It was cool and foggy along the Santa Barbara Channel coast in early June. So the delicate layer of ash coating everything outside and the faint smell of burnt sage seemed a bit incongruous. In fact, the coastal fog season arrives at the same time as sweltering inland temperatures. And in the middle of what will probably be the driest year since the 19th Century in southern California, the fact that the Wolf Fire was busy consuming 23,000 acres in the Los Padres National Forest, only 15 miles inland from the cool waters of the Pacific came as no surprise to Ventura County residents. Thankfully, no urban area was directly affected � other than the temporary closure of Ojai's largest park so that it could serve as a firefighter encampment. As it has turned out, the Wolf Fire and its Colorado cousin the Hayman Fire � which consumed 138,000 acres � were the first in a rash of headline-grabbing blazes plaguing the drought-stricken West this year. With development spreading up the slopes of California's mountains and foothills, land use conflicts associated with wildfire hazard must be growing, right? Not necessary, says Rich Schell, Staff Chief of the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (CDF). Fire suppression infrastructure and techniques � such as high-pressure water pipelines and brush clearance practices � have moved along with development into the "wildfire urban interaction zone," fire professional jargon for the urban edge. Local government has long addressed wildfire planning, primarily through the general plan's safety element, which requires delineation of wildfire areas within an agency's planning area. Through the years, fire protection of structures has become more and more codified. Requirements for fire-resistant roofing and siding materials, interior sprinkler systems, water pressure thresholds, and brush clearance specifications have all combined to blunt the effect of fire cycles within the urbanized edge. Currently, the Governor's Office of Planning and Research (OPR) is revamping the safety element guidelines, and has invited Schell and other state fire officials to the table to assist in the rewrite. As part of CDF's input, Schell plans to introduce the Wildland Fire Template, a fire protection policy document put together by the Regional Council of Rural Counties, an organization that represents more than half of California's counties and whose land receives primary fire protection from CDF. But the excellent ongoing work on fire protection and safety planning may be forcing California's wildlands into a corner � in effect, competing with natural resource management trends on BLM and Forest Service lands. First, by building solidifying the perception that fire protection techniques make it safe to build structures and reside in forested areas, government officials foster the relentless march of exurban sprawl into wildfire zones continues. The burden on firefighting agencies then increases, at least in part because of a necessary shift in firefighting techniques from fire management to protection of lives and structures. This then leads to more out-and-out fire suppression in nearby wildlands, thereby interrupting the natural cycle of burning that the forests and the grasslands of the west need to remain healthy and diverse. According to the University of Northern Arizona's Land Use History of North America project, the U.S. Forest Service and other land management agencies are entering their sixth decade of fire suppression to respond to omnipresent fire threat in the West. These efforts have resulted in far less frequent fires, disrupting the natural cycles of the region's forests and resulting in many damaging ecological effects. The practice has led to an increase in trees as a proportion of the forest botanical community. Therefore, when wildfires start, the fuel is more potent. As with any planning endeavor dealing with natural hazards, balance is the goal. The latest season of wildfires reminds us that, like with earthquakes, floods, and other cyclical environmental phenomena, wildfire should be part of our thinking when planning for the exurban fringe. And with the integration CDF expertise into the general plan guidelines rewrite process, the opportunity to achieve balance has improved. At the same time, however, the fate of wildlands as natural areas in California may be placed further in question. Stephen Svete, AICP, is president of Rincon Consultants, Inc., a Ventura-based consulting firm.

Spurred by a 1999 ballot initiative to find new revenue sources, San Francisco's Municipal Transportation Agency is examining some of its real estate holdings with an eye toward development opportunities. Muni has a development agreement with a hotel builder for one piece of prime property near the Ferry Building. Other properties could be developed with housing, stores and offices � possibly above ground-level transit facilities. In 2001, the Muni Board of Director approved an updated Short-Range Transit Plan, which includes a section on asset development. The plan identifies six sites ranging from less than 1 acre to 11 acres for potential development. Implementation has been too slow for some of Muni's critics. But most people acknowledge the process requires new thinking by Muni staff members and leaders, who have never before tried to capitalize on the transit system's real estate assets. "We decided to go ahead when we received more leeway with Proposition E," said Kerstin Magary, Muni senior project manager. The proposition made Muni a more independent agency by changing the Board of Directors selection process and mandating a number of performance standards for the new transit agency. "We need to seek new sources of revenue," Magary said "Land values and land uses in certain neighborhoods have changed over time," she said. So the agency is taking "a citywide look at how Muni should operate in the 21st century." And that means Muni's reliance on 100-year-old facilities that have been repeatedly retrofitted as transit technology evolved may need to change. The project farthest along is a proposed 200-room hotel at the foot of Mission Street. The 0.72-acre site has served as a terminal and layover site for buses and trolleys. Muni plans to relocate the buses and trolleys one to four blocks away and develop the prime Mission Street real estate, which is only one block from the waterfront and Justin Herman Plaza. Muni has signed a development and lease agreement with Emerald Fund Inc., a San Francisco developer. Construction, now scheduled to begin later this year, was delayed by the post-9/11 downturn in the San Francisco hotel trade, Magary said. The hotel will serve as a demonstration project and could prove a great deal about Muni's capabilities, said James Chappell, president of San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association (SPUR) and co-author of Measure E. Advancing the hotel project "took a lot of work to convince some people at Muni to do business a different way, and to convince the public, which in San Francisco tends to be very anti-development," Chappell said. Muni expects to receive about $300 million during the 65-year lease with Emerald Fund and a hotel operator. After the lease expires, Muni will own the hotel outright. Another Muni site with obvious potential is at Geary Boulevard and Presidio Avenue, near the University of San Francisco campus. According to the Short-Range Transit Plan, the 5.4-acre site "commands a stunning view of downtown to the east; affords a short, convenient downtown commute along Geary Boulevard; and is surrounded by stable, and to a large extent highly desirable, residential neighborhoods, and considerable retail uses, as well." Muni uses the site to store, maintain and dispatch about 170 trolleys, so it cannot give up the land. (Muni does plan to move out of an office building there in a few years.) Muni is conducting a site needs assessment and will issue a request for qualifications from developers, Magary said. Development could involve building residential units on a platform above the trolley facilities. The Muni office building could be refurbished or replaced with a larger office or apartment building. While developers salivate over the Presidio Division site, Muni might have to work harder to drum up interest in property in the south part of town, near City College of San Francisco. One site is the 1.4-acre Phelan Loop, an off-street terminal for trolleys and buses that serve City College. Interstate 280 separates the Phelan Loop from the other site � 11 acres next to a BART station where Muni has its light rail yard and keeps a fleet of historic streetcars. Exactly what the sites might become is partly tied up in a city planning effort called Better Neighborhoods 2002, which involves preparation of community plans for three neighborhoods. The Muni properties are in the Balboa Park Station Area Plan, a draft of which is due within two months. "Transit-based housing is absolutely the reason we are doing this," said Ken Rich, an associate planner in charge of the Balboa Park plan. Besides Muni, BART, Caltrans and the city's Water Department own property in the neighborhood, including nearly all of the "opportunity sites," Rich said. He foresees development of about 500 housing units on several sites within one-half mile of the BART station. The community plan, however, will not address in detail the 25-acre site of the long-proposed Balboa Reservoir � which might be the largest chunk of undeveloped real estate in the city � because fights over use of the reservoir site could bog down the community planning effort, Rich said. Muni is considering development on two-thirds of the Phelan Loop, leaving the rest as a green space and grand entrance to the neighborhood, said Jim Nelson, of Muni's real estate office. "The Phelan Loop is ugly, it's windswept, it's barren," Nelson said. "We're not in this one to make a huge profit. We're in it to be a good neighbor and to make a transit hub that works." Nelson sees tremendous redevelopment potential for parts of the rail yard site. "What it is now is a freeway offramp, and a bunch of people getting on and off buses and trains. � There clearly is a market for some level of retail activity, bolstered by residential above the retail area," he said. Chappell, of SPUR, said the Balboa Park plan is really a long-range proposal because it will require substantial public investment. He would like to see the city more strongly consider "platform" development above those transit facilities. But the city's Rich is not convinced. "The land values would have to be a lot higher than they are now, or we would need a lot more density, like a 20-story structure, before it would be worth it," he said. Elsewhere in the city, Muni officials are reviewing potential uses for a 2.6-acre bus yard near Fisherman's Wharf that Muni plans to vacate in 2004. However, preliminary plans for a parking garage and housing development at a trolley yard in the Potrero District have been abandoned for now because the dot-com crash changed the neighborhood's dynamics, Muni's Magary said. Contacts: Kerstin Magary, San Francisco Municipal Transit Agency, (415) 554-1789. Jim Nelson, San Francisco Muni, (415) 934-3934. Ken Rich, San Francisco Planning Department, (415) 558-6345. James Chappell, San Francisco Planning and Urban Research Association, (415) 781-8726.

