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 What remains on the record is only the Fourth Appellate District's unpublished ruling in favor of the EIR to replace a city-owned historic warehouse building with mixed-use development.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

If California's redevelopment agencies vanish on July 1, as Gov. Jerry Brown has proposed, it's clear the task of mending the state's blighted neighborhoods will likely grow more complicated. Less obvious is the fact that California's effort to clean up the Earth's atmosphere may grow more difficult as well. Senate Bill 375, passed in 2008, encourages cities and regions to promote new development in high-density urban areas with access to transit as a way of reducing the state's overall greenhouse gas emissions. It just so happens that many redevelopment project areas are in high-density urban areas with access to transit. By facilitating both commercial and residential development, redevelopment attempts to attract people to those blighted neighborhoods. According to many planners and public officials, those people are just the sort who will leave their cars behind, if given access to transit and walkable amenities. "It may have been mentioned, but at the time we were discussing 375, I don't think anybody was anticipating that there would be a proposal to eliminate redevelopment in California," said San Diego County Supervisor Ron Roberts, who sits on the Air Resources Board. "We were more focused on the loss of transit dollars and how that might affect compliance with SB 375." The governor's office has presented forceful arguments � and no shortage of empirical data � to suggest that redevelopment may not have a significant economic impact on a statewide level, and therefore are considered expendable by Brown. However, at the local level the consensus about the need for redevelopment to reach SB 375's goals is deafening, and nearly unanimous. Moreover, there is a perceived mandate to implement SB 375 based on the statewide vote in November, in which Proposition 22 prevailed, presumably shielding redevelopment funds from state takes, and Proposition 23 was defeated, protecting the state's climate change law AB 32. "There really isn't any other source of funding to the principles of AB 32 and SB 375, which the voters just reaffirmed overwhelmingly in November," said Cecilia Estolano, former CEO of the Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency and now chief strategist for state and local issues at advocacy group Green for All. In some sense, SB 375 and redevelopment are a unique pairing. Since SB 375 is essentially the only state law with an influence over local planning decisions, and redevelopment is the only state-sponsored funding scheme for local development. The potential loss of redevelopment is therefore considered � almost overwhelmingly � a profound blow to localities that would implement SB 375. In San Diego County, the San Diego Association of Governments will be the first of the state's "big four" metropolitan planning organizations to turn SB 375 into actionable local policy when it releases its Sustainable Communities Strategy. National City Mayor Ron Morrison said that so far the city�which he described as the oldest and, already, the densest city in the county�has adopted a new downtown plan specific plan that calls for 4,000 new housing units and intensification of the city's trolley station areas. The city's redevelopment agency is slated to contribute $14 million to affordable housing and other projects in that area. Morrison said that if the governor's plan prevails, many transit-oriented projects�especially those that involve affordable housing�will not get built. "Cities would be fiscally impaired to build housing in any way, particularly low-income housing," said Morrison, who is a former chair of the SANDAG board. "It would be totally counter to what the state is trying to tell us to do." While planning departments and other city agencies have implicit roles to play in the implementation of SB 375, their powers may not suffice to achieve the herculean task of re-orienting California's cities. "The benefit of having redevelopment still in place in some of these areas is that the agencies tend to have much more capacity to catalyze specific types of development than say the planning department, which kind of can lay out the plans and the zoning but then become almost totally reliant on the private sector to be able to bring those plans to life," said RTAC Member Stuart Cohen, executive director of the advocacy group TransForm. When SB 375 was passed, redevelopment was considered an inherent feature of the California policy landscape. It was clearly a piece of the toolkit that cities and regions could use to steer their urban environments towards the vision of SB 375. Likewise, in setting regional greenhouse gas emissions targets, the Air Resources Board � which approved final targets in September � operated under the tacit assumption that redevelopment would play a roll in meeting those targets. As recently as five months ago, the main concern of the ARB and SB 375 supporters was that of reduced transit funding. Transit agencies were then � as they are now � hemorrhaging money due to decreased state funding and lower ridership. That concern, while