The on-time budget bill sent to Governor Brown on Sunday, June 15 contains a deal for use of cap-and-trade proceeds with the high-speed rail funding the Governor wanted and more housing and sustainability money than there might have been. If Brown signs the budget as is, the "Affordable Housing and Sustainable Communities" program will get about $130 million in the 2014-15 fiscal year, out of a total pot of $872 million in cap and trade revenue. Then in future fiscal years starting with 2015-16, the same category will receive 20% a year of the cap and trade proceeds as one of several continuous appropriations. Half of the 20% must go to affordable housing projects designed to reduce greenhouse gases -- or at least, that's stated for the years from 2015-2016 onward. That result exceeds the $100 million for "transit oriented development grants" proposed by the Governor last winter (see http://bit.ly/1pbs4vt) but is a compromise from earlier legislative proposals that had called for as much as $400 million or 40% of cap-and-trade to fund a combination of transit, affordable housing and sustainability projects. Bill Higgins of the California Association of Councils of Government (CALCOG) linked the results to the work of outgoing Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, D-Sacramento. Higgins wrote on June 13: "Sustainable Communities and SB 375 related funding is the only thing to come out of the investment plan with the same commitment to ongoing funding as High Speed Rail. That is pretty significant. That is a direct result of Senator Steinberg's effort and leadership." The cap-and-trade budget deal figures appeared first in a Budget Conference Committee handout late June 12, then were repeated in the Assembly floor report at http://ow.ly/y2kOL. The floor report said, "In addition, when the $400 million General Fund Loan from the Cap and Trade fund is repaid, these funds are dedicated to High Speed Rail." Despite Republican opposition to the high-speed rail portion, the same numbers held almost completely steady through the budget negotiations on the completion deadline day, Sunday, June 15. Reportedly, though, Sen. Kevin DeLeon (who has since been elected Senate President pro Tem to succeed Steinberg) publicly mentioned a plan to add "cleanup" language on high-speed rail during the coming week. The figures for 2014-15 were lightly tweaked in the actual main 2014-15 appropriations bill, SB 852 (http://bit.ly/1q6vfpw), as shown by a glance at expenditures from the "Greenhouse Gas Reduction Fund". An expenditure for weatherization that was given in the floor report as $75 million was shaved to just over $70 million. The "$130 million" fund for "affordable housing and sustainable communities" shows an appropriation of $129,201,000. The continuous appropriations of cap-and-trade funds for future fiscal years passed as SB 862, (http://bit.ly/1py6fJT). That same bill adds two new members to the Strategic Growth Council, which is to administer the Affordable Housing and Sustainable Communities funds. The provisions call for one new member to be appointed by the Speaker of the Assembly and the other by the Senate Committee on Rules. These two legislative appointees are to be added to an existing roster heavy on gubernatorial appointees: six state agency heads, the Director of State Planning and Research, and one member of the public appointed by the Governor, who is currently Robert Fisher of The Gap. If, as is likely, the new appointees are local elected officials, their membership on the board could create new complexities regarding conflicts of interest in allocation decisions. The "Affordable Housing and Sustainable Communities" funding is to be allocated to the Strategic Growth Council, with the SGC to decide how to administer the "sustainable communities" funds apart from housing. SB 862 adds a new division, Sec. 75200 et seq., to the Public Resources Code to outline distribution criteria. Projects to be funded would need to be consistent with state environmental priorities and "support implementation of an adopted or draft sustainable communities strategy or, if a sustainable communities strategy is not required for a region by law, a regional plan that includes policies and programs to reduce greenhouse gas emissions". Additionally they would need to fit on a list of project categories beginning with "Intermodal, affordable housing projects that support infill and compact development" and "Transit capital projects and programs supporting transit ridership." The rest of the list is similar to categories proposed earlier in the session as part of the unsuccessful AB 574 (see http://bit.ly/1kwfAu1), but adds emphasis on infill, compact development, "improving connectivity and accessibility to jobs, housing, and services," and serving disadvantaged communities. Under a separate heading, the Transit and Intercity Rail Capital Program and Low Carbon Transit Operations get $25 million apiece in the first fiscal year. From the second year onward they get more: 15% of the cap and trade money, of which 10% goes to transit and intercity rail, administered through CalTrans and the California Transportation Commission, and 5% goes to low-carbon transit operations, to be distributed via the State Transit Assistance formula and administered by CalTrans. All projects must report their progress in reducing greenhouse gases to the SGC and the Air Resources Board. Since 25% of cap and trade funds must benefit disadvantaged communities. The bill calls for CalEPA to work with the Air Resources Board and hold at least one public workshop before identifying which are disadvantaged communities for purposes of the allocation. This involves a revision to the existing Health and Safety Code Sec. 39711 but it hangs on to the existing broad definition of the term in that statute. A broader budget analysis by the Western Center on Law and Poverty noted that appropriations for housing included $100 million for the Department of Housing's Multifamily Housing Program and $10 million for rental and utility assistance for drought-affected households. Further it noted the passage of the Prop 41 ballot measure authorizes $600 million to house veterans and their families. Among minor benefit increases and liberalizations in the CalWORKs program (the new benefit will be $703 per month for a family of three), a $20 million appropriation is to provide "rapid re-housing" assistance. The League of California Cities has a much more detailed analysis of the main budget bill and all the trailer bills for items relevant to local governments, available at http://bit.ly/1q6I7Mo. As the new cap-and-trade budget and allocation program develops in detail, it may be helpful to watch CALCOG's resource page at http://www.calcog.org/index.aspx?nid=96 for postings of further key documents.

A budget deal was reportedly nearing as of Monday night, with the Senate's Darrell Steinberg and the Assembly's Toni Atkins talking optimistically but not too specificially. See http://www.capradio.org/articles/2014/06/09/budget-deal-nears-at-the-capitol/. No clear sign where cap-and-trade proceeds fit into that mix, but the data points include an extended lobbying press conference given June 6 by LA Mayor Eric Garcetti and senior legislators, including Steinberg and his expected successor to the State Senate presidency, Kevin De León. The videotape is available on De León's site at http://bit.ly/1jh2Ac5 -- including Steinberg's quietly gleeful aside as he introduced De León: " I'm terming out of office!" StreetsblogLA put together a graphic explaining the three current public cap-and-trade spending proposals at http://bit.ly/1u075wA. CALCOG's helpful cap-and-trade tracking page at http://www.calcog.org/index.aspx?nid=96 has been updated to include the June 3 State Senate budget hearing's modification of the Steinberg plan, and, most recently, a link to a proposal for a compromise advanced by the Legislative Analyst's Office: http://www.lao.ca.gov/handouts/Conf_Comm/2014/Cap-and-Trade-Expenditures-060414.pdf. All the proposals include hefty funding for transportation and "sustainable communities" funding, but amounts and emphases vary, with the Governor's proposal leaning toward his beloved high-speed rail program, Steinberg's toward affordable housing at transit hubs, and the Assembly's toward broad state and local categories of "Sustainable Communities" funding. New EPA rule could push more states toward cap-and-trade California's cap-and-trade program gained standing as a national model this week because of the federal EPA decision to issue a nationwide proposed rule setting state-by-state carbon caps to be met by 2030. While the rules have been criticized as weakly allowing too much state-by-state discretion, they do create incentives for more states to enter the cap-and-trade business. Ethan Elkind's underwhelmed take on the rules is at http://bit.ly/1u0i6hr, Bloomberg's report is among those seeing a possible boost to regional cap-and-trade markets, but says it's complicated, at http://buswk.co/1kVDftA. The Nation , however, quotes some warnings that an unintended result could be more pressure to use natural gas instead of coal, hence more pressure in favor of fracking: http://bit.ly/1kLE7zZ. The EPA proposed rule itself is at http://www2.epa.gov/carbon-pollution-standards/clean-power-plan-proposed-rule. LA Metro offers new Union Station plan ideas Added ideas for the "master plan" to renovate LA's historic Union Station and surround it with new structures and amenities went public in a presentation June 5, in preparation for a board of directors meeting June 18 of the LA County Metropolitan Transportation Authority (Metro). The plan follows Metro's 2011 repurchase of the station and surrounding property from Catellus, which had owned it since 1990: http://www.greatamericanstations.com/Stations/LAX. The current proposal provides for closer bike and pedestrian connections to surrounding neighborhoods and expanded local transit, and also looks forward to "anticipated future arrival of high speed rail" with plans for a separate terminal to welcome that fabled beast if it ever arrives. Curbed LA has a summary at http://bit.ly/1o84YJP and Metro's own announcement page is at http://www.metro.net/projects/la-union-station/. The text actually released on June 5 appears to be a collection of slides rather than a dense narrative. Metro's own summary appears at http://bit.ly/1wYbYKQ including a grand rendering of the proposed complex "in the future after the Master Plan is implemented." Proposals in the main presentation slide set at http://media.metro.net/projects_studies/lausmp/lausmp_presentation_2014_0605_revised.pdf include a call to expand territory covered by the 1996 Alameda Specific Plan, including east to the LA River and south as far as First Street. San Pablo Avenue Specific Plan would reknit East Bay suburban corridor The San Pablo Avenue Specific Plan, a joint project by the towns of El Cerrito and Richmond, went public for comment June 3 with comments due July 21. The Mercury News has a summary at http://bit.ly/1xBuetW. The detailed plan text and EIR material is at www.el-cerrito.org/spaSP. Goals of the plan include a form-based code, complete streets plan and infrastructure review with a goal of increased attention to public use of outdoor space. Strategic Growth Council grants awarded The Strategic Growth Council awarded $40 million in grants under Proposition 84, including $16 million in the Sustainable Communities Planning Grant category. The announcement is at http://sgc.ca.gov/uploads/2013/05/SGC-Awards-40m-in-Planning-and-Urban-Greening-Grants.pdf. Grant purposes include an assessment of infrastructure needs in disadvantaged areas of Tulare County and the Pioneer Bluff Redevelopment Master Plan in West Sacramento. More special legislation for Tesla As noted last week at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3505, lots of California officials have been crowding forward to beg the privilege of hosting Elon Musk's "gigafactory" for Tesla car batteries -- amid regrets that the loss of Redevelopment tax-increment financing held back localities from promising tax expenditures to large employers. The Sacramento Business Journal now reports at http://bit.ly/1kLBCxD and http://bit.ly/1qkcIp5 on a new piece of courtship legislation for Tesla, handled as a gut-and-amend of SB 1309, now sponsored by State Sens. Steinberg and Gaines -- a Democrat and a Republican. The current placeholder draft of the bill, at http://bit.ly/1u0hGI1, promises but doesn't spell out "legislation, including, but not limited to, financial incentives and changes to regulatory and environmental processes, to expedite groundbreaking and construction in California of a large-scale battery factory to manufacture batteries for both electric-vehicle and stationary uses." As the Sacramento Business Journal notes, Musk's SpaceX company has already received special exemptions from California property tax under AB 777, which gives up local tax revenue estimated at $1 million. (See http://bit.ly/1o7I8SJ and http://bit.ly/1kVzsfQ). The Board of Equalization backed the exemption by a vote in late May defining certain rockets as "business inventory", hence as excluded from property tax for an additional reason. See http://www.boe.ca.gov/regs/reg_133_2014.htm and