This is the soundtrack of a person walking across a bridge above a busy street. The first sound we hear is the Doppler effect of a car approaching, then disappearing beneath the bridge, making a noise roughly like "eeee-UURRHH!!" A moment later, the same car emerges from beneath the bridge. "WHIFFF-urrrrh!" In addition to the sound, the motion of the speeding car seems to create a vacuum in its wake. Nearly stationary in comparison, the pedestrian has the sensation that he is at risk of being sucked off the bridge by the wake of the departing car and falling into the busy roadway below. That the danger is illusory does not make the experience more pleasant. A second, and possibly greater, problem is the sheer awkwardness of using pedestrian bridges. In most cases, pedestrians must mount a set of stairs, or an exceedingly long spiral ramp, then walk across the bridge ("eeee-UURRHH!!" "WHIFF-urrrrh!"), and finally walk down a second set of stairs or a ramp on the opposite end. These issues help explain why pedestrian bridges have failed to gain popularity. Although it is understandable that bridges would be attractive in concept as a way of creating convenient footpaths across wide and dangerous thoroughfares, they rarely work in urban planning. A downtown area might be able to span a river or a valley, but a bridge over a busy street might strike planners as a bridge too far. For that reason, I confess to some initial skepticism when I heard that the City Council of Yorba Linda, a city of 60,000 people in north Orange County, recently approved a new master plan for the city‚s downtown area with a bridge as a central feature. The basic goal of the plan is to bring visibility and new pedestrian activity to the city's miniscule Main Street, which is so small that some Yorba Linda residents do not know it exists. The problem, however, is that some of the most active areas of tiny downtown Yorba Linda are found on the opposite side of Imperial Highway, a six-lane thoroughfare with a median. Here are Mimi's Restaurant, one of the strongest local draws, the Station Shopping Center (named for the former Red Line station, still standing) and Nixon Park, the largest downtown green space and the place most capable of holding crowds. Located a few blocks southwest (not visible on our maps), the Nixon Library is by far the biggest regional draw, and the city eventually wants to strengthen the pedestrian link between the Nixon Library and Main Street. Fortunately, downtown Yorba Linda is "almost all right," to borrow a phrase from Robert Venturi. The area is rich in historic buildings to lend scale and texture to new development. And with some help, the streets can approximate a more-or-less regular grid. Master plan architect David Denton, a contractor of the city's primary downtown consultant, Downtown/Main Street Visions, has centered his efforts on Main Street. The modest, two-block-long downtown stretch comprises mostly two-story buildings, with some vacant lots intervening. Denton proposes to fill in what he calls the "missing teeth" on Main Street with compatible new construction. To create a uniform retail strip, Denton would like to reconfigure some buildings that are currently in use as professional offices, with retail at street level and offices above. To the south, he proposes extending the two-story scale of Main Street into "large floor plate" retail space capable of accommodating big retailers. The scale of these new buildings would echo the scale of the packing plants that formerly occupied the site, according to Denton. Fronting on Imperial Highway, the new retail buildings would be a kind of billboard for Main Street, which is otherwise invisible from the thoroughfare. Historic buildings line the streets both east and west of Main Street: To the west is the existing public library, where Denton would like to remove the surface parking and replace it with structured parking. An existing historic house on the site would be remade as a historic museum or a children's museum. (I vote for the latter, which would be more of a draw and has the potential of repeat business.) To the east is School Street, with a row of historic houses, and further still is Valencia Avenue, where the master plan envisions multifamily buildings. The bridge would be located between Main Street and the new retail buildings. Although Denton said he is normally a skeptic about pedestrian bridges — and he actually advised another city against just such a solution — he said Yorba Linda's special conditions will make the bridge acceptable to pedestrians. To start with, the Main Street side of the bridge starts on the second level of the new retail building. In other words, people on foot are not obliged to climb a set of stairs to an isolated bridge. On the park side, the bridge ends in a stepped ramp. Popular in Europe but rare here, the stepped ramp is a wonderful urban-design device: With an individual step every few feet, the ramp creates a steeper slope than a conventional ramp in an unobtrusive way. And rather than being only a corridor, the master plan sees the ramp as a destination in itself, with a sculpture garden on permanent display. The bridge is essential for the choreography for downtown festivals: Starting on Main Street, the processional would move south through the new retail buildings and cross the bridge, which is wide enough to line with booths. The parade ends up at Nixon Park, which would be fitted with a bandstand and fountains. If those conditions do not entirely take away the discomfort of the pedestrian bridge, they may provide the incentive to make the trip in the first place. And if Yorba Linda's gambit succeeds, the city will have accomplished the rare feat of extending its downtown across a busy road packed with through traffic. Noise aside, it may turn out that what lies on either side of a bridge is more important than what happens in between.

Movies, music and television have created a global image of California as the land of sunshine and surf. Like many caricatures, the mystique has a nugget of truth at its core: Californians do love their beaches. Eighty percent of the state's 34 million residents live within an hour's drive of the shore, according to the California Coastal Commission. A few years ago, the Public Research Institute of San Francisco State University reported that the average family makes 15 beach trips a year. The government's "California Coastal Access Guide" is now in its fifth edition. Some California beach lovers enjoy the experience so much, however, that they want to keep those of lesser financial means from intruding on their private patches of paradise. This summer, that classic struggle between the proletariat and the privileged is being played out quietly in the Legislature and loudly in gossipy newspaper stories. By law, the state owns everything on the beach below the mean high tide line, and the public has an unfettered right to use that damp strip of real estate. Getting to it, however, is another matter. About 42% of the coastline is publicly owned and accessible, while the other 58% is owned privately, or is held by local, state or federal agencies and closed to entry. The state is obligated by law to maintain and expand public access to the beach. The 1976 Coastal Act prohibits new development from blocking established access routes, whether they are on public land or private property. In areas where no public access exists, the Coastal Act requires that new routes from the nearest road to the shoreline be provided as part of any new project. In the first decade of its existence, the Coastal Commission commonly carried out this mandate by exacting Offers to Dedicate (OTD) public easements. In exchange for approval of a coastal development permit, the commission required the private landowner to offer an easement, generally 10 to 25 feet wide, to a government agency or nonprofit organization. Once a recipient accepts the offer — contingent on its acceptance of liability and responsibility for maintenance — it obtains title to the easement. If no public or private entity accepts the OTD, it expires, usually after 21 years. The Coastal Commission curtailed this practice after 1987, when the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Nollan v. California Coastal Commission, 483 U.S. 825, that such a requirement was an unconstitutional taking of private property unless there was a clear "nexus," or connection, between the project's impact and the condition for the easement. In 1981, 4.9% of all coastal development permits had OTDs attached to them, said Linda Locklin, the Coastal Commission's manager of coastal access programs. In the year after Nollan, the figure fell to 1.2%. By 1995, it was only 0.5%. Since 1976, the Coastal Commission has obtained 1,363 OTDs. Fifteen have expired, Locklin said, and about 750 have been accepted. The remaining offers are outstanding, and scores will expire during the next five years if a recipient does not step forward. The Coastal Commission has given highest priority to "vertical OTDs" — those providing access perpendicular to the ocean, generally from the first public road (Pacific Coast Highway, Highway 1) to the shoreline. During the next five years, 44 of these could expire. The Coastal Commission cannot accept the easements, but the California Coastal Conservancy and local agencies can and do. Many communities are reluctant, however, arguing that the cost of providing parking, restrooms, maintenance and liability insurance is prohibitive. Several bills are working their way through the Legislature this summer to address the pending expiration of OTDs: o SB 1962 by Richard Polanco (D-Los Angeles) would require the Coastal Conservancy to accept any outstanding OTD if it has not been accepted by another public agency or nonprofit organization within 90 days of the OTD's expiration. o AB 2162 by Assemblywoman Gloria Negrete McLoud (D-Chino) would earmark half the revenue from sale of the state's "Whale's Tail" vanity license plates for deposit into a special coastal access fund to pay for maintenance and other costs associated with easements. o SB 1966 by Sen. Kevin Murray (D-Los Angeles) would require that public agencies and nonprofit organizations prepare a study analyzing the public safety impacts before they open an access route obtained through an OTD, including the need for maintenance, parking, lifeguards, and police and fire access. The Coastal Commission has endorsed SB 1962 and AB 2162, but opposes SB 1966, viewing it as an impediment to public access. Meanwhile, California's rich and famous continue to battle the state and each other over access to public beaches near their multimillion-dollar estates. In June, entertainment mogul David Geffen sued the Coastal Commission and a nonprofit group, Access for All, which the commission authorized to accept an OTD that Geffen provided in 1983 as a condition of expanding his Malibu beach house. Nancy Daly Riordan, wife of former Los Angeles Mayor Richard