still very much alive, seems nearly quaint compared to the threat that the supporters of redevelopment now face. The list of redevelopment-supported transit-oriented developments that support the vision of SB 375 goals is, literally, too long to mention. While not every TOD relies on redevelopment assistance � and while not every TOD succeeds in discouraging auto use � many that are successful do rely on such assistance. " is the only mechanism in which funding and other important powers are available to be able to accomplish these things," said veteran infill developer Michael Dieden, principal at Creative Housing Associates. "Until there's a replacement mechanism it would mean that we would not be able to provide the affordable housing and workforce housing to transit-oriented and compact ." A pair of recent studies by the Public Policy Institute of California entitled "Driving Change" suggests that job growth around transit stations, rather than residential density, will lead to greater reductions in VMT. Even then, researchers found that redevelopment has played a role in increasing what the study calls "employment density." "The significant amount of job growth that happened near station had significant involvement from the CRA in Los Angeles," said Jed Kolko, research fellow at the PPIC and co-author of "Driving Change." "I think redevelopment has the potential to encourage job growth around transit nodes." SB 375 has often been criticized as an unfunded mandate from Sacramento. Yet the ability to use tax-increment financing to stoke development, build affordable housing, and improve infrastructure in dense urban areas is seen as one way that the state can contribute, indirectly, to many of the changes that are envisioned in SB 375. "In order to redo your general plan, redo your design guidelines, redo your street standards, you've got to find funding sources," said Simon Pastucha, director of the Los Angeles Department of City Planning's Urban Design Studio. "There's no funding source out there from the state saying, 'we're mandating this, here's some funding to help go do it.'" Pastucha said that CRA/LA has been instrumental in supporting projects such as new downtown street standards that are intended to promote walking and cycling. Dan Carrig, legislative director at the League of California Cities, said that the loss of redevelopment would greatly complicate infrastructure projects that would support SB 375's goals. He noted that mechanisms such as bonding, Mello-Roos funding, and new taxes all require voter approval, with thresholds up to two-thirds. "This would be to develop part of a town where most of the voters aren't currently living in," said Carrig. While redevelopment has frequently been criticized for straying from its mission to fight blight � often by defining blight too liberally for some tastes � many say that SB 375 provides the ideal impetus for saving redevelopment. The existing connections between redevelopment and development patterns that reduce vehicle-miles traveled may be coincidental and even tenuous. "The result of the redevelopment program is to bring about a more urban development pattern. In that sense it's really compatible with SB 375," said Roberts. "But there's not really a linkage between the two. It's sort of neutral with respect to the goals of 375." TransForm's Cohen cautioned that redevelopment projects are "not inherently green," but that they can be green if agencies focus on that goal and direct development accordingly. Supporters of SB 375 say that, whatever redevelopment's former shortcomings may be, the move towards compact, less auto-dependent urbanism points to exactly the new mission that redevelopment needs. Estolano said that if redevelopment survives, the budget crisis may offer an opportunity to recast redevelopment's mission. It can, she said, move away from blight-fighting and towards an explicit embrace of SB 375. "We are forward-thinking when it comes to addressing climate change and GHG emissions and addressing the real concerns about our urban form," said Estolano. "We need to marry those two: our desire to address our environmental issues with our desire to grow strong industries." It would, they say, be the ideal use of TIF financing and the organizational capacity of redevelopment agencies. "We see SB 375 as making sure that these areas that are near transit that are infill are not just developed but are developed in a way that makes sense on kind of a corridor scale, so that we're not just thinking what can work in this place from an economic perspective...along an entire transit corridor," said Cohen. Politically, the fight to save redevelopment has created some unlikely fans for SB 375. While representatives of the League of California Cities have been critical, at times, of the burdens that SB 375 places on cities, the law is also serving as the basis of an argument to preserve redevelopment. "SB 375 will be kind of a nice idea that everyone works hard at trying to implement," said Carrig. "The governor seems to be saying, and in fact he has said, that redevelopment doesn't really do much except move economic activity around. He's right. It will happen elsewhere�but it's not going to happen in those areas that are identified (by SB 375)." That shuffling around of development and its purported