http://www.boe.ca.gov/meetings/pdf/2014/052214_F3_Reg133.pdf. Coastal Commission: two big votes postponed, SoCal adjustments on deck A vote to at last approve the Santa Monica Mountains Local Coastal Program is expected to be before the Coastal Commission in July, per an email form the Commission's director, Dr. Charles Lester. The remaining step to complete this long-running project is to approve Los Angeles County implementing legislation -- zoning ordinances and other potentially devilish details -- to implement the Land Use Plan approved by the Commission in April. Back in April, players in the hard-fought controversy over vineyard and farming uses were looking toward the June monthly meeting in Huntington Beach as the likely approval session, but it's not on the June agenda. So it goes to the agenda for Ventura in July. See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3474 for CP&DR's prior coverage on this issue. Last month's hardest-fought issue, the Marin County Local Coastal Program update, got a land use plan out of the May meeting but it was so loaded with complex last-minute amendments that Commission and county staff have set no date to finish resulting revisions to the implementing legislation. The implementation plan is on the Commission's June agenda only to push back the deadline for completing it to July 27, 2015. Matters on the June agenda include a Huntington Beach redesignation of five acres from open space and agriculture to residential use, a raft of adjustments to the Carlsbad and San Diego Local Coastal Programs and home renovations in Los Angeles County. The discussion-only item for appeals on Wednesday morning's CCC agenda could see some tension over the appeal of a Laguna Canyon live/work project following a site visit by a CCC staff biologist. See http://bit.ly/1n30izT for local reporting on that dispute. The Commission's June 11-13 agenda is currently at http://coastal.ca.gov/mtgcurr.html. And in the sports venue business: San Jose's Diridon Station Area Plan -- available in draft form at https://www.sanjoseca.gov/index.aspx?NID=1743 -- will go to a City Council vote today, June 10, amid complaints from bike and transit activists over what StreetsblogSF called a "parking crater" sought by the SAP Center for its "Shark Tank" hockey arena. For details see http://bit.ly/1qlRyqT. The LA City Council approved a "relatively meager $300 million renovation" of its convention center  that would leave out a sports stadium supported by the NFL: http://bit.ly/1oPjS3B The city's soccer team, Sacramento Republic FC, teamed with a group of nonprofits to back a county sales tax hike for projects including a soccer stadium: http://bit.ly/1hD1Gv7 On May 23, Judge Timothy Frawley, who has ruled in so many heavy-hitting Sacramento county court cases, threw out the current lawsuit against the Kings arena proposal, saying the suit's challenge to the arena term sheet was inappropriate because the term sheet was not binding. See http://bit.ly/1kggsCO. Sacramento Taxpayers Opposed to Pork (STOP) announced it was giving up its campaign for a referendum on the proposed Kings basketball arena, following a rebuff (also by Judge Frawley) some months before: http://bit.ly/1ljKfzc Oakland A's owner Lew Wolff announced he was close to signing a lease extension for the A's to stay in the Oakland Coliseum -- a deal that would further weight Oakland's stadium site choice decision toward the proposed "Coliseum City" model. See http://bit.ly/1oPlpqq for current coverage and http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3476 for Morris Newman's overview of the Oakland stadium venue choices. The Oakland Tribune reported on a blossom of real estate activity nourished by expectations for Levi's Stadium, soon to be home to the ex-San-Francisco 49ers: http://bit.ly/1l2SpYi In Other News: A plan to expand San Francisco's Moscone Center, mostly upward along Howard Street, was before the city's Planning Commission on June 5. For details and links to the massive EIR see Curbed SF at http://bit.ly/1oH715k. Minutes of the meeting aren't posted yet but the agenda is at http://www.sf-planning.org/index.aspx?page=3835 with a note that comments will be accepted until June 16. The SF Business Times describes commercial hopes for the plan at http://bit.ly/1n350NX. The official expansion site is at http://mosconeexpansion.com/. Local real estate blog Socketsite has renderings and comments on an alternative at http://bit.ly/1pePumX. The Yerba Buena Neighborhood Consortium, which has roots in the 40-year-old conflict over demolitions at the site, posted criticisms at http://bit.ly/1s2753s, including an argument that the plan did too little for existing pedestrian safety and sidewalk crowding. Developer Larry Kelley announced a deal to buy and clean up the 240-acre Union Pacific rail yard in downtown Sacramento. The Sacramento Bee reported State Sen. Darrell Steinberg and U.S. Rep. Doris Matsui helped negotiate a deal on toxic cleanup responsibilities among Kelley's Downtown Railyard Venture LLC, Union Pacific as the last active industrial owner, and Inland American Real Estate Trust, which became the owner through a loan default by the immediately prior owner, developer Thomas Enterprises. See http://bit.ly/1oPuvnd for details. The California Supreme Court upheld the use of red-light cameras in traffic prosecutions, saying photos taken by automatic cameras weren't hearsay. Ars Technica has a thorough review of California and nationwide law and controversy on the question at http://bit.ly/TDbGtD. - In May the LA City Council approved a pedestrian bridge between elements of the "Da Vinci" downtown housing development, after criticisms of statements from its proponent, G.H. Palmer Associates, that suggested the bridge's purpose was to separate project residents from homeless people in the neighborhood. http://lat.ms/1jDC1N9 The LA Times reported on renewed neighborhood concerns about "mansionization" in homebuilding as the upper strata of the economy improve: http://lat.ms/1qlF7ey Further to LA planning woes, the City Council agreed to pay $1.75 million in legal fees to the challengers who beat the new Hollywood zoning plan: http://lat.ms/1nv3hmh Courthouse News reports that Kings and Kern Counties, the city of Bakersfield, and three other parties have filed challenges to the EIR on the Fresno to Bakersfield leg of the California high-speed rail plan: http://www.courthousenews.com/2014/06/09/68553.htm

The California First District has issued a publication order for its April opinion allowing a 167-acre Potrero Hills Landfill expansion to go forward on the grounds that a reduced alternative was not "economically feasible." In SPRAWLDEF v. San Francisco Bay Conservation & Development Commission , the appeals court overruled a Solano County judge to find local agencies properly approved the full-scale project. The plan, by Waste Connections, Inc., called for moving Spring Branch, an intermittent watercourse in the "secondary management" grassland area of Suisun Marsh. At issue was whether the expansion had to reduce effects on the existing watercourse, or whether it could move Spring Branch to create greater economies of scale from a larger project. Appeal was from a decision by the San Francisco Bay Conservation & Development Commission (BCDC) because that agency administers the Suisun Marsh Preservation Act, and from a decision by Solano County with respect to local protective planning rules. The Army Corps of Engineers had also reviewed and approved the project. The opinion, by Justice Kathleen Banke, joined by Justice Sandra Marguiles and Justice Pro Tem Diana Becton, interpreted the Suisun Marsh Preservation Act as allowing application of CEQA case law on the concept of a "feasible alternative," hence decided the matter essentially as a CEQA case. In walking through CEQA cases on "feasibility," the court identified the landfill case as comparable to Sierra Club v. County of Napa (2004) 121 Cal.App.4th 1490 in that clear evidence was provided to compare projects' preferred and alternate versions. It highlighted evidence that the smaller landfill alternative, compared to the full-scale project, "would result in a 30 percent reduction in capacity and a 45 percent reduction in revenue." A widely shared analysis by Deborah Rosenthal of Sheppard Mullin has noted that the court accepted the developer's own cost comparisons and gave close attention to their details as the basis for the decision: http://bit.ly/1n2Jqcs Pending since 2003, the landfill proposal has been through multiple environmental reviews, including one in 2009 that considered 20 different alternative plans. Initial legal challenges were brought under the heading "Protect the Marsh" but more recently by another group, SPRAWLDEF. David Tam, cofounder of SPRAWLDEF, is mentioned as a petitioner in the matter from the start. Links: The case is at http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/nonpub/A137619.PDF The docket reflects the publication order, a currently pending request for correction/modification, and a petition for review: http://bit.ly/1qkcs9D Sierra Club on environmental concerns and some procedural history of challenges to the landfill, 2007: http://sfbay.sierraclub.org/yodeler/html/2007/03/conservation8.htm BCDC Scientific Panel Review of landfill expansion, 2007: http://www.bcdc.ca.gov/planning/potrero/proposed_potrero_hills_11.shtml Northern California Recycling Association collecting 2012 accounts of a prior stage in the challenge, including one account by petitioner David Tam: http://ncrarecycles.org/NNHotOffThePress2012_12 SPRAWLDEF: http://sprawldef.org/about_us/history__mission_statement Potrero Hills Landfill: http://potrerohills.com/ Waste Connections, Inc.: http://www.wasteconnections.com/ BAAQMD Potrero Hills Landfill file: http://www.baaqmd.gov/Divisions/Engineering/Title-V-Permit-Programs/Title-V-Permits/Solano/A2039/Potrero-Hills-Landfill-Inc.aspx A blog-post with links by two editors of a recent UC Press collection on negotiated environmental management in this natural-looking but heavily reshaped ecosystem: http://californiawaterblog.com/2014/05/01/planning-for-the-inevitable-at-suisun-marsh/

California's Supreme Court heard oral arguments May 28 in Tuolumne Jobs & Small Business Alliance v. Superior Court , preparing to resolve a split between state appellate courts on when a developer's use of the ballot initiative petition process has demonstrated sufficient voter suport to substitute for CEQA review. The case most directly concerns a proposed Wal-Mart expansion in the Tuolumne County town of Sonora. The outcome could have statewide effects on a tactic allegedly used by Wal-Mart in several towns: qualifying a ballot measure for a costly special election as a way to pressure local officials into approving projects. Under Cal. Elections Code Sec. 9214, if 15% of a city's voters sign an initiative petition, the governing legislative body must either "adopt the ordinance, without alteration" or place it on the ballot. In 2010, proponents of the Sonora Wal-Mart expansion qualified an initiative for the ballot supporting a specific plan to authorize the project. The Council chose to adopt the text of the initiative as law rather than send it to a vote. In dispute was whether that decision required CEQA review. The San Francisco Daily Journal reported the high court "appeared skeptical of arguments" supporting the prior ruling, by the Fifth District Court of Appeal, that CEQA review was still required after the Sonora council adopted the petition. The petitioners, Tuolumne Jobs & Small Business Alliance (TJSBA), wrote in their final brief to the high court that the "ploy" in Sonora of Walmart and its proponent James Grinnell "appears to be part of a larger statewide strategy to force financially downtrodden communities into approving their development projects without CEQA compliance, without discretionary review, and without an election by presenting approving the Initiatives as the lesser of two evils." Accordingly TJSBA argued public policy should not allow CEQA review to be replaced by a presentation of 15% of a town's registered voters' signatures plus the sympathy of a local legislative body. The "statewide strategy" claim in TJSBA's brief cited to a broken SFGate link, but apparently referred to a report by Will Evans of the investigative news project California Watch, published in the San Francisco Chronicle in 2011. Evans' report suggested Walmart had been whipsawing local governments by gathering signatures to pressure them into either approving a project verbatim as proposed, without CEQA review, or spending public funds on a special election. See http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Walmart-wins-big-with-California-initiatives-2291127.php. The last pre-hearing brief by Wal-Mart's attorneys in the matter, of K&L Gates in San Francisco, accused TJSBA of "completely" ignoring legislative histories of the initiative process and of CEQA, and of using public policy arguments to distract from harm threatened by the Fifth District's position to the core functions of the initiative process and the core First Amendment rights of the voters who signed initiative petitions. Grinnell's counsel complained further of "the use of an irrelevant newspaper article to somehow impune (sic) the motives of the Initiative proponent