Democratic voters are more likely to be urban dwellers and that Republican voters are more likely to be suburbanites. Kotkin must know this, unless he has forgotten where Nancy Pelosi is from. So the voters who have supported SB 375 are in fact more likely to already live in denser urban environments. They support SB 375 not because they want to make everyone else miserable but because they want more people to enjoy the urban experience. Most of us city folk don't give a rip about what happens in the suburbs; if they want to stay boring, homogenous, and sparely populated, that's fine by me. Meanwhile, I've never met Kotkin's grandmother, but I'm sure she's a very nice lady and would not like her grandson to say mean things about her home. But that's beside the point. All the people who currently live in Brownsville—because they're hipsters who dig the lifestyle or families who enjoy the inestimable financial benefits of participating in New York City's economy—would probably not like him to say mean things about their lifestyle either. Kotkin then offers up a notion that is both logically and grammatically nonsensical: "The new regime…wants to destroy the essential reason why people move to California in order to protect their own lifestyles." This is where it gets personal. I live in an apartment. So do most of the people I know. By and large, all of us are pleased with our lifestyles because we get to live in great cities and reap their estimable social and economic benefits even if we don't have vast backyards or fences to shield us from people who make us uncomfortable. I support more dense urban development not just because I think it's a fine way to live but also because it will, indirectly, reduce my cost of living if the supply of apartments—which are already in high demand—increases. This is how land use economics works. So let's recap: Kotkin disparages people like me for liking a lifestyle that he disagrees with. He thinks that more people should live where I live (i.e. near the coast) but he doesn't think that coastal areas should build more housing, and he definitely doesn't think that the state should promote that housing. Because then there'd be too much of a bad thing, even though people want that bad thing very badly if it's located in the right places. And that's why, according to Kotkin, California shouldn't have passed SB 375 and instead should have maintained the status quo. Or something like that. Kotkin also spews some nonsense about the evils of green energy, but, to be honest, I'm too exhausted to write any more. Something weird is going on here, and I'll be damned if I can figure it out. If Kotkin wants to discuss further, I invite him to join me in my fourth-floor hovel and witness my childless depravity firsthand. He can bring his own espresso. This article has been updated since its original publication on April 26. For an excellent numbers-based analysis of these issues, see Robert Steuteville's May 1 essay in Better! Cities and Towns.

Of California's roughly 37 million people, not a single one of them remembers a time when the state was not growing at a seemingly out-of-control pace. With the exception of the Depression and World War II years, our state has tripped over itself to build homes, roads, and entire cities nearly from scratch. We bulldozed one patch of desert, farmland, or chaparral only to find the surveyors marking up the next plot. It's been exhilarating, but also exhausting.  And, according to analysis of the latest Census data, it may be coming to an end.  In  "Generational Projections of the California Population By Nativity and Year of Immigrant Arrival,"  a USC team led by professors John Pitkin and Dowell Myers, project that the state will henceforth grow scarcely faster than your money market account does: about 1% per year. In the face of decreasing rates of immigration and birth, the report predicts growth of less than 10% per decade, inching up to 44 million people by 2028. That's as opposed to 26% growth in the 1980s and 14% growth in the 1990s. To put this shift in perspective, as recently as 2007, the state Department of Finance predicted that California would reach 50 million people by 2032. The new numbers push that date back to 2046.   As could be expected, the proportion of elderly people in the state is expected to rise. But with a lower birthrate, there will come a time when there is a greater proportion of working-age adults as well. That's good for the tax base, which will need to support services for all of those seniors.  The report identifies one profound cultural shift: in the coming decades, the majority of Californians will be native-born, starting at 53% in 2010 and rising from there. Perhaps this will, once and for all, put a stop the immortal California question, "you mean you're actually  from here?"  Mind you, 10% per decade with a base of 37 million is still a lot of people. The USC team contends, though, that this pace will give planners a chance to actually plan rather that simply keep up.  That's good news for infrastructure and preservation of open space. But, in a roundabout way, could it be bad news for smart growth?  Even though current strategies such as the smart growth plans of SB 375 are designed to reduce the impacts of growth--on a per capita basis--they still anticipate and, indeed, rely on the occurrence of growth. The Sustainable Communities Strategies do not, contrary to the claims of critics, call for forced marches from the suburbs to center cities. Rather, they assume that urban housing will fulfill a predicted demand for more housing overall. But, with fewer Californians, that's fewer people to inhabit urban infill projects and fewer people to ride public transit.  A transformation of California's urban landscape may, therefore, happen more slowly too. In some places, planning may take the form of retrofitting and updating rather than expanding.  This isn't to say that California is going to grind to a halt or become Japan, where the population is predicted to plummet in the coming decades. At best, it means that we may, finally, get to enjoy that mellow, laid-back lifestyle that we all came here for in the first place.