benefits for the state lies at the heart of the governor's argument for eliminating redevelopment agencies. "Ultimately one needs to consider all the benefits and costs of redevelopment � not just those involving SB 375 � in order to decide the future of redevelopment," said Kolko. Contacts: Dan Carrigg, Legislative Director, League of California Cities,  (916) 658-8200 Stuart Cohen, Executive Director, TransForm , (510) 740-3150 Michael Dieden, Principal, Creative Housing Associates, (310) 836-1342 (Creative Housing Associates) Cecilia Estolano, Chief Strategist on State and Local Issues, Green for All ; (213) 612-4545 Jed Kolko, Research Fellow, Public Policy Institute of California , (415) 291-4400 Ron Morrison, Mayor, National City, (619) 336-4241 Simon Pastuscha, Director of Urban Design Studio, Los Angeles Dept. of City Planning, (213) 978-1475 Ron Roberts, Supervisor, San Diego County, (619) 531-5544

An appellate court has blocked a proposed Santa Barbara housing subdivision because the city did not receive of voter approval of an access road and bridge on city-owned open space land, as required by a 1982 initiative.  In the 100 years since the initiative and referendum powers have become part of the local land use planning and development legal framework, voters have used these populist elements of democracy to shape growth. The case from the City of Santa Barbara illustrates a variation on the intersection of planning and voter control.  In 1982, Santa Barbara voters amended the city charter by restricting the ability of the city of transfer or encumber land "dedicated to public park or recreation purposes" without voter approval. This charter amendment allowed the City Council to grant by contract only concessions, permits or leases "compatible with and accessory to the purposes for which the property is devoted."  In 2005, the city approved a 25-lot development on a 50.5-acre site off Las Positas Road in an unincorporated area the city would annex. Access to the project, proposed by Peak-Las Positas Partners, would necessitate construction of a bridge across city-owned open space and Arroyo Burro Creek. The 2005 approval generated a successful California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) legal challenge of the environmental impact report (EIR). In 2008, the city approved a revised EIR, providing that access to 22 of the 25 residential units would be via the new bridge spanning Arroyo Burro Creek. The bridge and road would occupy 5.89 acres of a much larger city-owned open space parcel. At the time of the 2008 project approval, the City Council adopted findings establishing the city's basis for not submitting the matter to the voters. These findings pertained to compatibility of the bridge and the underlying park land, explaining that the bridge would be dedicated for public use, that there would be improved public access to area parks and beaches, and that the bridge and road use would be accessory and minor in relation to the underlying open space parcel. Based upon the City Council's approved findings, the use of the open space land for the bridge was not submitted to the voters. The groups Citizens Planning Association and Santa Barbara Urban Creeks Council filed suit once again, alleging both CEQA and city charter violations. Santa Barbara County Superior Court Judge Thomas Anderle rejected the CEQA arguments, but he granted relief to the project opponents on the basis that voter approval was required. A unanimous three-judge panel of the Second District Court of Appeal agreed with the trial court. Noting that the findings were simply conclusory statements prepared by staff, and that there had been no evidentiary hearing on those issues, the appellate court had little difficultly rejecting the findings of the City Council. The appellate court's view of the evidence was that the land had been dedicated for open space and/or creek restoration purposes and not for the purpose of developing a roadway. Accordingly, the construction of a road and bridge on that property was not compatible with and could not be viewed as "accessory." Bottom line: voter approval required. "The clear purpose of this provision is to prevent parkland from being destroyed or given to private parties without voters' consent," Justice Paul Coffee wrote for the court. "Here, the result urged by Las Positas would circumvent the wishes of the electorate by giving city-owned land to a private developer without a vote of the people." The developer also argued was that the earlier litigation resolved all legal claims and, because the issue of voter approval had not been raised then, the issue could not be litigated in the second legal proceeding. The appellate court rejected this argument too. As the City Council had made no findings in 2005 regarding the compatibility of the road and bridge with the open space lands, the issue could not have been litigated in the first lawsuit, the court ruled. Accordingly, the issue was properly raised in the second lawsuit. The Case:  Citizens Planning Association v. City of Santa Barbara, No. B216006, 2011 DJDAR 1340. Filed January 25, 2011. The Lawyers: For Citizens Planning Association: William P. Parkin, Wittwer, & Parkin, (831) 429-4055. For developer Peak-Las Positas Partners: Timothy Metzinger, Price, Postel & Parma, (805) 962-0011.