and the voters who signed the Initiative petition." Wal-Mart's and Grinnell's briefs argued that authority descending from Associated Homebuilders, Inc. v. City of Livermore (1976) 18 Cal. 3d 582 established that once a proponent obtained a 15% signature tally for an intiative proposal, CEQA review requirements no longer applied to it. They argued this shut-out was constitutionally necessary to avoid second-guessing the wishes of the petition signers. The Fifth District court, in its 2012 opinion, had called for more substantial review than a 15% voter approval: either a CEQA process or an election. That opinion, by Justice Rebecca Wiseman with concurrences by Presiding Justice Brad R. Hill and by Justice Stephen J. Kane, warned: "Developers' strategy of obtaining project approvals without environmental review and without elections threatens both to defeat CEQA's important statutory objectives and to subvert the constitutional goals of the initiative process." According to the Fifth District, the Sonora council was already considering an EIR for the Wal-Mart expansion, but put the approval vote on hold to consider the ballot measure, and having adopted the ballot measure it did not approve the EIR. The Fifth District would have sent the matter back to the city for further environmental review. (Evans' article viewing the Fifth District's Sonora decision as a setback for Wal-Mart's statewide strategy is at http://californiawatch.org/dailyreport/win-environmental-law-loss-wal-mart-18670.) The Fourth District's 2004 opinion, by Justices Rylaarsdam, O'Leary and Fybel, had taken a directly contrary position in Native American Sacred Site & Environmental Protection Assn. v. City of San Juan Capistrano (2004) 120 Cal.App.4th 961. (See CP&DR's summary at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-547.) That decision treated the role of a city council, once presented with a qualified voters' petition, as merely ministerial -- a mandatory, automatic function, hence CEQA-exempt. The Fifth District opinion asked how that could be so if the council still held the power to choose between adopting the measure or placing it on the ballot. But the Fourth District opinion had asked how the council's function could be other than ministerial if the wishes of the petition signers were to be respected. (The Burke, Williams & Sorensen firm in 2013 posted an analysis on the conflict of authority as it stood after the Fifth District decision at http://bit.ly/UlWsKa. William Abbott of Abbott & Kindermann analyzed the case for CP&DR at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3298.) The Fifth District opinion interpreted a prior State Supreme Court case, Friends of Sierra Madre v. City of Sierra Madre , (2001) 25 Cal.4th 165, together with CEQA Guidelines Sec. 15378(b), as saying a referendum initiated by a petition -- as opposed to one initiated by a public agency -- could be a way past the trouble and expense of an EIR process under CEQA. Thence it took the backhanded implication that a petition without an election was not sufficient to substitute for the administrative review process. Grinnell's final reply brief argued on the contrary that the Sierra Madre case addressed only the need for CEQA review of a city council's decision to place its own measure on a ballot. It argued the authority of a city council was not comparable to the reserved power of "the people" to "tear through the exasperating tangle of the traditional legislative procedure and strike directly towards the desired end" by bringing an initiative. And in such a case, it argued, the council acted only as "the ministerial agent of the electorate." TSJBA argued, "The results of an election represent the will of the people. A petition signed by 15 percent of the voters does not." Grinnell answered that the reserved initiative power "is not only manifest when an election is held," but also is manifested in "the right to have a duly-qualified, voter-sponsored initiative immediately passed by the local agency". The parties' papers concluded with project proponents exalting the rights of petition signers to be heard and project opponents presenting CEQA as a shield for city councils against corporate bullying. The California Supreme Court docket for the case is at http://bit.ly/Um828m. The prior Fifth District decision is at http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/revpub/F063849.PDF. Links to full texts of briefs to the California Supreme Court are at http://www.courts.ca.gov/25993.htm.

Clearlake posts General Plan revision for review The draft EIR to update Clearlake's 1983 General Plan is up for review. Prepared by a team at Cal Poly, the draft runs to almost 500 pages. A local news report at http://bit.ly/1kkSbRP describes the plan as preparing for population growth from the present through 2040. The plan also seeks to "Protect the City's rural character and maintain the small town atmosphere." The plan seeks to improve affordable housing, "streamline" permits, promote infill, and focus development in eight separate "key growth areas" ranging from the aging Lakeshore Drive business district to a public facilities complex to a commercial strip with a Wal-Mart. More specific goals include "targets" of nearly doubling jobs, from 2,675 in 2010 to 5,744 in 2040, but increasing housing less, from 8,035 units in 2010 to 8,486 in 2040. Subjects of expressed concern include correct handling of stormwater, preservation of agricultural land, the future of Clear Lake, and preservation of fragile local species, whose poetic names cover eight pages, from the bent-flowered fiddleneck, Amsinckia lunaris , to the American badger, Taxidea taxus . Historical resources cover a timespan of some 8000 years, beginning with ancient artifacts found at Borax Lake, and including the early-20th-century "Cobblestone Building", but the city itself is described as not having designated any historical resources. A comment period that has had several announced end dates is now shown on the city Web site as expiring June 30. Plan documents are available at http://bit.ly/1iNSejM. AB 32 scoping plan gentler than courts on GHG cuts? There's a smart CEQA question from the environmental firm of Stoel Rives on its weblog at http://bit.ly/1hxBDWz -- in the new AB 32 scoping plan update, are the envisioned cuts to greenhouse gases (GHG) as deep as those endorsed by California courts? The authors of the item, Thomas Henry and Bao Vu, suggest the update's figures effectively call for a 16% reduction in GHG below "business as usual", which is less than called for by a recent unpublished appellate court analysis. The March 20 CEQA decision on Newhall Ranch, Center for Biological Diversity v. Department of Fish & Wildlife , includes an intricate discussion of GHG requirements in Section IV(G). Although this section of the opinion was excluded from publication, Henry and Vu found it helpful as a guide to prior published authority on the matter. It reviewed the analysis of the Department of Fish and Wildlife, which worked back from the AB 32 goal of returning GHG emissions to 1990 levels by 2020 and concluded that the proper reduction in emissions would have to be 30% below "business as usual" levels otherwise projected for 2020. So the lawyers ask in their analysis, if a project "only" reduces GHG by 16% in alignment with the terms of the new scoping plan, might it be environmentally careful enough to satisfy a court's CEQA review? The Newhall Ranch case is at http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/documents/B245131.PDF. Section IV(G) starts at Page 92 of the PDF. For context on that case see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3461. The AB 32 scoping plan update (9.7 MB download) is at http://www.arb.ca.gov/cc/scopingplan/2013_update/first_update_climate_change_scoping_plan.pdf. Kern County settles disputes over tax apportionment Two tax revenue apportionment disputes cutting in opposite directions appear to have settled this spring. Most recently, Kern County claimed back $882,000 from the city of Ridgecrest based on an overpayment of tax increment funds that were no longer due to the city because of Redevelopment's dissolution. See www.ridgecrestca.com/article/20140519/NEWS/140519677 on the error. Per http://www.ridgecrestca.com/article/20140523/NEWS/140529827 the parties reached a settlement allowing the city to pay the money back over three years. Back in March, the county agreed to pay Bakersfield $713,000 in recalculated tax revenue. That payment settled a city-county lawsuit over the county Auditor-Controller's decision to reverse tax sharing agreements for areas annexed to the city since 2005. See http://bit.ly/1naQsNP and links from there. McKinley Village opponents file suit Opponents of the McKinley Village subdivision appealed the Sacramento City Council's approval vote with a lawsuit May 30 based on alleged CEQA and zoning law violations. The project, led by former California State Treasurer Phil Angelides, is on an isolated parcel between a rail line and a freeway in east Sacramento. The opponents' writ petition says "up to 40 trains per day pass the site," it's next to a 172-acre landfill, and the project isn't proper infill but "consists of wedging a residential complex into a corner of the City that is utterly inappropriate for that use." There has been extensive talk of pedestrian and vehicle underpasses to improve access in and out of the proposed site but it's not clear which will be built or who will pay for them. See http://www.sacbee.com/2014/05/30/6445702/foes-of-mckinley-village-file.html and links from there. The new lawsuit is East Sacramento Partnerships for a Livable City v. City of Sacramento , Sacramento Superior Court case No. 34-2014-80001851. Court documents will be available free online in the case until Sacramento's county court download fees take effect July 1. More time to comment on BDCP State and federal sponsors of the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP) granted an extension sought by environmental groups of time to comment on the massive Delta water tunnel project. The new deadline is July 29, 2014. In the same May 30 announcement as the time extension, the agencies released a draft implementing agreement for the plan, out for review by the same deadline as the whole. See http://bit.ly/1outEYX for the press release. Maven's Notebook collected reactions at http://bit.ly/1naJzMH from the Metropolitan Water District (favorable), Restore the Delta (indignant), and the State Water Contractors (anxious to start the dig). The Stockton Record 's Alex Breitler has more details, plus highlights of the new proposed agreement text, at http://bit.ly/1jPmXwf. Also in late May, the Governor named Karla Nemeth, the BDCP project manager at the California Natural Resources Agency, to serve as deputy secretary for water policy at the agency, per the Central Valley Business Times at http://www.centralvalleybusinesstimes.com/stories/001/?ID=25946. New curtailment orders on junior water rights Seniority in California water claims is starting to be enforced in more than theory, and the sheer oddness of the state's water rights system is becoming a far worse than theoretical problem for serious numbers of people. As affected parties are no doubt aware, more curtailment orders came down Friday, May 30. The Stockton Record's Breitler says 1,634 junior water rights holders are affected in the San Joaquin basin (see http://bit.ly/1iR0Ndy). There are now orders in effect in the Scott, Sacramento, San Joaquin and Russian rivers' watersheds. For the main state site with orders see http://www.waterboards.ca.gov/waterrights/water_issues/programs/drought/water_availability.shtml. Meanwhile, the Center for Investigative Reporting found many agricultural water districts aren't complying with current requirements to track water usage per farmer: http://bit.ly/1kB6gtr. An AP report found the state's water system is simply not set up to keep accurate track of water usage by holders of pre-1914 water rights who are entitled to unlimited flow: http://bit.ly/1mPAl6M The San Francisco Examiner has even reported that San Francisco's seemingly enduring claim on the Tuolumne River's flow from Hetch Hetchy Reservoir in Yosemite is based on a water right that is junior to the Modesto and Turlock irrigation districts -- and if they assert their full rights, San Francisco's entitlement could work out to "the beer foam out of a beer mug." See http://bit.ly/SrlplX. Sacramento officials trying for Tesla factory Sacramento officials have stepped into competition with other areas' municipal boosters in a competition to land Tesla's planned "Gigafactory" battery plant. The Sacramento-area site would be Mather Commerce Park, a business park near the airport. A detailed Sacramento Bee writeup at http://www.sacbee.com/2014/05/22/6425105/sacramentos-mather-airport-in.html among other things laments the loss of redevelopment funds as a means of offering tax advantages to the company. The Silicon Valley Business Journal reports developers are active around the existing Tesla plant site in Fremont. Lennar is reportedly about to buy a 112-acre parcel from Union Pacific on Highway 880 with plans to build a residential and commercial complex including a school, and Toll Brothers is working on 34 acres next to the new BART station. See