State Controller John Chiang sent what many cities consider to be an ominous letter, advising them to hand over assets that they may have acquired from redevelopment agencies. The letter, dated April 20, instructs cities, counties, and other agencies to cast a wide net to identify assets that may have been improperly transfered following the January 1, 2011 effective date of AB 1X 26, the bill that calls for the dissolution of redevelopment agencies and liquidation of their assets.  Cities and other entities are ordered to "reverse the transfer" and return all applicable assets to successor agencies, which are charged with liquidating such assets. The order refers to assets transfered both "directly and indirectly" between RDAs and parent jurisdictions. Many agencies had reportedly formed hasty loan agreements and put real assets on the books of their host jurisdictions presumably in order to shield those assets from liquidation.  The order "applies to all assets including, but not limited to, real and personal property, cash funds, accounts receivable, deeds of trust and mortgages, contract rights, and rights to any payment of any kind." The only exemption is if such assets were involved in a contract with a third party, such as a developer, as of June 28, 2011.  The letter warns that cities and counties can expect audits "in the coming weeks." The League of California Cities has announced that its Post-Redevelopment Working Group is working on a response to the letter and will advise cities how to proceed.  For the full text of the letter, please click here .

The adjective "short" best describes California's land use and CEQA statutes of limitation, and Okasaki v. City of Elk Grove illustrates this principle perfectly.  From CEQA's 30- and 35-day limitation periods, to the 90-day limits of the planning and zoning matters (Government code section 65009), to the Subdivision Map Act (Government Code section 66499.37, time waits for no litigant. The most recent case addressing the planning and zoning law wrestles with the interface of the 90-day statute in Government Code section 65009, with the timeline found in Code of Civil Procedure section 1094.6. These latter timelines call for an extension of time periods in circumstances in which the petitioner has requested the agency to prepare the administrative record, in which case, the statute extends to 30 days from the delivery of the record. (Section 1094.6(d)) Okasaki challenged a variance granted to a neighbor by the City of Elk Grove. Roughly one week after the city's decision, Okasaki requested that the city prepare the administrative record. Eventually, 90 days passed without the city preparing the record and without Okasaki having filed suit. Okasaki eventually filed suit soon after the 90-day period passed.  The city successfully demurred on the basis of Government Code section 65009. The court of appeal affirmed. However, Okasaki argued the timeline for filing the writ was extended by the city's failure to deliver the record. Not so, according to the appellate court. Rather, in reconciling these two provisions, the appellate court noted that 65009 was the more specific section and therefore prevailed over the terms of the broader provisions found in Code of Civil Procedure section 1094.6. The Case:  Okasaki, et. al.  v. City of Elk Grove, et. al.  (February 24, 2012, C066203) Cal.App.4th  The Attorneys: Jerry Sandefur for Plaintiffs and Appellants. Best Best & Krieger and Stacey N. Sheston for Defendants and Respondents. Wiliam W. Abbott is a partner in the Sacramento law firm of Abbott & Kindermann, LLP.