Voters will face only a handful of local ballots March 8, and the slate is mercifully light--and concentrated in Southern California. After a November election (see CP&DR Vol. 25, No. 21 Nov. 2010 ) packed with some of the most contentious local and statewide questions in recent memory, next month's smattering of project approvals and parking spats likely comes as welcome relief. The biggest local question surrounds the would-be city of Jurupa Valley, which will vote to become yet the newest city in the Inland Empire, a region that is maturing in fits and starts. Meanwhile, the City of Beverly Hills has reached its boiling point over one of the most contentious issues in land use: free parking. Beverly Hills Measure 2P and Measure 3P Two Hours of Free Parking Initiative, Measure 2P Three Hours of Free Parking for Residents of Beverly Hills, Measure 3P Voters in Beverly Hills are facing dueling parking fee measures that would make Don Shoup's head spin. The measures focus on the city's "golden triangle" of ultra-high-end retail between Wilshire and Santa Monica boulevards. Measure 2P would institute two-hour free parking in five of 18 city-owned parking structures. Those structures already offer one-hour free parking, while six of the other city-own structures already offer two-hour free parking. The measure is backed largely by an owner of medical buildings in the area but has broad support from merchants. Members of the Beverly Hills City Council consider the measure an inappropriate subsidy for a few buildings, and the city sued in November to remove the measure from the ballot. While a final ruling may yet come, the California Court of Appeal issued a stay in January that keeps the measure on the ballot. In fact, the city council placed Measure 3P on the ballot in response to Measure 2P. Measure 3P would institute three-hour daytime free parking at 12 city-owned lots -- but only for Beverly Hills residents. In the evening, parking rates for everyone would drop by 50 percent from current levels. The City Council estimates that the city would still lose $400,000 annually versus the status quo, as opposed to a $1.3 million loss if Measure 2P prevails. A city spokesperson said that the city has yet to determine a method by which the garages would distinguish residents from non-residents. Jurupa Valley (Riverside Co.) Measure A Jurupa Valley Incorporation Election The voters of Jurupa Valley, which encompasses 43 square miles and over 88,000 residents in Riverside county, will decide whether to unite a half-dozen communities into the county's newest city. Incorporation would unite the communities of Mira Loma, Rubidoux, and Glen Avon, among others, into the sixth-largest city in the county. Supporters of Measure A contend that, in addition to benefits of self-rule, incorporation will stave off inevitable attempts by neighboring cities to annex various communities. Supporters say that the Riverside County LAFCO has given the would-be city a clean bill of financial health. Opponents worry that the city will not have the funds to function without help from the county and/or imposing new taxes. The vote follows a highly contentious vote last year to incorporate the City of Eastvale; that vote was successful. San Clemente Measure A Vote on the Playa Del Norte Development at North Beach Approval of Measure A will uphold a 3-2 City Council vote approving a 42,000-square-foot commercial, retail, and restaurant development in San Clemente. Supporters claim that it fits with the city's character and will generate sales tax revenue. Opponents claim that it will eat up convenient beach parking and will require the city to pay for millions in infrastructure upgrades. West Hollywood Measure WH-A Tax Billboard Act The Marlboro Man may be long gone from the Sunset Strip, but he has a lot of would-be friends. The Sunset Strip is prime territory for so-called supergraphic outdoor advertisements, and Measure A would amend the city's zoning code to allow them on both the Strip and nearby Beverly Boulevard. The measure includes provisions for a 7% tax on revenue from the lease of any such billboards, which would be permitted without discretionary review by the city. The intniatives supporters claim that it will generate up to $4.2 million annually for the city. Those supporters happen to include Mike McNeilly, who is known as the "king" of supergraphics in the Los Angeles area. Opponents of the measure claim that it would invite rampant erection of ads throughout the designated areas, thus adding to visual blight. The City Council sued to keep the measure off the ballot, but a December court ruling found in favor of Measure A's supporters.