http://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/news/2014/06/02/lennar-buying-100-acres-from-union-pacific-as.html. Judge blocks Riverside-Figueroa "Landbridge" plan A June 2 hearing before an unsympathetic judge may have ended an attempt to preserve the Riverside-Figueroa Bridge over the LA River for reuse on the model of New York's "High Line". A campaign led by nonprofit Enrich LA and architects RAC Design Build had sought to turn the 1927 structure into a "Landbridge" bike and pedestrian amenity. But per an indignant account from LA Streetsblog , Judge James Chalfant treated the effort as coming too late in a planning process that had already arranged to demolish the bridge, and refused to grant an injunction sought by the would-be renovators. Landbridge proponents and the city disputed whether retaining the old bridge would truly interfere with planned further construction along the LA River, since the bridge's replacement was already completed and operating at a separate site upstream. The LA Times reported Deputy City Attorney Mary Decker "estimated that delaying the demolition would cost $18,000 a day starting next Monday." According to the paper, Landbridge proponents said they took formal action so late in the planning process because they only realized belatedly that the new bridge would not be built on the same site as the old one. See http://bit.ly/SsgZey for Streetsblog and http://lat.ms/1jNj0s3 for the LA Times report. Can George Lucas do more with Pier 30 than Warriors? San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee has reportedly offered George Lucas the Seawall Lot 330 site for his magnificently funded but currently homeless "Cultural Arts Museum" proposal. The site is just inland across the Embarcadero from Pier 30 and forms part of the area the Golden State Warriors would have developed if they had built an arena on Piers 30 and 32. With the Warriors now contracted for a waterfront site farther south, and mixed-use development at Piers 30-32 already enabled by Assemblymember Phil Ting's AB 1273 (see http://bit.ly/1tGZdQw), it's a live question what may move into the political and legal vacuum. Lucas has been seeking a home for his project since the Presidio Trust refused to let him build it on Crissy Field near the Golden Gate Bridge. And while the Presidio site didn't work, Lucas' talk of spending $300 to $400 million up front, and providing another $400 million endowment at his death, has held the interest of a city government whose entire proposed public budget (see http://sfcontroller.org/Modules/ShowDocument.aspx?documentid=5395) is a little below $8.6 billion. For details see the writeup and links on Socketsite , which asks if maybe Lucas could add some housing to the mix: http://bit.ly/1o8K1My Any such proposal could be affected by San Francisco's Measure B, which appeared to have won in the June 3 election, and which calls for a public vote on any future waterfront height limit variance. However, Socketsite notes the ex-Warriors site is already zoned for a solid 65-foot structure with towers possibly up to 105 feet. Elsewhere in San Francisco news, Mayor Lee included in his budget a proposed fund of $2.48 million in combined city and federal money to renovate 172 vacant units of public housing so homeless families can live in them. The plan has been championed by Supervisor London Breed. See http://bit.ly/1kpiWEB. And in the first days of June, as Muni transit drivers staged a disruptive sickout, a city Transportation Task Force report found San Francisco was behind on transportation infrastructure and in need of some $10.1 billion in improvements through 2030. (See Socketsite writeup at http://bit.ly/1hynNmT and the report itself at http://bit.ly/1hUkOop.) During the sickout, Gawker 's Kevin Montgomery reported, many buses and trains were delayed but Muni stayed on time with the 83X, known as the Twitterbus, which connects the Caltrain at Fourth and Townsend to Twitter headquarters at Tenth and Market. http://bit.ly/1uhcvW4

The Fifth District Court of Appeal last week rejected an EIR on air quality grounds for a senior-oriented housing complex near Friant Dam. The methodical, linguistically attentive opinion by Justice Donald R. Franson, Jr. toured three realms of environmental review: land, water and air. It turned down objections from environmental and community groups based in the law of land zoning and water impacts, leaning hard on some word definitions to do so. But when it examined the project's mitigation measures in the air, it found the EIR had failed to put foundations under them. The appellate court sent the decision back to Fresno County's local judge with instructions to have the county describe more specifically what harm might be done by the project's extra air pollution, such as vehicle exhaust, and how the harm would be mitigated in ways the county could measure and enforce. According to the decision text, the project by Friant Ranch, L.P. would cover about a square mile and a half, mainly of former grazing land. The court says it would build some 2500 housing units, some of them restricted to adults 55 and older. Media reports put the total of units at 2,270. By the court's description the project additionally calls for 250,000 square feet of commercial use and it would all be on 942 acres counting 460 acres of dedicated open space. That sounds large but it was the project's Alternative 3, smaller than some earlier projections. As clarified on the docket at http://bit.ly/1iN6hpI the case was brought by the Sierra Club, Revive the San Joaquin and the League of Women Voters of Fresno against the county and Friant Ranch LP. A related suit brought by the City of Fresno moved toward settlement in March with an agreement that the developer would charge a $500 fee for each unit to contribute toward a parks fund. See http://bit.ly/1h1q35r and http://bit.ly/1pNq2SC. Opponents of the Friant Ranch project greeted the May 27 decision with a victory press conference emphasizing opposition to sprawl and concern over "diverting our already scarce resources to new-town development": http://bit.ly/1mLgDZL. But the developer's counsel told local news station KFSN that the dispute wasn't over and the project's proponents still counted on going forward with it: http://abc30.tv/1iNaREi. The matter on appeal was a county Supervisors' approval that updated the Friant Community Plan within the Fresno County General Plan, authorized a specific plan for the project, and amended the Friant Redevelopment Plan. The court found the land element of the proposal was acceptable because the County properly, though controversially, amended the county general plan to change the area's land use designation: from mainly agriculture plus a few other uses, mainly trailer parks, to the commercial, residential and public uses that the project had in mind. The decision walked through a word-by-word dispute on whether the land use change for the area matched the county's policy to "maintain agriculturally-designated areas for agricultural use" and to "direct urban growth away from valuable agricultural lands to cities, unincorporated communities, and other areas planned for such development where public facilities and infrastructure are available." It quoted the EIR as finding that the land lost to agriculture was neither prime, nor of statewide importance, nor designated as unique, nor subject to preservation contracts, hence that it was not not "valuable agricultural lands" as defined in the policy. The EIR language had quietly extended the phrase about "public facilities and infrastructure" to include areas where facilities "are available or can be expanded." Plaintiffs objected that the last four words were not in the regulation. But the court chose not to view their appearance in the EIR as impermissible mission creep, in light of an additional policy that discussed installing infrastructure prospectively. The court found that plaintiffs' objections about traffic congestion under the General Plan's transportation element were not exhausted administratively. Plaintiffs had argued the issues were raised sufficiently at the administrative stage of review by a six-paragraph section in a critical letter by Fresno's city manager. The court quoted the letter as citing projections for "unacceptable levels of service" through crowding on two major roads reaching the project site, and as expressing polite skepticism over the EIR's claim that emergency services would not thereby be affected. But the court rejected those phrases as not placing the county sufficiently on notice of the issues because they didn't mention the problem's relation to the general plan nor the county's LOS Policy -- "in contrast to" other parts of the letter that were more specific in describing standards and stating whether they were met. As to the law of water -- CEQA review of wastewater disposal provisions, that is -- the court rejected plaintiffs' objections because it found wastewater treatment and disposal were adequately addressed, primarily through a plan to build a new wastewater facility, create an effluent pond in a former gravel quarry, and use treated wastewater for summertime irrigation, principally at the project itself. The court found inconsistencies in the EIR on the effluent pond's dimensions but worked past them and accepted evidence presented that effluent stored or used locally for irrigation either would not reach the San Joaquin River, or, if it did, would not harm it. It found the EIR presented sufficient detail overall on the volume of wastewater and its disposition -- especially after setting aside discussions of larger wastewater volumes that would have been called for by larger, unapproved versions of the project. The court rejected complaints that the draft and final EIRs gave too little attention to the hydrogeology of the proposed quarry pond (an issue that the Sierra Club was still reportedly disputing two weeks ago). In doing so, the court distinguished its own 1994 ruling in San Joaquin Raptor/Wildlife Rescue Center v. County of Stanislaus , 27 Cal.App.4th 713, saying that, when it found the draft EIR inadequate in that earlier case, it "did not establish new rules of law heightening the disclosure required in a draft EIR or preventing a final EIR from curing a draft EIR's omission of information." Regardless, the court said that in the 1994 case the final EIR was also deficient and "Our holding referred to the final EIR, not the draft." Further, it said the Friant Ranch draft EIR was more specific than the 1994 document to begin with, and then evidence from competing experts had further filled out the administrative record. Turning to air quality analysis under CEQA, the court said the EIR provided more detail than the one previously found deficient in Bakersfield Citizens for Local Control v. City of Bakersfield (2004) 124 Cal.App.4th 1184 but it was still "short on analysis." It said the Friant Ranch EIR failed sufficiently to connect the dots from the county's existing serious air pollution problems, to the volume of pollution likely to be added by traffic to the new project, to the likely specific effects of those emissions, such as health detriments or days when local air quality standards would not be attained. It found this problem had been sufficiently raised in administrative proceedings because the City of Fresno's objecting letter said the EIR had failed to "disclose the human health related effects of the Project's air pollution impacts." The court's toughest assessment was of a "mitigation measure" that was actually a list of approaches such as saving energy and encouraging bicycle use. In the nonresidential development areas, the EIR offered mitigations including shade trees in paved areas and catalyst-equipped HVAC systems in the buildings. The list came with an assurance that the mitigations would reduce pollution "substantially". The court said the EIR was not at fault for failing to explain more carefully how or how much the listed mitigation measures would help, though saying it shouldn't claim pollution reductions would be "substantial" without giving evidence to back up the claim. On the other hand, the court did insist that the actions to be taken needed to be spelled out somehow: either the EIR should give specific descriptions up front of promised actions whose performance the county could enforce at need, or if it called for "deferred formulation of mitigation", it should provide "specific performance criteria" for designing such measures later. The decision said neither was the case for many of the mitigation measures proposed, and that use of a hedging phrase, "where feasible and appropriate", was not reassuring, but only "add to the vagueness". (This central part of the ruling was reminiscent of the recent Woodland case, though it's not cited. See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3472). The court found the county did adequately consider whether compensation through off-site emission reduction programs might help, in that it said the possibility was going to be considered during the air district's Indirect Source Review. For full approval, the project would need to be approved by regional water and air quality boards as well as the county. The case is at http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/documents/F066798.PDF.