Riordan, billionaire developer Eli Broad and cartoon producer Haim Saban won permission to build huge Malibu mansions that blocked the ocean by spending $1 million to buy land for public access near actor Ryan O'Neal's home at the La Costa Beach Club. The La Costa Beach Homeowners Association and the Malibu La Costa Owners Association sued the state and last year won at trial, persuading a judge that the Coastal Commission had illegally allowed the trio to circumvent beachfront building restrictions. The state has appealed. In 1991, singer and actress Julie Andrews and her husband, movie director Blake Edwards, gave the state $338,000 to move a public-access route from their Malibu property and instead build a staircase to the beach near the home of former MGM studio head Frank Mancuso. More recently, Mancuso offered to pay for a program to bus school children to other beaches if the state would relinquish that easement. The state refused. Malibu is not the only wealthy enclave where private residents are trying in court to curtail public access (see CP&DR Legal Digest, May 2002). At exclusive Hope Ranch just north of Santa Barbara, Wendy McCaw — the billionaire owner of the Santa Barbara News-Press who inherited an OTD when she bought her home — sued the Coastal Commission over an easement granting public access to 500 feet of beach below her 25-acre, bluff-top estate. The Coastal Commission countersued; McCaw settled earlier this year by paying $460,000 in fines. McCaw also sued Santa Barbara County over the easement. She lost at both the trial and appellate court levels. Contacts: Linda Locklin, California Coastal Commission: (831) 427-4875. Bill information: www.leginfo.ca.gov Coastal Commission's OTD program: www.coastal.ca.gov/web/access/otd-access.html

As suburban-era cities have become "land poor," both planners and developers have advocated the recycling of underutilized commercial property for high-density housing. In particular, this solution has been under discussion throughout California and especially in Los Angeles, where housing production has been low and the supply of available raw land is dwindling. A new analysis by Solimar Research Group shows that multi-family residential development is, in fact, occurring on commercial strips in L.A. Our analysis reveals that residential construction on commercially zoned properties is commonplace in the city of Los Angeles. We also found that commercial areas get larger projects than residential areas, and that poor parts of town see minimal multi-family construction. Our findings: o In the last two years, 44% of multi-family permits issued in the City of Los Angeles were for projects located in commercial areas. In 2000 and 2001, the city issued 6,548 multi-family residential building permits. Of these, 2,944 (44.3%) were issued for projects located on commercially zoned parcels. In some parts of the city this figure is much higher, including South-Central L.A. (68%), East L.A. (98%), and the "Metro" planning area, which includes Hollywood and the Wilshire Corridor (68%). In two areas of the city, the North Valley and the Harbor area, all multi-family permits were issued in residential areas and none in commercial areas. o The vast majority of multi-family projects — in either residential or commercial areas — are located in affluent sections of the city. Of those 6,548 units, 2,629 (40.1%) located on the Westside, 1,623 were located in the South Valley (24.9%), and 1168 were located in the Metro planning area (17.8%). By contrast, South Los Angeles saw the construction of only 208 units (3.2%), while Central L.A. had only 271 (4.1%), East L.A. had 166 (2.5%), and the Harbor area 75 (1.1%). These numbers were not appreciably different between residential and commercial parcels. o Multi-family residential projects located in commercial areas are generally larger than multi-family residential projects located in residential areas. The 3,644 multi-family units constructed on residential parcels represented 125 different projects -- an average of 29 units per project. However, the 2,904 multi-family units constructed on commercial parcels represented only 31 different projects -- an average of 94 units per project. These statistics were fairly consistent across all area planning commission areas. o Multi-family densities average approximately 50 units per acre, and that figure is similar for projects located on both residential and commercial sites. Overall, the 6,548 units were constructed on 136.3 acres of land, for an average density of 48 units per acre. The figure for residential property was 51 units per acre; for commercial property it was 44 units per acre. The overall density on commercial property was reduced by the low density of the Pico Aliso public housing project in East Los Angeles (12.4 units per acre), a HOPE VI project intentionally designed at low densities. Overall densities were similar for each planning area, but densities did vary within each planning area for commercial and residential parcels. For example, densities on residential parcels in the Metro planning area averaged almost 150 units per acre, while densities on commercial parcels in the Metro area averaged only 52 units per acre. In West Los Angeles, the reverse was true: Multi-family densities on residential parcels averaged 89 units per acre, while on commercial parcels they averaged 148 units per acre. These conclusions are derived from data provided by the Los Angeles City Planning Department. (Special thanks to Jane Blumenfeld for assembling the data.) The seven geographical areas represented in this data comprise the territory covered by the seven Area Planning Commissions created by the city's new charter. The statistical patterns are influenced by the presence of a small number of large projects. More than half of the permits (3,716 units out of 6,548, or 57%) were issued for approximately 10% of the projects (15 out or 156, or 9.6%).

The state Supreme Court has struck down a common method that cities and counties use to select temporary administrative hearing officers for land use controversies and other issues. The court ruled that San Bernardino County's unilateral appointment and payment of an attorney as a temporary hearing officer created the possibility of a conflict of interest for the attorney. The court accepted the argument from a massage clinic owner that the attorney might provide the county a favorable decision in hopes of being rewarded with additional work as a hearing officer. The California State Association of Counties, 110 California cities and the California School Boards Association filed amicus briefs for San Bernardino County. They argued that a more formal process for selecting hearing officers would be expensive and cumbersome. But the court said, essentially, "tough." " peculation about the possible outcome of hypothetical cases cannot justify tolerating a practice that we have considered and found to create a constitutionally unacceptable risk of bias," Justice Kathryn Werdegar wrote for the court. Five other justices joined Werdegar's opinion. Justice Janice Rogers Brown filed a concurring and dissenting opinion in which she agreed with the ruling on the San Bernardino County case but said the court should not dismantle a selection process used by many local governments. The case at hand involved a massage clinic in San Bernardino County operated under a county license by Theodore Haas. When a deputy sheriff reported that a massage clinic employee exposed her breasts and propositioned him, the county revoked Haas's license. He requested a hearing, which the county granted. The county counsel's office selected local attorney Abby Hyman to hear the matter. Haas's attorney, Roger Jon Diamond, objected prior to the hearing and again during the hearing. Diamond argued that Hyman had an interest in ruling for the county so she would be hired again. The case was like one in which a prosecutor files cases before a judge of the prosecutor's choice, Diamond contended. He offered to pay for a judge if the county were to contract with the state Office of Administrative Hearings, but the county declined. Hyman refused to recuse herself and conducted a hearing. About seven weeks later, she issued a written decision recommending revocation of Haas's license. During a hearing at which Diamond again complained of the hearing officer selection process, the Board of Supervisors accepted Hyman's recommendation and pulled the license. Haas filed a lawsuit. San Bernardino County Superior Court Judge J. Michael Gunn accepted Haas's argument and ordered the Board of Supervisors to set aside its decision. The county appealed, but the Fourth District Court of Appeal ruled the county had violated Haas's due process rights and upheld Gunn's decision. The county appealed again, but the state high court backed the lower courts, although for slightly different reasons. The state Supreme Court focused on the monetary interest the hearing officer had in ruling for the county. While judges challenged for other reasons have been presumed impartial, courts have provided no exception for judges with a "direct, personal, substantial pecuniary interest," the court held. "The question presented," Werdegar wrote, "is whether a temporary administrative hearing officer has a pecuniary interest requiring disqualification when the government unilaterally selects and pays the officer on an ad hoc basis and the officer's income from future adjudicative work depends entirely on the government's goodwill. We conclude the answer is yes." " ourts have consistently recognized that a judge has a disqualifying financial interest when plaintiffs and prosecutors are free to choose their judge and the judge's income from judging depends on the number of cases handled. No persuasive reason exists to treat administrative hearing officers differently." The county presented a variety of arguments: Hyman's financial interest was too slight to require disqualification. The court should require a showing of actual bias. The hearing officer only makes a recommendation that the Board of Supervisors automatically reviews. The benefits of a different system do not outweigh the costs. The court rejected all of the county's arguments. The Government Code offers two methods the county could follow, the court ruled. The county could establish the "office of county hearing officer," or the county could contract with the state Office of Administrative Hearings for services of an administrative law judge. "To satisfy due process, all a county need do is exercise whatever authority the statute confers in a manner that does not create the risk that hearing officers will be rewarded with future remunerative employment for decisions favorable to the county," Werdegar wrote. The Case: Haas v. County of San Bernardino, No. S076868, 02 C.D.O.S. 3888, 2002 DJDAR 4893. Filed May 6, 2002. The Lawyers: For Haas: Roger Jon Diamond, (310) 399-3259. For the county: Alan Marks, county counsel, (909) 387-5459.