As debates and hearings over the fate of redevelopment have raged on, the Governor's Office has been drafting legislation that would eliminate redevelopment much as the governor has proposed. A strongly worded preamble lays out the case for the governor's position, and, in anticipation of potential legal battles, it claims that "the Constitution does not explicitly state that redevelopment agencies must exist and, unlike other entities such as counties, does not limit the Legislature's control over that existence."  Though agencies have been feverishly approving new projects while deliberations have taken place, the legislation would nullify those new obligations so "that the greatest amount of funding be realized from these actions to fund core governmental services." The legislation estimates that local entities will receive $1.9 billion per year in new resources.  For the full text of trailer bill 502 RDA Legislation: Redevelopment Agency Dissolution and Succession please download the pdf from the Department of Finance website.

Proposition Thirteen. There, I said it. But I'm not the only one uttering those words during the ongoing discussion of the State of California's enormous budget gap. Just maybe, we can no longer ignore the elephant in the room. The state's fiscal problems are as big as an elephant, and the reasons for them are legion. But, make no mistake, the largest contributor to those problems -- by far -- is the system created by and in reaction to Prop 13. One of Gov. Brown's proposals for solving the budget deficit is the elimination of local redevelopment agencies. Doing this, according to the administration, would result in $2 billion in additional property tax revenue for schools – meaning the state would not have to "backfill" $2 billion to the districts. The governor's proposal has triggered intense debate about the value of redevelopment. It's a debate that is probably worthwhile, but not in the hothouse environment of the state budget debate. The real issue is not the effectiveness of redevelopment, it's the fact that cities and counties turn to redevelopment because it's one of the very few tools they have to boost revenues and invest in their communities' infrastructure, economic well-being and housing stock. Approved in 1978, Proposition 13 set the property tax rate at 1% of assessed value, limited increases to 2% annually, and prohibited re-assessments except when property is sold. Before Prop 13, cities, counties, school districts and every other local government agency set their own property tax rates. After Prop 13, those same cities, counties, school districts and other agencies had to share the same pie – a pie that was suddenly two-thirds smaller. The State of California did what seemed like the responsible thing and bailed out the locals. Nowadays, 70% of the state's general fund is composed of payments to other government agencies, primarily school districts and counties. Proposition 98, passed in 1986, ensures that schools get a certain percentage of the state's general fund. In other words, what we used to pay for directly with property tax is now funded by the state, which gets most of its money from income taxes. It's not a wash by any means. For 30 years, as state budget deficits have come and gone, we ignored the system that voters imposed and the consequences from it. That silence seems to be ending. During recent testimony before the state Senate Governance and Finance Committee, state Treasurer Bill Lockyer noted that Proposition 13 triggered the debate about which levels of government are "stealing money" from other levels. That debate raged during last year's campaign over Proposition 22 (which seeks to protect local revenues) and over the governor's proposal regarding redevelopment. This is all because we don't pay for many local government services and public works directly. Jean Ross, of the advocacy group California Budget Project, said during the same hearing that while most states pay for education at the local level, Propositions 13 and 98 transferred most of the responsibility for funding schools to the state. This is important because it reflects California's disconnected system, in which no average citizen can follow the money from tax payment to service provided. Not only did Proposition 13 spur the change in how schools are funded, it caused redevelopment project areas to expand enormously, because redevelopment emerged as the only way cities and counties could capture increased property tax revenues, Marianne O'Malley, of the Legislative Analyst's Office (LAO), explained. The LAO says this redevelopment expansion is bad public policy, but it recognizes that Prop 13 is the cause. I recently spoke with Elizabeth Patterson, the mayor of Benicia. Her 161-year-old city does not have a redevelopment agency, but she understands the appeal of having one. Redevelopment has been cities' response to the disproportionate way that property taxes are distributed in light of Prop 13, she said. I know, I'm repeating myself. I'm doing so because I'm overjoyed that people are talking about Proposition 13. Few people are urging reforming it, but the first step toward recovery is admitting you have a problem. The fiscal issues faced by the state and by local government are systemic. Those issues will remain no matter what happens with redevelopment, because redevelopment agencies are barely a fly on the elephant's butt. – Paul Shigley