It's easier at this point in the legislative season to say which bills are dead than which ones have a chance. This is a quick rundown of bills we've been following, plus a few more. For descriptive notes on many of the bills' provisions see our prior discussion at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3498 and as linked from there. Cap and Trade seems to be in high-level horse-trading mode. Only Jerry Brown, State Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg, and the legislative leadership know for sure how this one will end. The latest iteration of Steinberg's legislative proposal appeared June 3 in a Senate budget committee hearing at http://sbud.senate.ca.gov/sites/sbud.senate.ca.gov/files/FullC/June032014SBFRCapandTradeAgenda.pdf. Comparison with the original April version, available at California Association of Councils of Government (CALCOG) site at http://www.calcog.org/index.aspx?nid=96, shows the Steinberg proposal has given some ground, dropping from 40% to 20% the portion of cap and trade proceeds that would go to "affordable housing and sustainable communities", and within that dropping the percentage for affordable housing from Steinberg's original 20% down to 10%. See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3494 for the main starting points of proposals in that area, which have been the subject of many hopes for transportation and housing funding this session.  Bills that are now procedurally dead include: SB 1132, fracking limits. SB 1260, housing set-aside in post-redevelopment tax increment financing AB 2175, renters' rebates AB 2729, Infrastructure Financing Bank expansion SB 391, raise funds for affordable housing with real estate recording fees SB 1270, limits on surface mining SB 1451, raising procedural bars for would-be CEQA litigants, is also done for this year, having failed to pass out of its house of origin. Next year's CEQA sequel has already begun: staffers with the State Senate Environmental Quality and Judiciary Committees are circulating a survey to "stakeholders" on the issue. It asks broad open-ended questions on how best to revise the CEQA environmental process and seeks responses before next September 1. The attached copy was provided by a recipient of the emailed letter. The following remained live bills after the May 30 "house of origin" deadline: SB 1439, Ellis Act restrictions, was turned down in the State Senate on the Wednesday before Friday's deadline but then won approval on reconsideration in a dramatic Thursday lobbying push. There's an insider blow-by-blow account by San Francisco's Randy Shaw at http://www.beyondchron.org/news/index.php?itemid=12670. AB 2372, limited Prop 13 reform on business reassessments, "was modified enough to gain support" by the CA Chamber of Commerce and passed into the Senate, per the Sacramento Bee at http://bit.ly/1kyv05I. See also SF's smart Socketsite blog at http://bit.ly/1hx4TNl. SB 1021, limited parcel tax rate variability AB 1537, change Marin County's status from "urban" to "suburban" to downzone default housing density from 30 to 20 units per acre. Lots of critical comment is around on this one, including Planetizen with links to Marin IJ coverage at http://www.planetizen.com/articles/node-69031 and a critique from attorney and climate/transit scholar Ethan Elkind suggesting the measure could be a corrosive precedent against the enforceability of housing elements: http://www.ethanelkind.com/the-beginning-of-the-end-for-californias-affordable-housing-requirements/ SB 968, public access to Martin's Beach; recent coverage in the San Mateo Daily Journal at http://bit.ly/Sr6k3Z . SB 1424, City of Martinez tidelands transfer. See http://martinezgazette.com/archives/13910, and an exceptionally detailed legislative summary on history behind control of the Martinez marina via http://bit.ly/1kAWOqahttp://basecamp.com/ SB 2135, affordable housing priority for surplus public land. AB 2104, overriding HOA landscaping rules to save water, shown at http://bit.ly/1knvkVP as calendared for a June 10 State Senate hearing. SB 270, ban single-use carryout bags AB 2493, post-Redevelopment release of $750 million in project funds to cities. SB 1129, post-Redevelopment cleanup AB 2280, re-create some elements of Redevelopment with a housing emphasis AB 1404, allow and require San Francisco Redevelopment's successor agency to rebuild over 5000 affordable housing units lost to the city through "urban renewal" demolitions 1955-1975 AB 2292, expand infrastructure financing districts specifically for Oakland freight and ex-military sites that are already redevelopment targets. AB 2549, local commission on Milpitas' post-Redevelopment funding losses. AB 2417, for "purple pipe" distribution of recycled water AB 1739/SB1168, groundwater management: see http://www.acwa.com/news/water-news/groundwater-bills-move-forward-legislature. AB 2453, Paso Robles water district governance by a locally controversial "hybrid" board structure: see http://pasoroblesdailynews.com/state-assembly-passes-bill-permit-paso-robles-water-basin-district/21199/ SB 1077, pilot program imposing auto tax based on miles traveled SB 69/AB 1521, restore Vehicle License Fee revenue for newly created municipalities such as Jurupa Valley. AB 1513, Residential property: possession by declaration AB 1999, state historic rehabilitation tax credit AB 2145, new rules on community choice aggregation for clean electrical power: opponents' site with many municipal endorsers at http://www.no2145.org/; IBEW union argument in favor: http://bit.ly/1rIUTEB ; State legislative site, which links to recent floor analyses, at http://bit.ly/1p5rUqk SB 1199, designate almost 37 miles of the Mokelumne River as "wild and scenic": http://on.news10.net/1iQE0ym Floor analyses available via http://bit.ly/1l3Dfq7 show long lists of endorsers for and against.

Below are a dozen picked results from June 3 local ballot measures affecting land use. Links are included here to more detailed county results pages. A community plan near the shipyards in San Diego was defeated while a proposed waterfront height limit passed in San Francisco. South Lake Tahoe defeated paid parking kiosks, Half Moon Bay picked the go-slow option for a bridge repair, Monterey Park narrowly approved a small development project, Marin County approved a farmer's market structure near the Frank Lloyd Wright civic center, and Lake County approved a sales tax for lake cleanup. Watsonville voted in a strict rule that puts future place-naming choices to a public vote. California's statewide electorate passed ballot measures on veterans' housing and local government transparency. Statewide results are at http://vote.sos.ca.gov/. The Secretary of State's directory of county election offices is at http://www.sos.ca.gov/elections/elections_d.htm. June 3 Election Results Tally El Dorado County -- City of South Lake Tahoe Measure P: End a kiosk-based parking fee program in busy tourist areas. See http://www.cityofslt.us/index.aspx?NID=743 and http://www.smartvoter.org/2014/06/03/ca/ed/meas/P/ Lake Tahoe News endorsement against: http://www.laketahoenews.net/2014/05/editorial-vote-measure-p/ Op-ed in Tahoe Daily Tribune in favor: http://www.tahoedailytribune.com/southshore/11300378-113/parking-measure-vote-meters Follow results at: http://elections.edcgov.us/results.fwx Yes: 68.41% No: 31.59% Percent Reporting: 6 of 6 precincts Lake County Measure L: Increase sales tax in the county by a half-cent for 10 years to pay for  the eradication of weeds, algae and invasive mussels from Clear Lake, the restoration of wetlands in the county and the improvement of water quality. Because it's a tax, a two-thirds vote is required. http://ballotpedia.org/Lake_County_%22Healthy_Lake_Tax%22_Sales_Tax,_Measure_L_(June_2014) Proponents' site: http://savethelake.info/ Critical semi-endorsement from Record-Bee outdoors columnist Terry Knight: http://www.record-bee.com/outdoors/ci_25805517/measure-l-beats-doing-nothing Follow results at: http://www.co.lake.ca.us/Government/Directory/ROV.htm http://acm.co.lake.ca.us/elections/results/result26.htm#c9909 Yes: 63.9% No: 36.1% Percent Reporting: 70 of 70 precincts Note: The measure did not receive its required 2/3 vote. Los Angeles County -- City of Monterey Park Measure A: Approve a general plan amendment and a rezoning of commercial land to permit the Olson Co. to construct an 80-unit residential development on an undeveloped 9-acre parcel of land on Potrero Grande Drive near Resurrection Cemetery, just off the 60 freeway. The vote is required by a 1982 city ballot measure that requires voter approval for a change in land use designation. Olson is a Seal Beach-based developer specializing in townhome and small-lot-single-family infill projects. More information in the following City Council staff report: http://www.ci.monterey-park.ca.us/AgendaCenter/ViewFile/Agenda/02192014-569 Follow results at: http://rrccmain.co.la.ca.us/14062043/2043_CITIES_Frame.htm Yes: 52.45% No: 47.55% Percent Reporting: 24 of 24 precincts Los Angeles County -- City of Signal Hill Measure U: Require a 2/3 vote for all "taxes, assessments and fees" and sunset them after 10 years. See http://bit.ly/1wf6H1h. Measure U is supported by a group called Signal Hill Community First (http://www.signalhillfirst.org/) The Long Beach Press Telegram reports supporters lost a challenge to the way the city presented the measure on the ballot: http://bit.ly/1nkMTnX. Just a few days before the election, disagreement continued on the measure's scope, including whether it would apply to impact fees and other fees developed as part of the land-use process: http://bit.ly/1rIexkb. The city claims it will lose 13% of local tax revenue as a result of the measure. Follow results at: http://rrccmain.co.la.ca.us/14062043/2043_CITIES_Frame.htm Yes: 34.30% No: 65.70% Percent Reporting: 6 of 6 precincts Marin County Measure B: Create permanent structures for a farmers' market at Frank Lloyd Wright's historic Marin Civic Center building. The Marin IJ supports the measure and recounts some history of the prior referendum that led to strict voter-approval requirements for changes around the Marin Civic Center building, at http://bit.ly/1ns5gLk. See also http://www.smartvoter.org/2014/06/03/ca/mrn/meas/B/and a snarkier appraisal of the plan (with some cinematic history of the Civic Center complex) at http://www.northbaybiz.com/Columnists/Only_in_Marin/Organically_Grown.php. Follow results at: http://www.marincounty.org/depts/rv/election-info/election-results Yes: 81.14% No: 18.86% Percent Reporting: 157 of 157 precincts -- Measure O: Establish a policy preference in favor of a publicly owned water district. Opposed by Californian American Water. A court ruled the ballot description couldn't say Measure O would guarantee public ownership and save money. See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3467 on that issue. The county Supervisors voted to oppose it: http://bit.ly/1oSKYKT Cal American has reportedly outspent proponents by 24 to 1: http://bit.ly/1n9DUGH Follow results at: http://www.montereycountyelections.us/Election%20Result.htm Yes: 43.61% No: 56.39% Percent Reporting: 55 of 55 precincts Riverside County -- City of Desert Hot Springs Proposition F: Raise parcel tax on vacant land within the city from $29.80 to $372.68 per acre, to be spent only on public safety services. Not strictly a land use measure but of interest as a municipal finance move because city officials placed it on the ballot to avoid a second municipal bankruptcy. See http://www.pe.com/articles/city-695413-measure-council.html and http://www.cityofdhs.org/Elections. Follow results at: http://www.voteinfo.net/Elections/20140603/eresults/Election%20Result.htm Yes: 62.92% No: 37.08% Percent