State lawmakers appear to be accepting the longstanding argument that needed construction of condominiums and townhouses is being chilled by construction defect litigation, and legislators might be ready to pass a reform bill this year. Homebuilders have long argued that such litigation is the main reason why the state sees little construction of attached ownership units -- housing that would seem to make sense in a high-cost, high-demand market and that conforms with the "smart growth" philosophy of higher-density housing. However, many planning and development experts have been reluctant to accept the homebuilder argument completely, suggesting that other factors — including anti-growth sentiment, lender reluctance, and even consumer preference — may also play an important role. This summer, however, representatives of the building industry, trial lawyers and the insurance industry are meeting regularly to negotiate language that could be inserted into a bill before the Legislature adjourns at the end of this month. State Senate President Pro Tem John Burton (D-San Francisco), as well as Assemblymen John Dutra (D-Fremont) and Darrell Steinberg (D-Sacramento) are encouraging the talks and appear ready to push legislation. "The problem has gotten so bad that legislators can't say it's not a problem anymore," said Kimberly Dellinger, a lobbyist for the California Building Industry Association. "We're about as near to a collapse as you can get without having an actual collapse." The industry would like lawmakers to adopt "functionality standards" that define what constitutes a construction defect, said Dellinger, noting that "cosmetic" deficiencies often get thrown into lawsuits. Builders also want a right to repair any defects, and mandatory mediation if problems remain. Trial lawyers say they can accept a speedier process for resolving problems. But attorneys and consumer advocates argue that when a builder continually stalls to repair "cosmetic" problems, a homeowner has no option but the courtroom. Mark Milstein, of Santa Monica's Verboon, Milstein & Peter, which specializes in construction defect lawsuits, said he is encouraged that the building industry's proposals are not as strongly tilted against consumers as they have been in the past. "I think there is a fair amount of momentum, and it is not unlikely we will see some substantial legislative changes," Milstein said. He Said, She Said The construction defect litigation battle has traditionally occurred separately from the policy debate over higher density housing. The battle is largely between builders, who fear higher insurance rates, and trial lawyers, whose members are active in construction defect liability lawsuits. Although anyone can sue over poor construction, defect lawsuits often involve condominium homeowners associations. This is because homeowners associations bring many plaintiffs together and because the associations are corporate entities with a fiduciary duty to members. The exact number of condominiums built each year is unclear. "No one collects data on condominium construction is a systematic way," the California Research Bureau reported in 1999. "There is, however, little dispute that the market has declined." The California Building Industry Association offers a chart compiled by The Meyers Group, a real estate consultant, that shows condominium construction slipping from about 18,000 units annually in 1994 to about 3,000 units a year in 1999. Those figures suggest that condominiums account for only about 2% of the new units built each year. And a fair number of those are high-end units or second homes in resort areas. Anecdotal evidence exists that condominium construction is picking up. "What is curious in the Bay Area is that a lot more condos are starting to go up," observed Christy Riviere, a regional planner for the Association of Bay Area Governments. The Olson Company is developing about 15 townhouse or loft projects in the East Bay and Southern California. At least three condominium projects are under construction, or nearly so, in suburban Sacramento. The first phase of the huge Playa Vista project on the west side of Los Angeles, which is under construction, will provide about 3,000 townhouses and condominiums ranging from about $200,000 to more than $500,000. Barratt American is building a 324-unit project in Temecula, with units starting at less than $160,000. Some redevelopment agencies are working with condominium developers. Barratt American President Michael Pattinson said some developers are pressing ahead because there is a large consumer market for condominiums. "Without them, there is no first rung on the ladder," he said. More Interest in Land-Use Circles For the most part, housing advocates and smart growth supporters have been reluctant to participate in the debate over construction defect litigation. Although it is a new party to this summer's Capitol negotiations, the Davis administration has also stayed out of the fray. "It is an issue of interest," said Richard Friedman, chief counsel for the Department of Housing and Community Development. "It is a constant battle. We know we're not building enough units in this state, and that leads to overcrowding and loss of affordability. Multi-family units, whether they are rentals or condos, are some of the more affordable units." Recently, however, planners and land use policymakers have begun to pay more attention to the construction defect litigation issue as a possible brake on needed higher-density housing. Besides providing opportunities for first-time buyers, condominiums and townhouses are also efficient land uses. And, because they are for-sale units, they can help stabilize a neighborhood. "If you want to build compact housing, you need to build townhouses," said Judy Corbett, executive director of the New Urbanist-oriented Local Government Commission. Sacramento architect, planner and developer David Mogavero said most people involved in smart growth advocacy do not see construction defect litigation as a big issue because they are not connected to the development community. But, he contended, the issue provides common ground for environmentalists, smart growth advocates and developers — all of whom have a stake in efficient development patterns. "It's a very, very critical urban form issue, and, therefore, an environmental issue," Mogavero said. "The number of people who are interested in getting entangled in doing condominiums these days, whether they do them well or not, is very limited — especially in markets like the Central Valley and the East Bay, where land is available and people have a choice." Mogavero, who is currently developing a 13-unit condominium complex in midtown Sacramento, said insurance for such projects costs five to eight times as much as for a comparable single-family home development. Insurance alone can top 2.5% of total development costs for a condominium project, he said. The more people like Mogavero, a respected urban thinker and activist, talk about construction defect litigation, the more attention the subject gets from entities without a direct economic interest. Both the San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG) and the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) have conducted workshops, and the influential Silicon Valley Manufacturing Group is lobbying for reforms. Last year, SANDAG conducted a workshop and several follow-up meetings involving representatives of developers, insurers, attorneys and local government. SANDAG even identified the issue as a legislative priority. However, the group had not progressed far enough to sponsor legislation by January 2002, and the effort has waned since then, said Susan Baldwin, SANDAG senior regional planner. Still, the SANDAG Housing Task Force, which looks for affordable housing solutions, hears about the issue constantly. "A key part of implementing smart growth is having attached housing built," Baldwin said. "What's getting built in San Diego is the luxury apartments and the subsidized projects that the nonprofits build." But new, moderately priced attached housing — whether it is for-rent or for-sale — is absent, she said. In May, ABAG gathered the parties together for a half-day forum that was well received, said Riviere. The group's regional planning committee would like to sponsor legislation, and Riviere said ABAG might join with SANDAG and the Southern California Association of Governments next year for a push at the Capitol. What such legislation would say, however, remains unclear. Rhetoric Continues to Swirl Despite the potential for cooperation, the rhetoric continues to flow from all sides. "If there is genuinely defective work, it needs to be fixed and the builder should step up," said Barratt American's Pattinson, who is also president of the California Building Industry Association. "But anybody who has seriously studied California's history of construction defect litigation can see these cases were brought with the intention of somebody profiting from litigation, most often plaintiff's attorneys. … It's gotten to the stage now where insurance carriers won't insure builders, subcontractors and the trades for building attached product." But Milstein, the Santa Monica attorney, argues that builders use construction defect litigation as a red herring in the condominium debate. "We think it's clever politicking for the most part," he said. "Certainly there's litigation for single-family homes, but they are still building those." There is little hard evidence that a "wave" of litigation has hit condominium builders. Most lawsuits get settled out of court. Still, the availability of insurance has decreased. The California Research Bureau reported that only a handful of companies are willing to underwrite contractors who have worked on condominiums, and the cost of coverage has risen. Milstein questioned how builders can say insurance is unavailable or prohibitively expensive when numerous condominium projects are going forward. Like other developers, Barratt American started its Temecula project after the state Supreme Court issued a ruling favorable to builders in a construction defect case. In , 24 Cal. 4th 627 (see , January 2001), the state high court ruled that homeowners could not sue a builder in cases where no property damage or personal injury had occurred. In the case, homeowners in a single-family home subdivision and a condominium association in San Diego's Carmel Mountain Ranch alleged that their homes were not seismically safe and that fire walls had been improperly constructed. But in a 5-2 ruling, the state Supreme Court said that until the alleged defects resulted in economic damage, the homeowners could not sue. While the decision appeared to be a major victory for the construction industry, builders contend that the basic rules of the game remain unchanged, which is why they continue to press for legislation. Builders' record on this subject in the