I'm sure that by now plenty of people would be willing to kill redevelopment just to put an end to the ping-pong match of debate that has surrounded the governor's budget proposal. While all very civil and often enlightening, it's a debate that has relied on a handful of studies against redevelopment (most prominently Michael Dardia's 1998 PPIC study, "Subsidizing Redevelopment in California" ) and a single study in favor of redevelopment (the California Redevelopment Association's 2009 study, based on earlier work by the private firm Time Structures < doc =">doc"> ). Beyond that, there's enough anecdotal evidence -- pro and con -- to give anyone whiplash. Things got interesting last week, though, when Legislative Analyst Mac Taylor put the smackdown on the CRA's study. I'm not sure if the average redevelopment official has the phrase "oh, snap!" in his vocabulary, but it would do well here. Taylor's letter expressed a degree of indignation not normally seen in official discourse.   Taylor's letter , which responds to an earlier CRA response to previous criticism (again, watch our for whiplash), alleges the following three flaws in the CRA's study:  - The CRA assured the LAO that its study encompassed projects that redevelopment agencies were substantially involved with, so as to distinguish the effects of redevelopment apart from general economic trends or other, private development activities in the studied project areas. Taylor, however, notes that the study focused on projects that redevelopment agencies were "involved with" and then points out that the researchers themselves did not define "involved with" nor did they "take any steps to review these data for consistency or accuracy." In other words, Taylor says that the CRA's study cannot distinguish between true redevelopment projects and projects that just happen to be in the neighborhood.   His point: If you don't ask people for exactly the information you want, you're almost guaranteed not to get it.  -The CRA study, which attributes the creation of over 300,000 jobs to redevelopment activities, seems to assume that developers and public entities would not invest in projects in the absence of redevelopment. Taylor notes that this is pure speculation on CRA's part.  In fact, this inabilty for anyone -- LAO, CRA, or anyone else -- to construct a counterfactual all but condemns the debate to the realm of emotion and anecdote. Given that we are dealing with thousands of individual decisions on the part of both agencies and developers, no one will ever know what would have happened in the absence of redevelopment. If nothing else, we'll get a heck of a data set if the governor's proposal succeeds.  Social scientists, keep those spreadsheets ready. -The CRA's claim of 300,000 jobs discounts the notion that tax money spent in other ways might have generated jobs. While Taylor does not claim that these funds would have the same job-creating impact that the CRA study claims, he does note that it's unlikely that they would have zero impact. Therefore, he implies that the 300,000 net jobs created is wildly inflated.  Taylor's letter ends on perhaps the snarkiest note: he presents a bibliography of 12 studies that, he claims, supports his assertions and the LAO's overall position of skepticism of redevelopment. You can bet, however, that there are 400 or so cities in California that have plenty to say about those studies. Whose serve is it now?  --Josh Stephens

After meeting, apparently unsuccessfully, with Gov. Jerry Brown several weeks ago to ask him to back off of his plan to eliminate redevelopment , the mayors of the state's ten largest cities are reportedly lobbying for a compromise. The mayors' plan would preserve revelopment while also generating $1.7 billion to help offset the state's deficit. That is roughly the amount of property tax increment that the governor hoped to recover by doing away with redevelopment entirely.  The mayors' plan, which reportedly originated out of the office of Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, would employ a distinctive, and novel, funding metchanism that Villaraigosa has explored before. The $1.7 billion would not be a transfer payment -- such as this year's SERAF transfer -- but rather a loan that would be borrowed against redevelopment agencies' future tax receipts. Agencies would collectively set aside $200 million annually over the next 25 years to pay off the loan.   A spokeperson for the governor told the Sacramento Bee that no such proposal had been delivered to the governor. He indicated that the governor would not be receptive to "any plan involving smoke, mirrors or gimmicks."  This is roughly the same strategy that Villaraigosa has proposed for funding his "30/10" transportation plan. That plan would borrow up to $30 billion from the federal government in order to construct a slate of transit projects all at once. That loan would be paid off by expected tax revenues from an extant special sales tax.  While Villaraigosa has had to appeal to Capitol Hill lawmakers to push his "30/10" plan, the redevelopment plan would be ask California voters to amend Proposition 22 and thereby allow the transfer to the state government. Opponents of the proposed elimination point to Prop. 22 as a major legal impediment for the governor.  Earlier this week over 900 mayors and council members from across the state signed a letter < pdf =">pdf"> urging the governor to reconsider his proposal. That letter threatens legal action under Prop. 22 if the governor's plan goes forward. On Friday committees of both the Senate and Assembly approved the governor's plan.