Reporting: 7 of 7 precincts San Diego County -- City of San Diego Propositions B and C: Approve the City Council's approval of the Barrio Logan Community Plan and associated changes in the zoning code. Industrial landowners placed the measures on the ballot after failing to reach a compromise with community-based organizations in the old neighborhood adjacent to the San Diego shipyards, where residential and industrial uses are intermixed. The issue is discussed at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3473. Recent debate has centered on whether the city-approved plan would actually make air quality worse: http://voiceofsandiego.org/2014/05/19/fact-check-clearing-the-air-in-barrio-logan/ LA Times report of June 2: http://www.latimes.com/local/la-me-barrio-logan-20140602-story.html Follow results at: http://www.sdvote.com/voters/results/results.shtml -- (Disclosure: William Fulton, publisher of CP&DR, is Planning Director for San Diego.) Measure B: Yes: 41.53% No: 58.47% Measure C: Yes: 39.50% No: 60.50% Percent Reporting: 697 of 697 precincts City and County of San Francisco Measure B: require a vote for all future height limit variances on the waterfront. The measure lost some of its point when the Warriors basketball team management gave up their contested effort to build an arena on Piers 30-32 near the Golden Gate Bridge, and instead picked an arena site farther south in Mission Bay near Third and 16th Streets. Considerable future development plans are still at stake, however, notably for the old Union Iron Works property at Pier 70. For Measure B see http://www.sfgov2.org/index.aspx?page=4279 and http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3443. On the Warriors see http://bit.ly/Q9kLbg. On Pier 70, which for years was a backwater of warehouses, studios and car impound storage, see developer Forest City's plans at http://pier70sf.com/ and artist Wendy MacNaughton's impressions at http://pier70community.com/. Measure B proponents' page: http://www.nowallonthewaterfront.com/news An opponent's argument: http://urbanlifesigns.blogspot.com/2014/06/no-sea-of-parking-on-waterfront.html Follow results at: http://www.sfelections.org/results/20140603/ Yes: 59.42% No: 40.58% Percent Reporting: 597 of 597 precincts San Mateo County -- Half Moon Bay Measure E: Allow the city to demolish the Main Street bridge and build a new, wider bridge that would include accessible walkways. Backed by the City Council. Measure F: Conduct more modest renovations of the bridge and require any future attempt to demolish the bridge to be approved by voters. The measure would also make preservation of the "historical, visual, and physical integrity (including appearance and character)" of the bridge the official policy of the city of Half Moon Bay. Caltrans recently gave the bridge a sufficiency rating of 24 out of 100. SMCounty Daily Journal pre-election coverage: http://bit.ly/1qSd7mU Comment pro-F: http://bit.ly/1kue3Jd Comment anti-F: http://bit.ly/1p4ZFrJ Fierce local chat page argument: http://talkaboutwidget.hmbreview.com/topic.php?t=9611&c=4 Follow results at: https://www.shapethefuture.org/elections/2014/june/ Measure E: Yes: 38.25% No: 61.75% Measure F: Yes: 64.41% No: 35.59% Percent Reporting: 8 of 8 precincts San Mateo, Santa Clara and Santa Cruz Counties Measure AA: Issue $300 million in bonds, to be paid off over 20 to 30 years, for habitat preservation, trails and visitor amenities in the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District. Required a two-thirds overall vote. Supporters at http://www.openspace.org/news/bond_measure.asp say the final result across the three counties voting was "over 67%." The vote was taken in parts of San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties and a small area of Santa Cruz County. San Mateo County results: https://www.shapethefuture.org/elections/2014/june/ Yes: 66.28% No: 33.72% Santa Clara County results: http://results.enr.clarityelections.com/CA/Santa_Clara/51635/131405/Web01/en/summary.html Yes: 68.81% No: 31.19% Santa Cruz County results: http://www.votescount.com/jun14/results.htm Yes: 50% No: 50% Supporters claimed a favorable vote of over 67% across three counties. Precints reporting: San Mateo Co.: 200 of 200 Santa Clara Co.: 296 of 296 Santa Cruz Co.: 1 of 1 Santa Clara County -- City of Los Gatos Measure A: The "Albright Way Initiative" would authorize the appropriate changes in zoning and construction code regulations to allow a development project to go forward, creating two 65-foot tall buildings, two 50-foot tall buildings and a 35-foot tall parking garage at 90-160 Albright Way and 14600 Winchester Boulevard. The project is envisioned in part as an office for Netflix. Currently, the town's General Plan limits construction in this area to only 35 feet in height. Opponents and proponents of the measure settled the essential disputes over the property's future in March, making the initiative itself superfluous, but by then it was too late to withdraw the measure from the ballot. See http://www.mercurynews.com/los-gatos/ci_25284048/los-gatos-albright-way-lawsuit-settled-but-election and http://bit.ly/1puHMlP, and see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3443 on the dispute over signature gathering that preceded the measure's placement on the ballot. Follow results at: http://results.enr.clarityelections.com/CA/Santa_Clara/51635/131405/Web01/en/summary.html Yes: 71.69% No: 28.31% Percent Reporting: 26 of 26 precincts Santa Cruz County -- City of Watsonville Measure J: Require a citywide election to decide on the new names of any public places, such as parks, public buildings, bridges, plazas, courtyards and airports. The name selection process would allow each of the seven City Council members to propose a name for the public place in question. The names would all be put before voters at an election, and the name receiving the most votes would become official. The measure emerged from a 2010 plan to name Watsonville Plaza for Dolores Huerta of the United Farmworkers. See http://bit.ly/1nv8vPK. Follow results at: http://www.votescount.com/jun14/results.htm Yes: 64.55% No: 35.45% Percent Reporting: 17 of 17 precincts

On May 23 the Strategic Growth Council announced recommendations for the $16 million in its third and last round of planning grants under Proposition 84. The 33 recommended awards go before the Council for approval June 3. See http://bit.ly/1lOYfO3. Santa Barbara creates a land conservation bank The state and federal fish and wildlife services have approved the 853-acre La Purisima Conservation Bank, which places easements on "critically important grasslands and oak woodlands" outside Lompoc. The project will sell mitigation credits to developers. See http://bit.ly/1jX0r9k. Costa Mesa wins back $10.3 million Redevelopment loan The City of Costa Mesa is celebrating a clawback of a clawback in the state post-Redevelopment finance wars. In a jubilant press release, the city said the state Department of Finance agreed that a $10.3 million loan made by the city to its redevelopment agency was owed back to the city. The city statement said DOF would pay $782,983 up front, and would work out a payment schedule for the rest. For the city statement, see http://www.costamesaca.gov/index.aspx?page=40&recordid=1445. The OC Register has more detail at http://www.ocregister.com/articles/state-615593-costa-mesa.html. Drought and Water Notes The State Water Resources Control Board issued the first of what may be more "curtailment" orders blocking water use by some holders of post-1914 water rights. On its May 20-21 agenda, the main curtailment discussion, on rights in the Sacramento-San Joaquin River Delta, appeared at first as a resolution proposed for approval but was changed to a public workshop to receive comments. The board did pass a curtailment resolution "due to insufficient flow for specific fisheries" for three creeks feeding the Sacramento River in Tehama County. See the May 20 entries at http://www.waterboards.ca.gov/board_info/calendar/ and http://www.waterboards.ca.gov/waterrights/water_issues/programs/drought/mill_deer_antelope_creeks.shtml. Conservation groups sought to extend the comment period on the massive BDCP plan text, which is schedule to expire June 13. See sacb.ee/1lWGlLS. California Sen. Dianne Feinstein's drought bill passed the U.S. Senate after weeks of delay, after giving up $300 million in drought relief funds. The bill, SB 2198, has worried environmentalists because of provisions for more water pumping from the Sacramento River Delta. The bill now goes to conference with House Republican leaders. See http://bit.ly/1jqdRFZ. A group of water officials have asked the Ninth Circuit for en banc review of San Luis & Delta-Mendota Water Authority v. Jewell . See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3448 for CP&DR's prior discussion and http://bit.ly/1k38QYN for an update from the Nossaman firm. Bakersfield Californian columnist Lois Henry wrote a furiously critical column on the entry of the Tejon Ranch into the business of selling water to other users, with the hovering possibility that it might eventually use the water rights it has been purchasing to supply its multiple pending housing and business developments. See http://bit.ly/SQAcas. In other news -- The Long Beach Press-Telegram reports the California Attorney General has filed a motion to intervene in the dispute between Long Beach and Los Angeles over the 153-acre BNSF rail yard upgrade project. See http://bit.ly/SfmcGB. California's Air Resources Board held its seventh cap-and-trade auction, selling almost $195 million in 2014 credits and almost $46 million in 2017 credits. See http://www.arb.ca.gov/newsrel/newsrelease.php?id=616.. Unsuccessful parties and others have filed requests to depublish the Woodland "urban blight" EIR case that we discussed at www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3472. For a little discussion see http://www.ceqadevelopments.com/2014/05/12/spring-2014-ceqa-roundup/. The updated online docket is at http://bit.ly/1qrIrFt. San Franciscans filed an appeal seeking CEQA review of a city decision to repeal the recent imposition of Sunday parking meter charges.: http://bit.ly/1kHAISc