Capitol is not good. In 1995, the Legislature did approve SB 1029, which established the "Calderon process" (named for the bill's author, Sen. Charles Calderon) that requires arbitration prior to litigation. However, many people say the process does not work because subcontractors and insurers are not required to participate. Last year, lawmakers approved AB 1700 (Steinberg), which was intended to strengthen the Calderon process by involving all the parties and laying out a dispute resolution process. AB 1700 was the result of consensus reached by builders, lawyers and insurers. Whether that consensus extends further this legislative year is the big question. The fact that Senate leader Burton has taken an interest means that a bill introduced during the Legislature's final month could still pass. Among the bills that could serve as a vehicle for last-minute amendments are AB 267 (Steinberg), AB 2418 (Dutra), and SB 355 (Escutia). "We're not trying to stop a homeowner from getting to court," the CBIA's Dellinger insisted. "We just want to give the builder a chance to fix the problem before the lawyers get involved because that's where all the money is." Added the multi-hatted Mogavero, "The problem with litigation is huge. I've had some developers tell me they've never done a condo project they haven't gotten sued on." But attorney Milstein countered that he has never filed a lawsuit in which the builder responded by arguing that nothing was wrong. The defense is always a matter of what the defects are and how best to remedy them, he said. Contacts: Kimberly Dellinger, California Building Industry Association, (916) 443-7933. Michael Pattinson, California Building Industry Association, and Barratt American Homes, (760) 431-0800. Mark Milstein, Verboon, Milstein & Peter, (310) 396-9600. Susan Baldwin, San Diego Association of Governments, (619) 595-5343. Christy Riviere, Association of Bay Area Governments, (510) 464-7923. David Mogavero, Mogavero Notestine Associates, (916) 443-1033. Richard Friedman, Department of Housing and Community Development, (916) 323-7288. California Research Bureau report on Construction Defect Litigation, http://www.library.ca.gov/html/statseg2a.cfm

One of the largest housing developments ever proposed for the Central Valley received approval from the Sacramento County Board of Supervisors in July. After about a decade of planning, environmental reviews and public hearings, supervisors backed the 2,600-acre, 10,000-unit Sunridge Specific Plan — a detailed subset of the 6,000-acre Sunrise-Douglas Community Plan, which supervisors also approved in July. The development is planned for pastureland south of Highway 50 in the eastern part of Sacramento County. The entire community plan area is within the borders of the proposed City of Rancho Cordova; voters will decide on incorporation in November. "We are basically bringing houses to where the jobs already are," said John Hodgson, a project manager for the 18 landowners in the specific plan area. The planning and environmental review process took many years not because of strong public opposition, but because pollution from the nearby Aerojet factory prevented developers from using on-site wells for water. "I think the greatest difficulty has been over the water supply issue," said Dave Pevney, Sacramento County senior planner. "Water will come from several miles away to get away from the Aerojet plume. There can be no on-site wells." Airplane noise from Mather Field, a closed Air Force base about three miles from the specific plan area that now serves as a cargo airport, was also a complicating factor. The area is also dotted with vernal pools, which provide habitat for endangered fairy shrimp and some rare plant species. Developers resolved the airport noise issue by agreeing to place a noise easement on land most affected by the airport. The wetlands could be a bigger obstacle. The largest landowner in the Sunridge Specific Plan area, Angelo Tsakopoulos's AKT Development, has the necessary federal permits for its 1,200 acres. But the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has halted further permitting until Sacramento County completes a habitat conservation plan (HCP) for a broad area that includes the community plan area. House the workers In recent years, the Highway 50 corridor — roughly 15 miles from the California State University, Sacramento campus to Folsom —has experienced rapid economic growth. New business parks and office buildings have transformed the corridor into the second largest job center in the region, behind only downtown Sacramento. In 1993, supervisors placed the Sunrise-Douglas area within the urban services boundary. In 1994, a citizens advisory committee recommended some guiding principles for the Sunrise-Douglas Community Plan and urged preparation of a specific plan for the entire 6,042 acres within the community plan area. The county abandoned the plan for one huge specific plan in 1995, mostly because the private landowners funding the planning effort were not willing to pay for the whole thing. So the county moved forward on a more general community plan for the whole area, and on a specific plan for the 2,632 acre Sunridge area, which property owners were willing to fund. The Sunrise-Douglas Community Plan is not a land use plan, Pevney explained. Instead it provides planning policies and outlines holding capacities. Ultimately, the 6,000-acre community plan area could accommodate 22,000 housing units. The Sunridge Specific Plan constitutes 43% of the community plan area. Planning and environmental review for Sunridge ground forward slowly. Hodgson half-joked that he was brought in for the final 18 months of the process — in 1996. "We lost 2 1/2 years on water, alone," he lamented. The lost time was the result of the state Department of Health Services blocking plans for on-site wells because the wells would too close to groundwater contamination at Aerojet, a major Defense Department contractor. Eventually, a well site was chosen about four miles south of Sunridge. Ultimately, a diversion Sacramento River water by the Sacramento County Water Agency and the East Bay Municipal Utility District will serve the community plan area (see CP&DR Environment Watch, December 2001). In fall of 2001, supervisors began public hearings on the community plan, the specific plan, related general plan and zoning amendments, an infrastructure financing plan and an EIR. Supervisors continued to review the project every week or two until voting final approval in July. The project received surprisingly little opposition from Sacramento's environmental community. A group called Vineyard Area Residents for Responsible Growth has threatened to sue the county over the EIR. The group's primary concern is that the development will harm existing groundwater wells. Some affordable housing advocates questioned the number of low-income units in the Sunridge plan area. Also, developers have had to work out an estimated $3 million agreement with a rendering company to retrofit a nearby plant with odor-control equipment. "We didn't have a lot of neighborhood opposition because there are almost no neighbors at all," Hodgson said. There is traffic, however, especially on the area's arterial roads and on Highway 50. The plans do not account for transit service, other than shuttles to a light rail station several miles away and possibly to large Rancho Cordova employment centers. The project does not have the housing density to justify light rail. Plus, light rail would have to pass through several miles of low-density commercial and industrial development to reach the specific plan area, Pevney said. Instead, the infrastructure plan focuses on roads and the timing for improvements. The county is requiring Sunridge developers to put in an estimated $50 million to $60 million worth of road improvements. "Over time, there will be a lot of road construction out there, although people recognize that traffic is already a major problem and will always be a major problem," Pevney said. While the density may not be adequate for rail service, it is greater than any other large specific plan in the region, Hodgson said. The residential areas will have densities ranging from 4 to 20 units per acre, with an average of 5.5 units an acre. "Any time we do a project, we get pushed by some supervisors for more density, and by some of the supervisors for less density," Hodgson said. The specific plan designates 120 acres for commercial mixed uses, 54 acres for community commercial, 100 acres for parks, 44 acres for schools and 34 acres for stormwater detention. An additional 482 acres is set aside as a wetlands preserve. Making a federal case The wetlands preserve is a condition of AKT Development building on the remainder of its 1,200 acres. A previous property owner, Sares-Regis, accepted the condition in arranging Clean Water Act permits. That puts AKT well ahead of other property owners, who are going to have to deal with frustrated federal regulators. "Because of the growth of that area, we envision a more comprehensive planning effort," said Karen Schwinn, EPA Region IX Water Division deputy director. Since the 1980s, the EPA has provided about $750,000 toward preparation of an HCP that covers 300,000 acres, Schwinn said. The county has prepared some maps and species risk studies, but it has not drafted a habitat plan. In comments provided to the county in May, the EPA said, "If the Board of Supervisors approves the Community and Specific Plans before they approve the South Sacramento Habitat Conservation Plan, the County risks undercutting the HCP and devaluing its potential effectiveness for integrating permitting and guiding development and conservation across the region." Without an HCP in place, EPA officials note, federal and state agencies are going to have final say over particular development projects. Interestingly, the Sunridge developer's point man, Hodgson, has chaired the HCP Steering Committee for five years. He conceded that an HCP could help the project. "But they take so long to do and they get litigated so much," Hodgson said. "We're creating many of the major parts of what the HCP would create anyway." Still, developers other than AKT will need Clean Water Act permits. Whatever the EPA decides could require the county to reopen the specific plan, Pevney warned. Developers hope to begin work on infrastructure in spring 2003, with the first home construction to follow later in the year. Those homes would be built within the City of Rancho Cordova if voters approve incorporation in November. Leaders of the incorporation effort have backed the county's community and specific plans, saying the area's growing employment centers need the housing. Contacts: John Hodgson, The Hodgson Company, (916) 383-6091 Dave Pevney, Sacramento County Planning Department, (916) 874-6141. Karen Schwinn, U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, (415) 972-3472.