Don't start dreaming about that downtown loft just yet.  Though curbing low-density housing may be one key to implementing SB 375 and reducing greenhouse gas emissions, a new Public Policy Institute of California study suggests that the true key to reducing the state's vehicle miles traveled lies in employment density, not residential density. The study,  Driving Change:  Reducing Vehicle Miles Traveled  in California , argues that while the state has taken solid first steps to implement SB 375, the state must reverse some counterproductive trends and consider some innovative, and potentially controversial amendments to SB 375 if it is to fulfill its promise.  Authored by PPIC researcher fellows Ellen Hanak, Louise Bedsworth and Jed Kolko the study relies on a variety of sources, ranging from government data to interviews with planners and public officials.    The study notes that "employment density  matters more than residential density for encouraging transit use as an alternative to driving" and that cities must therefore make investments and policy choices that promote greater commercial density, coordinated with transit.  The study points out shortcomings in the state's recent approaches to smart growth. For instance, it contends that many recent transit investments have not reduced VMTs and that many transit-oriented developments have failed to reduce traffic because residents of those developments often make ample use of their cars. While rail ridership has increased slightly—from 0.9 percent of all commutes in 1990 to 1.4 percent in 2008—the growth is much slower than the pace of transit cost increases and service expansion. The report found that transit ridership is increasing, with recent investments directed toward higher-density areas, where they will be more likely to get people of out their cars. Regional transportation authorities and local governments recognize the importance of integrating land use, transit, and pricing policies such as toll lanes, carpool lanes, and parking fees. And, despite the recession, local governments have increased activities to support the goals of SB 375, and they say the policies they have begun to implement have a strong potential to reduce residents' driving. The study recommends that SB 375 be amended to specifically promote commercial development around transit. This recommendation contrasts somewhat with some of the more popular tenets of smart growth. In many ways, smart growth promotes an urban lifestyle -- meaning a residential lifestyle. In contrast, increased commercial density hearkens back to the 20th century "doughnut holes" in which downtown areas empty out at night once all the employees have fled via automobile.  Driving Change  seems to suggest that the doughnut hole should in fact rise again -- but with employees rolling home on steel wheels rather than their own tires.  The study wades into more controversial territory with its tacit endorsement of pricing tools to influence drivers' behavior. The study claims that pricing tools, such as congestion pricing, tolls, and even a milage tax (instead of a gas tax), could be the most effective means of getting drivers' out of their cars. These tools are, however, the most politically unpalatable and are likely to raise the ire of voters who are both wary of both higher fees as well as government intrusion in their lives.

Ever since Gov. Jerry Brown first announced his intention to eliminate redevelopment agencies the redevelopment establishment – led by the California Redevelopment Association – has taken a hard line: no elimination, no compromise, no relinquishment of the tax increment. The CRA is even preparing for a legal battle based on its interpretation of both the State Constitution and Proposition 22. Beyond these hard-line tactics, the threat of elimination has prompted a robust discussion of what form redevelopment might take once the dust settles. Almost everyone admits that reforms – such as greater accountability and oversight, especially of affordable housing funds – are warranted and necessary. They frequently warn that the state should not "throw the baby out with the bathwater." Others, however, are calling for – and expecting – a rebirth. Even Brown, in his press conference introducing the budget, promised to create "a new tool" for local economic development. And while a $12 billion budget gap that threatens everyone from schoolchildren to senior citizens may not qualify as a blessing in disguise, many boosters and detractors alike see this as the ideal moment to reconsider the state's 60-year-old redevelopment system. "It's good to reconsider things every generation or so," said Madeline Janis, boardmember of the Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency and executive director of the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy. Redevelopment originally took a sledgehammer to communities that were considered blighted. It was the local tool that worked in conjunction with federal programs that leveled entire city blocks. It still rests on the fundamental mission of fighting blight and promoting economic development mainly as an ancillary benefit. Now the governor's proposal does essentially the same thing to redevelopment itself. And the proposal provides scant guidance for the future. "The thing he didn't do, which is always a problem in these circumstances, is to put forward an alternative," said Michael Teitz, emeritus professor of planning at UC-Berkeley and former research