Ever since I moved to San Diego last year without owning a car, people have felt sorry for me. They offer me rides. They wonder where I buy groceries. They ask me how I feel about being nature-deprived. They ask me how I can stand to ride the bus. I usually smile and nod and acknowledge what they are saying and tell them it really isn't so bad. I rarely tell them that they are making a fundamental mistake: They are equating owning a car with using a car. I belong to Zipcar, and there are two Zipcars parked at all times in the parking garage in my apartment building – a MiniCooper wagon and a Ford Escape SUV – that I can rent whenever I want. In fact, they are located closer to the elevator than my two eternally vacant parking spaces. I also belong to Car2Go. Right now, my smartphone tells me there are six two-seater SmartCars parked within 1,000 feet of my apartment, all available for me to rent on a per-minute basis. Avis is located four blocks away. Sometimes I rent a car for the weekend, though that seems awfully old fashioned these days. When I have to drive for work – my office is five blocks from my apartment – I have access to the city motor pool, which is located right downstairs in a parking lot outside my office building. I usually take a taxi to the airport (two miles away); from my apartment window I can see whether there are any taxis waiting for a fare at the Doubletree Hotel across the street. And when I don't know what else to do I call Uber X.  Right now my smartphone says there are five Uber X vehicles within four blocks of my apartment. Cars? I have more cars than I know what to do with. I use cars all the time, in order to go all kinds of places, and I am never without access to a car.  My overall automobile cost is probably less than half of what it was when I owned a car – because I usually pay for a car only when I am traveling in it, not when it is just parked somewhere. I'm well aware that I am on the leading edge of this whole "car-sharing" thing and that the vast majority of people don't have the same options because of where they live and work. But the fact that I am doing just fine without owning a car in a traditionally suburban place like San Diego suggests that something important is going on, at least in modern urban neighborhoods: Our complete reliance on a "monoculture" of owner-occupied automobiles is being augmented with a much more varied ecosystem that includes not just alternatives to driving, but many different ways to use a car. The urban transportation infrastructure obviously also includes walking, bicycling, and rail and bus passenger service. (Because I limited my discussion above only to cars, I didn't even mention that I can walk to the Santa Fe Depot in downtown San Diego from either my apartment or my office, making it easy for me to get to downtown Los Angeles without a car.) In California cities, these choices have not traditionally been "robust," as they say. But when they are augmented by the range of car-sharing options I listed above, the entire system becomes a much more powerful option. You can take a regular bus or train to a destination and then use a car-sharing service like Uber X if you get stuck later on in the evening when service is bad or nonexistent. (I have done this several times.) Or – perhaps most important – you can use a car-sharing service as the "last-mile" solution to get to and from a rail stop. (This is part of the reason why car-sharing services have been more successful in Los Angeles than even the vendors thought they would be. In such a spread-out city, solving the last-mile problem is huge.) At the recent Southern California Association of Governments annual general assembly, transportation infrastructure guru Dan Sturges noted that any successful transportation system has to function like the vines that Tarzan uses in the jungle. Swinging from one vine isn't enough. The next vine always has to be there, ready to grab, or else the whole system falls apart. All transportation systems work like this, but if they work well we don't even notice. For example, we routinely take off on long car trips, confident that the infrastructure of well-placed gas stations will be available to us before we run out of gas. The same is true for car-sharing. The more options we have, the more powerful the system becomes. We can move about the city using lots of them, confident that the next swinging vine will always be there. Obviously, many people – especially in suburban locations – will always have activity patterns that will require them to own their own cars, drive them everywhere, and leave them parked most of the time. But for even semi-urban locations – such as old close-in single-family neighborhoods adjacent to commercial corridors – the swinging vine option is pretty viable. Indeed, the swinging vines can help transform these neighborhoods much faster than public transit alone ever could do. And success is likely to feed on itself. The more people use these options, the less parking these neighborhoods are going to need. Obviously, heavy use of Uber or Lyft cars, which are constantly circling around, reduces the need for parking. But research also suggests that one Car2Go or Zipcar – which the user has to park somewhere – has a similar impact becauseas a short-term rental car it will be driven more and parked less. Plus you can park two Car2Go SmartCars in one parking space. When less parking is needed, more land can be devoted to new buildings, which means a greater concentration of both people and destinations in one place, which means even less need for parking and greater opportunities for using the swinging vine. From this perspective, the traditional suburban model seems pretty archaic – and expensive. Cars that are parked virtually all the time, at great expense to their owners? Huge amounts of land devoted to parking that could be devoted to more profitable or more human-scale uses? How rigid! How inflexible! How expensive! How 20th-Century! Obviously, this suburban model will be with us for a long time because so many people live and work in suburban locations – often with long commutes. They will have little choice but to own their own car, drive it everywhere they go, and park it virtually all the time. And huge numbers of people will continue to make the suburban choice. But for urban and semi-urban neighborhoods, car sharing seems like an almost miraculous way out of the conflict between density and driving. And in those neighborhoods, the ongoing and often inevitable transition away from the suburban model will become more viable, cheaper, and much easier to plan for.

With the June 15 Constitutional budget deadline approaching , it's getting easier if not easy to pick state bills that have a chance this season. A few measures affecting land use and planning didn't survive the suspense file or were otherwise pulled. But a lot is still up in the air. Cap and Trade - The Sacramento Bee's Dan Walters is reporting at http://bit.ly/1h9bbT0 that three proposals are now in play for the use of cap-and-trade carbon auction proceeds for environmental, transit and housing purposes. We've discussed two of them previously at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3494: Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg's proposal, with its strong emphasis on transit-oriented affordable housing, and the prior proposal by Gov. Jerry Brown. Walters reports, however, that a third version was adopted by the Senate Budget and Fiscal Review Committee as of May 23 with $450 million for transit and rail and some "sustainable communities" funding. Prop 13 Reform - AB 2372 , which would block a split-ownership tactic for avoiding business property reassessments, passed out of the Assembly suspense file May 23. As we've also discussed at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3494, the measure has historic support from the Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association. The state's tracking page on the bill with text, status and a committee analysis is at http://bit.ly/1i0mbN1. A bill to restore some limited variation in parcel tax rates, Sen. Lois Wolk's SB 1021 , also discussed in our prior writeup, had passed the state Senate and has been with the Assembly Committee on Revenue and Taxation since May 12. If you're keeping score at home: a suspense file tally - The California Special Districts Association posted spreadsheets on Dropbox of bills' fates in the May 23 hearings on Assembly and State Senate suspense files. See  http://bit.ly/1tKgJVX for the Assembly and http://bit.ly/1nsbj2l for the Senate. One edgy bill that made it out of the suspense file was SB 1132 , the anti-fracking measure by State Sens. Holly Mitchell and Mark Leno. It passed with clarifying amendments. For more see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3475 and http://bit.ly/RiQt7c. Mitchell, a Los Angeles Democrat, has expressed concern for her district as close to "the largest urban oil field in the country" in Inglewood. SB 1260 , the DeSaulnier bill for a 25% affordable housing set-aside requirement on either Redevelopment-type or IFD tax-increment districts, did not make it off the suspense file at the May 23 Senate Appropriations hearing. Another ambitious housing bill, AB 2175 (Daly & Ting) to strengthen renters' rebates, also stayed stuck in the Assembly suspense file May 23. AB 1537 (Levine) - This bill to change Marin County's status from urban to suburban would reduce default zoning densities for the county from 30 to 20 units. The Marin IJ has analysis at http://bit.ly/TQD1Jd. The measure passed the Assembly May 19 and was awaiting committee assignment in the Senate Rules Committee. SB 968 (Hill) - Billionare Vinod Khosla has reportedly hired lobbyists to fight SB 968, Sen. Jerry Hill's bill to have the State Lands Commission negotiate the purchase from Khosla of Martin's Beach, a popular privately owned beach in San Mateo County that Khosla closed to public access. The public had long been allowed to visit there for the cost of parking in a private lot. (See http://bit.ly/1pv2UIs.) Despite a reported lobbying push against the measure, SB 968 made it out of the Senate Appropriations suspense file May 23 by a vote of 5-2. SB 270 (Padilla) - State Sen. Alex Padilla, also a candidate for California Secretary of State, continued to advance his bill for a statewide plastic bag ban, SB 270. Sacramento Bee columnist Mariel Garza wrote this weekend at http://www.sacbee.com/2014/05/18/6411959/mariel-garza-ban-single-use-plastic.html that Padilla was facing attack ads from the plastic industry over the matter. But the bill has passed the Senate, has survived one Assembly committee vote, and next goes to Assembly Appropriations. AB 2493 (Bloom) - Post-Redevelopment funds retention This bill by Assemblymember Bloom, D-Santa Monica, would return some $750 million to successor agencies to finish redevelopment projects. By the end of April it had passed two Assembly policy committees and had passed out of the suspense file at Assembly Appropriations. For Bloom's comments in the local Santa Monica Lookout see http://bit.ly/1jwkF9e. The League of California Cities, which supports it, has a tracking page and support letter at http://bit.ly/Q8J612. SB 1129 (Steinberg) - SB 1129, a post-redevelopment cleanup bill with League of California Cities support, would give cities' successor agencies more authority in several areas, notably to enter contracts. It was heard May 5 in Senate Appropriations and passed out of the suspense file with amendments on May 23, receiving a second reading and further amendment May 27 on the Senate floor. For an endorsement statement by the City of Glendale see http://bit.ly/SvBvvz. The League's comments on this and a crop of other March-introduced bills on the Redevelopment wind-down are at http://bit.ly/1igufww. SB 1 (Steinberg) - This bill emphasizing transit-oriented "smart growth," in a quasi-revival of Redevelopment, remains on the "Inactive" file. For background on this and other efforts to fill the vacuum left by Redevelopment's demise see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3480   AB 2280 (Alejo) - This bill to re-create some elements of Redevelopment with a housing emphasis passed the Assembly May 8 and was referred to two Senate policy committees. See League of Cities analysis at http://bit.ly/OUOtRg. SB 33 (Wolk) -  SB 33, which would remove the requirement of a popular vote from infrastructure finance districts, remained formally dormant but still informally under consideration, as discussed at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3480. AB 2729 (Medina) - Would expand use of the California Infrastructure and Economic Development Bank, or "I-Bank" to finance more infrastructure surrounding shipping and transport. Brought to a hearing for discussion April 22 but not moving at present. AB 1404 (Leno) - San Francisco Redevelopment housing backlog San Francisco-specific SB 1404, originated by the city government, passed the State Senate May 12 and went to two Assembly policy committees. The measure would both require and allow the successor to the city's redevelopment agency to replace over 5000 units of affordable housing that were destroyed during 1955-1975 "urban renewal". See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3480. AB 