In September, the San Diego City Council is scheduled to vote on "City of Villages," the new "strategic framework element" of the city's general plan. Designed to provide a foundation for revising the city's 1970s general plan, City of Villages makes all the usual politically correct statements about promoting smart-growth ideas. Like most vision-style planning efforts, this one contains a lot of platitudes about environmental protection, affordable housing, equity and prosperity, and public transit. The document acknowledges that San Diego is mostly built out — only 12% of its 331 square miles remains undeveloped — and proposes that most new growth be teased out of existing neighborhoods by turning them into "villages" with higher density housing and a greater variety of public facilities. Also, not surprisingly, San Diego's planners are trumpeting the effort as a triumph of public participation — a process that used workshops and focus groups to bring residents around to the conclusion that growth is inevitable, so it's a question of rather than . But the most impressive — and challenging — part of the City of Villages effort is the way the city is attempting to face the implementation question head-on. On the one hand, the city is arguing that a New Urbanist-style vision is probably the only way to accommodate an estimated population increase of 200,000 people between now and 2020. On the other hand, the city has recognized that this approach will not be successful without some big changes in the way development and public investment occurs in San Diego. Changing those longstanding practices will not be easy. San Diego has been at the forefront of growth management since the 1970s, when Mayor Pete Wilson -- then regarded as a national leader in the field -- promoted a set of policies seeking to re-direct growth from rural areas to existing urban areas. He also called for a set of strategies to permit conventional suburban development in certain areas, especially in the 12,000-acre North County Future Urbanizing Area. He also insisted that development bear the full cost of infrastructure there. This strategy, embodied in the 1979 "Progress Guide and General Plan," worked in some ways and backfired in others. First, the whole strategy drove more growth than expected into existing areas, which put a burden on existing infrastructure and cut into support for the idea of redeveloping existing neighborhoods. Second, as development proposals came through the pipeline, densities in the North County Future Urbanizing Area dropped below expected levels — down to 2 to 3 units per acre. On top of that, other considerations reduced the amount of housing to less than the levels specified by the 1979 General Plan. The environmental impact report on City of Villages does not provide a specific estimate of units lost due to downzoning, but suggests that the number is in the thousands. Implementation of the Multi-Species Conservation Plan (required by the Endangered Species Act) converted 3,700 acres from urban to open space use in the plans, resulting in a loss of more than 6,500 units from the plan. In addition, new school construction appears likely to cost between 600 and 1,000 additional units, either by removing existing units or by using up land that would otherwise go for housing. The end result is that San Diego's planners estimate that, if the 1979 General Plan is built out, it will fall 17,000 units short of the total number required to accommodate growth in the city by 2020. City of Villages is designed to figure out how to make up that gap, and do so in the context of improving neighborhoods. The plan also piggybacks on an already good public transit system that is likely to get better. City of Villages calls for a strengthening of neighborhoods, especially those that accommodate higher-density housing, by creatively deploying public infrastructure. For example, the plan encourages joint use of public facilities by schools, libraries, and other public institutions in order to consume less land. At the same time, however, the document bluntly acknowledges that this strategy will require an investment of no less than $2.5 billion in new public facilities, and an institutional rearrangement that stretches California's current planning and governance system to the limit. City officials are already talking about a "quality of life" bond to finance the needed infrastructure upgrades. But not right away. The first item on the list is to move forward on a series of pilot projects designed to prove that the City of Villages idea can work in neighborhoods outside of downtown. These pilot villages will get a whole variety of development incentives. Furthermore, City of Villages calls for another pilot effort to create a "Model Urban School," that takes advantage of joint use to conserve land and work a school into the urban fabric of the transitional, but well-organized, City Heights neighborhood. The proposal calls for the demolition of 245 hours and then the construction of a school, a park, and 350 units of replacement housing. This might sound good to the smart growth crowd, but implementation will be difficult. To move the Model Urban School program forward, the city and other government agencies in San Diego are asking the Legislature for a bill allowing them to create a new kind of joint powers authority. In so doing, these entities are running up against well-established rules of governance in California, and they are not likely to change those rules without a fight. To support the Model Urban School idea, Assemblywoman Christine Kehoe (D-San Diego) has introduced AB 2867. The bill would create a special joint powers authority in City Heights that would include the city, the school district, the redevelopment agency, the housing authority, and the housing commission. The bill passed the Assembly and made it out of the Senate Local Government Committee on August 7. But virtually all the things San Diego asked for ran into criticism from the legislative staff because they conflict with existing laws and practices. For example, the bill called for the new entity to inherit the eminent domain powers of the redevelopment agency, which are more expansive than the eminent domain powers of the other agencies. Typically, JPAs can hold only that authority that all of its members hold. In this case, the legislative staff's conclusion was that this would give the school district more eminent domain power. Similarly, the bill would have relieved the JPA of the typical redevelopment agency obligations for low and moderate income housing set-aside and replacement. Apparently, the idea is that the entity should have greater flexibility to introduce a variety of housing types into the City Heights neighborhood, which is mostly poor. Again, this ran into concern on the part of the legislative staff. The bill was also amended after it passed the Assembly to exempt the JPA from state school siting rules, raising process concerns on the part of the legislative counsel. Kehoe accepted the most recent amendments the legislative staff recommended. But it is difficult to say whether the Model Urban School project — or, indeed, City of Villages generally — can advance quickly without a major effort to change or evade most existing rules regarding planning and governance in California. Therein lies the rub: Smart growth may be a good idea. It may even be the only way to accommodate future growth in coastal California. But it is still a long way from being smoothly implemented — not just because of skeptical NIMBYs or reluctant financiers, but also because it is swimming upstream against 80 years of California planning and development law.

To get some idea of how much San Francisco Bay has changed during the past two centuries, unfold a map and trace the estuary's amoeboid outline as it squeezes through Carquinez Strait into the Delta's confusion of sloughs and marshes. There, 33 miles inland from the Golden Gate but still bathed in tidewater, lie a pair of features named Grizzly Bay and Grizzly Island. Once common on California's coastal hills and plains, grizzly bears vanished from the Bay Area during the 1800s. The absence of Ursus arctos is by no means the most remarkable difference between the Bay Area of the Gold Rush era and that of today. Filled, diked, drained and paved, the largest estuary on the West Coast has been reduced to half its pre-statehood size. Once a lonely outpost of European empire, San Francisco Bay lies now at the heart of a metropolitan area of 7 million people. The disappearance of grizzlies is a reminder, though, that not all the changes wrought by human activity are immediately obvious or restricted to the physical landscape. They reach deep into the complex web of life that depends on the bay and its surrounding wetlands, dunes, beaches and grasslands. And it is that biological web that stands to benefit most from a landmark deal announced in late May, through which several public and private entities agreed to pay $100 million to buy 16,500 acres in the South Bay and near Napa from Cargill Salt. If the sale goes through as planned, the agri-business giant's property — former wetlands that were diked and flooded more than a century ago for commercial salt production — will be protected from urban development and restored as wildlife habitat. In both cost and scale, it will be the biggest wetlands restoration effort ever undertaken on the West Coast. Nationally, only the Everglades restoration — a $7.8 billion project to be carried out over the next 30 to 40 years on 18,000 square miles in Florida — is bigger. Political leaders and Northern California environmental groups hailed the Cargill deal as a turning point in their long effort to reverse the destruction of San Francisco Bay wetlands, nearly 95% of which have been lost to urban development and agricultural conversion. Gov. Gray Davis, U.S. Sen. Dianne Feinstein and Interior Secretary Gale Norton all rushed to share credit for brokering the deal. But even Davis and Norton acknowledged that it was Feinstein's involvement that finally made the agreement possible after years of speculation about the fate of Cargill's holdings, most of which lie in a 20-mile-long arc around the bay's southern tip from Redwood City to Hayward. Although the tentative agreement announced May 29 is significant, ecological restoration experts warn it barely counts as a first step in a long, expensive and difficult process. A host of contractual and liability issues must be resolved before the purchase can be concluded. Even if those negotiations succeed, there will remain the much more complicated matter of planning, funding and carrying out the restoration itself, which could take decades and cost as much as seven times the actual purchase price. The stage for the May 29 deal was set about three years ago, when Cargill offered to sell to the state and federal governments about 19,000 acres of its San Francisco Bay property. Cargill had acquired the property in 1978 when it purchased Leslie Salt Company. Cargill determined that modernizing its production techniques would allow it consolidate operations near its Newark processing plant and dispose of excess evaporation ponds, which are inefficient to operate and costly to maintain. The property Cargill initially offered to sell — a combination of land it owns outright and mineral rights to land it sold in 1979 for inclusion in the Don Edwards San Francisco Bay National Wildlife Refuge — was appraised at about $300 million. That amount was far more than any government agency was willing to pay, so negotiations stalled. San Francisco officials continued to press acquisition as a way to offset a proposed new San Francisco International Airport runway in the bay. (See CP&DR , February 2001, September 2000 and January 1999.) San Francisco Mayor Willie Brown and other local officials persuaded the Legislature to budget $25 million for salt pond purchases in 2000, but local officials eventually dropped their effort to link airport expansion and salt pond acquisition. Discussions resumed in January after Feinstein persuaded several private foundations to join state and federal agencies in fashioning a deal acceptable to Cargill. The preliminary agreement reflects a reduction in the acreage from the offer three years ago and, as a consequence, a drop in the overall value of the deal, now down to $240 million. Cargill agreed to accept $100 million for 16,500 acres, and will take a tax deduction for the difference. Most of the property is already within or will be added to the Edwards wildlife refuge, although about 1,400 acres lie along the Napa River north of San Pablo Bay. Cargill also agreed to negotiate the future donation of mineral rights to another 8,000 acres inside the wildlife refuge, where salt production will continue for now. Of the total purchase price, $53 million is due at the closing of the sale, which is scheduled for December 16. The money will come from the federal Land and Water Conservation Fund ($8 million), the state ($25 million, budgeted two years ago), the Hewlett, Moore and Packard foundations ($6.33 million each) and the Goldman Fund ($1 million). The remaining $47 million will be payable to Cargill once the salt ponds have been cleaned up enough to meet Regional Water Quality Control Board discharge standards. The source of that money, however, is unclear. Under the agreement announced May 29, the state promised to provide the money. But no additional state funds have been budgeted, and the state faces a projected budget deficit of $23.6 billion. In June, the Legislature formed a committee of six Bay Area lawmakers to scrutinize the deal. The agreement calls for another $35 million to be spent over the next five years to plan and begin carrying out the ecological restoration. The Hewlett, Moore and Packard foundations have agreed to contribute $5 million each toward that expenditure, and the state and federal governments will split the remaining $20 million cost. Again, no funds have been budgeted for the government share. Other hurdles also remain. Before the sale closes in December, the state and federal agencies must negotiate with Cargill a purchase agreement and a phase-out agreement, the deadline for which is September 16. Those agreements will specify how the salt-contaminated ponds will be cleaned up, who is responsible to perform the clean up, and how permits must be obtained. The agreements are also supposed to specify who is responsible for maintaining the vast system of levees that prevents the bay from rushing into the ponds and, ultimately, flooding San Jose and other urban areas below the high-tide level. Once all those hurdles have been leaped, there remains the much more complicated matter of how the ponds will be restored — what types of habitat (mudflat, marsh, open water), they should become, and how quickly. Those decisions are crucial, because they will determine how much the project ultimately will cost. Projections vary. In a report issued in April, the environmental group Save the Bay estimated it would cost between $148 million and $228 million (exclusive of acquisition costs) over the next 20 years to turn the Cargill salt works into a mosaic of tidal wetlands and shallow ponds, while raising and reinforcing key levees to protect low-lying urban areas from flooding. A more detailed feasibility analysis, issued in May by Wetlands and Water Resources, a private engineering firm in San Rafael, places the total restoration cost at between $264 million and $523 million if the ponds are allowed to silt in and become marsh through natural processes. If dredged fill is used, the estimate ranges up to $720 million. Despite the challenges remaining, many of those involved in the long effort to preserve some of the last unprotected but restorable wildlife habitat along the bay are optimistic, although clearly aware that the process will take a long time. "We're working to restore the whole thing," said Dev Novack, public affairs director for the Audubon Society's San Francisco Bay Restoration Program. "This is just the first step." Contacts: Lori Johnson, Cargill Salt, (510) 790-8157. Marge Kolar, Don Edwards San Francisco Bay National Wildlife Refuge, (510) 792-0222. David Lewis, Save the Bay, (510) 452-9261. Dev Novack, Audubon Soceity, (415) 947-0331.

Generating economic activity at Norton Air Force Base in San Bernardino has proven to be difficult since the base closed in 1994. But Norton is now the scene of a proposal to replicate a successful airport in Texas that was built during the 1980s solely for industrial users. In fact, the same developer of Alliance Texas in Fort Worth — Ross Perot Jr.'s Hillwood — is negotiating with base reuse officials to develop a logistics and maintenance airport along with a warehouse and manufacturing hub at Norton and on surrounding land. The proposed Alliance California development could eventually provide jobs for 6,000 to 8,000 people. However, the deal has proven difficult to consummate, and now a planned expansion of a rail hub that is part of the project is drawing concern because of the potential for trains tying up automobile traffic. "This is an extremely complicated deal," said T. Milford Harrison, executive director of both the Inland Valley Development Agency (IVDA) and the San Bernardino International Airport Authority. "The things that complicate it so much are that we still have buildings full of asbestos and lead-based paint. We have ground contamination that still is not clear. … We have not received title to all of the property yet. And we have about six different agencies that have been granted part of the Air Force base for one public reason or another." Both Harrison and John Magness, Hillwood's project director, said they expected to sign a master development agreement long ago. And both predicted a contract could be settled within a few months. In the meantime, Hillwood and the local entities have already worked out one agreement that allowed construction of a Kohl's department store warehouse. Other small agreements are on the table. "We made a conscious decision about a year ago," said Magness, "to push ahead with development, bureaucracy be damned, because it's the right thing to do." Everyone agrees that bringing jobs to San Bernardino is the right thing to do. When Norton closed, the community lost about 10,000 jobs. That economic blow followed Santa Fe Railroad's closure of a large maintenance facility in San Bernardino in 1992. Since the base closure was announced in 1988, government agencies and the private sector have presented numerous proposals for site reuse. The largest operation to move to Norton is a Defense Department finance and accounting office. It employs 270 people, about half its peak, and federal officials are considering closing it altogether. Among the failed reuse ideas are a prison, a large facility for the homeless, a passenger airport, a small-business incubator, a jet repair business, housing and retail development. "You have every kind of idea coming out there," said Robert Christman, chairman of the airport