2292 (Bonta) - Freight rail, redevelopment sites AB 2292, per the Assembly Local Government committee's analysis, would "allow an infrastructure financing district in the Oakland Army Base, Howard Terminal or Coliseum City in the City of Oakland to finance public capital facilities or projects that include freight rail." All three sites are subjects of major redevelopment planning; the latter two are competing sites for pro sports stadiums. (See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3476.) Per the author's statement in the analysis, "we need to include freight rail as an eligible expense for IFDs" to improve the city's transportation capacity and emissions reduction through rail use. The measure was ordered to a third reading in the Assembly on May 23. AB 2549 (Ridley-Thomas) - Milpitas post-redevelopment The Assembly has passed AB 2549, to create a local commission to address Milpitas' especially deep post-Redevelopment funding losses. It is before the State Senate's Governance and Finance Committee. SB 391 (DeSaulnier) - Affordable housing via recording fees SB 391, which would raise funds for affordable housing with real estate recording fees, remains formally before Assembly Appropriations, having passed the Senate last year. It did not go anywhere in the May 23 suspense file hearings. AB 2417 (Nazarian) - Recycled water AB 2417, on "purple pipe" distribution of recycled water, passed the Assembly May 23 and moved to the Senate. It would create an exemption from CEQA for new or existing recycled water pipelines of less than eight miles. The Associaton of California Water Agencies (ACWA), which backs the measure, had background in April at http://www.acwa.com/news/state-legislation/acwa-sponsored-ab-2417-clears-first-committee. AB 1739 (Dickinson) - Groundwater management Another ACWA-backed bill, AB 1739, passed out of the suspense file May 23. Per the water committee's legislative analysis it would require "sustainable groundwater management in all groundwater subbasins determined by the Department of Water Resources... to be at medium to high risk of significant economic, social and environmental impacts due to an unsustainable and chronic pattern of groundwater extractions exceeding the ability of the surface water supplies to replenish the subbasin." See http://www.acwa.com/news/groundwater/assembly-committee-approves-groundwater-legislation SB 1077 (DeSaulnier) - SB 1077, which calls for a tax based on vehicle miles traveled, made it out of the suspense file May 23. The Southern California Association of Governments has been talking it up (see http://bit.ly/1nkxKTG) but the measure was questioned last fall on privacy grounds (see http://lat.ms/1jwnuHj). SB 1439 (Leno) - Ellis Act restrictions State Sen. Mark Leno's Ellis Act restriction measure, SB 1439 (discussed previously at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3477) now has a heavy weight of tech industry endorsers behind it (see http://beyondchron.org/news/index.php?itemid=12611). The measure went to a third reading May 13 in the Senate. Assemblymember Tom Ammiano's AB 2405, which would have limited the Ellis Act more strongly and provided tenant litigants with other procedural protections, failed to clear the Assembly Judiciary Committee on April 29. SB 1451 (Hill & Roth) - CEQA procedural restrictions A widely shared commentary by the Miller Starr Regalia law firm at http://bit.ly/1q9qPkX is arguing for SB 1451, which would limit the ways petitioners could place allegations of CEQA violations on the record. Principally, it would exclude allegations from court review if the alleged violations were known, or could have been known with reasonable diligence, during the public comment period, but were brought to the agency's attention at another time. The legislative summary and the Miller Starr essay describe the measure as designed to stop use of "document dumping" as a tactic to delay a decision or preserve a record. The bill has passed the State Senate Environmental Quality Committee. However, it may be doomed for this season: a hearing set for May 6 in Judiciary was canceled at the author's request, and Arthur Coon, author of the law firm's commentary, posted again May 27 saying he had been told the bill was stopped by "organized labor interests." See http://bit.ly/SfjoZW. SB 69 (Roth) and AB 1521 (Fox) - Restore Vehicle License Fee revenue These two somewhat different measures, both supported by the League of Cities (and discussed previously at http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3464), would restore features of the 2004-2005 budget deal's "VLF-property tax swap" and transfer back vehicle license fee income to local jurisdictions, undoing the work of 2011's SB 89, which repurposed the vehicle license money to help with "realignment" additions to the functions of county carceral systems. (Compare http://www.cdcr.ca.gov/about_cdcr/docs/realignment-fact-sheet.pdf.) The two current bills would especially help recently created municipalities such as Jurupa Valley. Per an AB 1521 legislative analysis, "SB 89 had the effect of eliminating over $15 million in the Motor Vehicle License Fee (MVLFA) revenues in 2011-12 from four newly incorporated cities (Menifee, Eastvale, Wildomar, and Jurupa Valley)." SB 69 passed the Senate last year, but with a different text focused on education funding. It was amended to substantially its current form in September 2013, then sat with formally unchanged status until it began to move in the Assembly a few weeks ago. It was read a second time and amended in the Assembly on May 6 and moved to the Rules Committee. AB 1521 made it off the suspense file May 23 in the Assembly. It passed the Assembly May 27 and is now before the Senate. The most recent floor analysis shows no opposition on file. AB 1513 (Fox) - Residential property: possession by declaration The California Association of Realtors was sponsoring a measure, also supported by the California Police Chiefs Association, described as meant to assist landlords, security companies and police in removing squatters from vacant properties. It would allow a landlord to declare ownership of a property, register it as vacant, and challenge allegedly unauthorized occupants to obtain or present proof of a right to remain within 48 hours. Some tenant activists had begun campaigns against the measure because they argued it could create an extrajudicial eviction process, giving landlords an end run around the more procedurally complex and time-consuming procedures of the standard California "unlawful detainer" eviction. (See e.g. http://bit.ly/RjmiN5 and http://killthebillcoalition.com/about/) Assembly bill analyses as posted on the measure's official page at http://bit.ly/1iooOZ2 set out the dispute in detail. Opponents listed as of the May 16 floor analysis included the statewide Tenants Together group and the Western Center on Law and Poverty. The measure passed the Assembly May 19 and is with the Senate Rules Committee for assignment.

When a mobile home park's owner proposes to convert it from space rentals to resident ownership, a local agency must "consider" the results of a survey of resident support. Residents have never had the definite right to prevent conversion by a vote -- not even under the new SB 510, which allows (but does not require) local agencies to disapprove conversions based on lack of majority tenant support. But resident surveys do carry some weight. How much? In 218 Properties v. City of Carson , California's Second District Court of Appeal considered two conversion applications, filed in 2009, in which majorities of survey respondents opposed conversion. Although SB 510 was not binding for cases of that vintage, the court viewed the newer law as "instructive on what the Legislature may have envisioned all along." On that basis it found the Carson City Council properly disapproved a proposed conversion at the Park Granada Trailer Lodge, owned by 218 Properties, LLC, where 20 of 26 renters answered the survey and all 20 opposed conversion. However, it agreed with the trial court that the council should have allowed conversion of 225-space Imperial Avalon park, where only 82 residents responded to the survey: 46 against, 18 in favor, and "18 did not state an opinion". In mobile home park conversions, the very first sale of a previously rented space removes the whole surrounding park from local rent control. (After that first sale, state-level protections, which may be less strict, still limit rent increases for low-income tenants in conversions under Government Code Sec. 66427.5.) State law therefore requires a survey of residents' wishes as part of a local review to consider whether the park owner's true purpose in beginning to sell spaces is to switch entirely to resident ownership (viewed as legitimate)  or only to end the application of local rent control (viewed as a "sham"). Reviewing pre-2014 conversion law, the court cited Colony Cove Properties, LLC v. City of Carson (2010) 187 Cal.App.4th 1487 and Goldstone v. County of Santa Cruz (2012) 207 Cal.App.4th 1038 for the rule that local agencies are entitled to base some part of their conclusions on the residents' wishes. It cited Chino MHC, LP v. City of Chino (2012) 210 Cal.App.4th 1049 for the countervailing rule that (in its own paraphrase) "a local agency may rely on the survey to find the conversion is a sham, but it may not make that finding based solely on a lack of majority support among the residents for the conversion." Under Chino, it said, either majority disapproval or the landlord's subjective wish to avoid rent control was not enough to stop a conversion. In light of those cases plus the implications of SB 510, the court considered not only the surveys from the Park Granada and Imperial Avalon parks, but the overall realism of the respective owners' plans to convert to resident ownership. At the larger Imperial Avalon park, it said, the owner "expected to sell 25 to 35 percent of the park's lots to current residents in the first 180 days" -- but that was unlikely at Park Granada, where all the survey respondents opposed conversion and all or most residents were low-income. Lacking "overwhelming" evidence that the Park Granada property would truly convert to full resident ownership, the court agreed the council had acted properly in disapproving that conversion. Turning to an alternative argument by the city of Carson, the court found the Council also could not properly reject the Imperial Avalon conversion based on inadequacies in its required Tenant Impact Report. It agreed with the trial court that the Carson council could not properly second-guess a finding by the city's planning commission that the report was complete, and that if the council wanted more information it should have asked the owner for it before declaring the report insufficient. In concurring, Presiding Justice Tricia A. Bigelow relinquished her prior dissenting opinion in an unpublished 2010 case, Carson Harbor Village, Ltd. v. City of Carson , Case No. B211777, which, she wrote, was later denied review by the Supreme Court. She had argued that Sec. 66427.5 as it then stood did not allow a local agency to reject a conversion based on opposition in a residents' survey. Now, she wrote, in light of subsequent rulings and developments, "that view will no longer carry the day," and at any rate "Cases going forward... will need to be addressed under the new statute." The case is at http://www.courts.ca.gov/opinions/documents/B241969.PDF. Staff reports from the Carson Planning Department on the parks are at http://carson.ca.us/content/files/pdfs/planning/sr/2010-03-09/71207.pdf and http://ci.carson.ca.us/content/files/pdfs/planning/sr/2010-02-23/mobl.pdf.