authority, vice chairman of the IVDA and a Loma Linda councilman. "I found it interesting how many times we dealt with developers who had lots of nice plans and ideas, but when it came time to wire in $50,000 for something, they didn't have the money." These failed schemes make Hillwood's proposal all the more attractive because Hillwood has the capital and the experience to complete a large project, Christman said. Thirteen years ago, Hillwood opened Alliance Texas in a pasture about 15 miles north of Fort Worth. Since then, the 9,600-acre facility has become the most successful logistics airport in the country. About 20,000 people work for 107 tenants in 21 million square feet of warehouse and industrial space. Hillwood also has 5,000 acres of housing, office and retail development nearby. While Alliance Texas provides a model for Alliance California, the projects are quite different, Magness noted. Alliance Texas was a greenfield development with a substantial residential and retail component. The San Bernardino project would be an infill and brownfield development on a smaller location, and the sites would not necessarily be contiguous. Still, the site is ideal for logistics operations and manufacturing, Magness said. Three freeways surround Norton. With some improvements, the airport could accommodate large cargo airplanes flying to and from Asia and Europe. And Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad plans to expand its existing intermodal facility. A number of studies have pointed to the need for additional cargo handling capacity. The Southern California Association of Governments estimated the amount of air cargo in the region would triple from 2000 to 2025. The proposed master development would allow Hillwood to develop about 800 acres of the closed base that are controlled by the IVDA. (Composed of three cities and San Bernardino County, the IVDA is a redevelopment agency whose project area covers 14,000 acres in a roughly three-mile radius around Norton.) The master development "is most akin to a joint venture," said the IVDA's Harrison. "We put up the land, and they do the development." A master development agreement would let IVDA and the airport authority settle many issues at one time, Christman said. It would encourage uniform development and prevent the agencies from having to negotiate with dozens of developers of small projects. Plus, a private entity with a profit motive is more likely to carry out the development, he said. The sheer number of local agencies involved is a factor in everything at Norton. Representatives of San Bernardino, Colton, Loma Linda and San Bernardino County sit on the IVDA board. The airport authority has the same members, plus the City of Highland. The various local agencies have not always agreed about base reuse, as evidenced by the City of Redlands's decision to drop out of the airport authority. The railroad proposal is one of the latest issues to cause friction. The proposed expansion of the intermodal facility could greatly increase train traffic, blocking busy San Bernardino surface streets a dozen times a day for up to seven minutes at a time. San Bernardino officials, who are processing an application from Burlington Northern Santa Fe, appear skeptical. Harrison said the railroad project would be "a great benefit. But it would not be a great benefit if it compromises the quality of life." This summer, Hillwood expects to complete a 650,000-square-foot warehouse for Kohl's. And Hillwood is trying to stir interest in more warehouses and industrial facilities, and the airport. The airport has received a $2.5 million Federal Aviation Administration grant to fund remodeling of some hangars and the terminal, and it has a $6.3 million FAA grant to rebuild the 10,000-foot-long runways. The airport authority also intends to prepare a master plan. Contacts: T. Milford Harrison, Inland Valley Development Agency and San Bernardino International Airport Authority, (909) 382-4105. Robert Christman, IVDA, SBIAA and City of Loma Linda, (909) 307-3811. John Magness, Hillwood, (909) 382-0023. Hillwood website: http://www.hillwood.com

State legislation that would lead to the creation of a planning and transportation "super agency" in San Diego County is moving forward. Capitol insiders and a number of officials in the San Diego region expect bills that address San Diego regional governance to pass in some form before the Legislature concludes on August 31. In fact, there appears to be consensus that San Diego County needs a new, multi-functional entity to coordinate land use and transportation planning better. The sticky issue is one of governance — namely, who will be in charge of the new agency. Bills by Assemblywoman Christine Kehoe (D-San Diego) and Sen. Steve Peace (D-El Cajon) call for an appointed governing board similar to the existing San Diego Association of Governments (SANDAG) board, on which all 18 cities and the county have equal representation. However, the San Diego County Board of Supervisors and some policy analysts question whether an agency with the extraordinary powers that are proposed should be run by appointed representatives. The county has produced a counter-proposal to create a new transportation agency with a seven-member, directly elected board. As of late June, both Kehoe's AB 2095 and Peace's SB 1703 remained alive in the Legislature. The bills would create the "San Diego Regional Authority." The bills are not identical but are similar, and SANDAG is sponsoring both measures. "We're trying to consolidate the decision-making process so that the people who are making the land use decisions are also the people making the transportation decisions," said Gary Gallegos, SANDAG executive director. One of the key provisions — and a source of some controversy — would be the Regional Authority's ability to override a city or county decision that impacts a "regionally significant transportation project." Peace, who is in his final year in the Legislature, has made regional governance one of his top priorities. And Kehoe, a former San Diego city councilwoman, is a believer. "Along with revenue-sharing and managed growth planning," Kehoe said, "regional governance is one more tool towards trying to stretch our dollars more efficiently, and to respond to housing, transportation and development needs." "The bill is still a work in progress," Kehoe added. "I think something will get through. I don't know what it is yet." The regional government debate has been ongoing in San Diego County since Peace three years ago proposed merging five existing entities, including two transportation boards and the port district, into one super agency. He eventually settled for creation of the San Diego Regional Government Efficiency Commission (known as Regis). Last year, that commission recommended creation of an entity similar to the proposed Regional Authority. The commission also led to creation of a new entity to run all airports in the county and to plan for a large new airport (see , August 2001, October 2001). Officials at SANDAG have been part of the regional debate since its outset and have proposed a five-prong approach, Gallegos explained. • Create permanency. SANDAG is a joint powers authority whose members can come and go. State legislation would mandate a permanent entity, recognizing that metropolitan San Diego is really one place. • Develop a regional plan. SANDAG is already working on a plan that meshes local general plans. A state law would ensure a plan that considers regional needs gets done, Gallegos said. • Assume authority and responsibility for regionally significant transportation projects. This means a two-thirds vote of the Regional Authority board could decide the location of freeways, arterial streets and transit lines, no matter what the local jurisdiction says. • Address the border zone. The state should require a comprehensive plan for San Diego and Imperial counties for the stretch of land just north of the border with Mexico, Gallegos said. • Consolidate SANDAG's regional planning responsibilities with the ability to plan and deliver transit projects. Now, the Metropolitan Transit Development Board (MTDB) and the North San Diego County Transit Development Board (NCTD) handle transportation planning and operate transit systems. The Regional Authority would take over transit planning and project delivery. Gallegos said SANDAG officials wanted to gain agreement on the five above points before addressing who would run the Regional Authority so that the first — and potentially last — argument would not be about governance. The SANDAG proposal gives every city and the county one representative with the exception of the City of San Diego, which would have two representatives. Board actions would need to receive a majority of board votes, as well as a majority of votes weighted approximately by population, with no city having more than 40% of the weighted vote. The county Board of Supervisors has objected to the governance proposal, saying that an agency with the Regional Authority's proposed powers should be directly accountable to voters. A state Senate committee analysis of AB 2095 agreed that duties such as "connecting land use and transportation choices, or overriding local agencies' decision require the representative democracy." The Kehoe bill does require voters to approve creation of the Regional Authority. But, Kehoe said, there is no need for directly electing the board at this point because the entity would have no taxing authority. The county also objects to the proposal to fold the border development zone into this agency, said Jonathan Clay, a lobbyist for the county. And, he said, there is a need to clarify the Regional Authority's environmental planning role because SANDAG now assists cities with habitat plans and related matters. Leaders of the county's smaller cities have expressed concern about creation of the Regional Authority. The biggest worry is the potential to lose local control, said Christy Guerin, mayor of Encinitas. But Guerin said she is consigned to the likelihood that state lawmakers will approve something this year, so the city needs to work on shaping how the entity will look. Guerin said she concurs with Regional Authority proponents about the county's need for more cohesive transportation planning. And, like many officials in north San Diego County, she complained that the south county cities of San Diego and Chula Vista get more than their share of transportation improvements. "A part of me really looks forward to shaking up things at NCTD and MTDB," Guerin said. A less ambitious regional planning proposal regarding the San Francisco Bay Area also is making its way through the Legislature. The bill, SB 1243 (Torlakson), would merge the Association of Bay Area Governments and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission into the Bay Area Land Use and Transportation Commission. The new entity would be responsible for preparing a long-range policy plan every five years. The bill is opposed by ABAG and a number of local government officials in the Bay Area, although amendments that make the bill more palatable could be introduced before the end of the session. Contacts: Gary Gallegos, San Diego Association of Governments, (619) 595-5332. Assemblywoman Christine Kehoe, (916) 319-2076. Christy Guerin, Encinitas mayor, (760) 633-2620. Jonathan Clay, San Diego County lobbyist, (916) 441-0202.