director at the Public Policy Institute of California. "He just said, ‘let's get rid of them.'" Then What? Whether or not redevelopment and TIF financing survive intact, it appears increasingly likely that the scope, mission, and funding mechanisms will change dramatically. Those changes may entail an explicit focus on social goals such as fighting poverty, raising employment, and building sustainably rather than on a mandate to facilitate real estate deals. "I think there will be some form of redevelopment," said Cecilia Estolano, former CEO of the CRA of the City of Los Angeles. "At the end of the day when the dust clears something will be left, but it will look completely different." The governor's budget refers to "successor agencies," but even they are not defined. At the very least, it is likely that redevelopment agencies will end up quite a bit poorer. The so-called "SERAF" redevelopment funding transfer of 2009 and 2010 (as well as smaller transfers in the past) set a precedent by which the state could hobble, but not eliminate, agencies while still recapturing some tax revenue. It appears now that, when faced with possible elimination, the redevelopment community may be willing to discuss a compromise, even one that might violate Proposition 22, the voter-approved ballot measure that protects further redevelopment raids. "We would be interested in any kind of reform conversation that places more restrictions on the amount of a city or county's geography that could be in a redevelopment area and the amount of tax revenue that gets generated in that jurisdiction that would go to redevelopment activities," said Fred Blackwell, Director of the San Francisco Redevelopment Agency. "I think that any reform has to have two parts: there has to be some money that's given up this year to help balance the budget because we are in such a crisis. We have to recognize that we're citizens of the state too.  We depend on fire stations and schools," said Janis. "I know as an L.A. city commissioner I fully support doing something similar to what we did last year with the (SERAF) take." Both activists and redevelopment officials are bracing for, and even welcoming, the elimination and contraction of many redevelopment project areas. A New Mission Many agencies, flush with tax increment monies, gain attention for attracting big-box retailers and even sports stadiums. The future of redevelopment may, however, lie in thinking small. Redevelopment might promote higher returns by focusing on smaller local ventures that create tighter multipliers. "There's a lot of excitement in the economic development field about…doing more endogenous development: looking at the resources we already have within the community so we don't need to throw deep subsidies at the Best Buy to come to our community," said Karen Chapple, Associate Director of the Institute for Urban and Regional Development at UC-Berkeley. "We all know that's going to be a waste of money because it's a zero-sum game anyway." According to Chapple, in many cases the obvious replacement for redevelopment agencies would be business improvement districts. Because they are locally organized, she said that they can often do much more for a neighborhood than can an agency that pursues initiatives from on high. And she said that BIDs can be much more than just boosters or beautification teams. "It's astounding the amount of jobs created, the amount of tax revenue, decreases in crime lots of new sales, vacancy rates declining," said Chapple. "I think we've really underestimated these small-scale types of tools." When Estolano headed LA/CRA, from 2005 to 2010, she made aggressive, though controversial, moves to expand the agency's reach into social issues. She said that burgeoning economic trends such as green technologies offer abundant opportunities for redevelopment agencies and other economic development agencies to think strategically about investments that will provide the greatest social and financial returns. "Whatever economic development ends up being, it should be true economic development," said Estolano. "Study the clusters and the industries and the regions that have competitive advantages…what are the existing businesses doing?" Although this change of mission would be a fairly radical departure from the ay that most redevelopment agencies currently do business, Estolano said that it would not necessarily require major surgery on redevelopment laws. "I don't think it requires a clean (legal) slate," said Estolano. "I think you can redefine blight or change the purpose a bit." Others, however, insist that this moment provides the ideal opportunity for a radical restructuring, not just a redefinition.  Janis would like to see redevelopment formally decoupled from the condition of the built environment and instead focused on economic conditions. "I'm suggesting that we rewrite state law," said Janis. "That we delete the whole section on the findings of physical blight.  Replace that with a standard precondition to redevelopment areas is high poverty and/or high unemployment." Janis admitted that some communities – including small towns and suburbs – that do not meet these conditions might find themselves with no redevelopment at all. "Suburban areas or areas that don't have high unemployment or high poverty, they would lose this as a tool," said Janis.  "I have no problem with that. I don't think that redevelopment in certain parts of the state that are doing pretty well anyway are that necessary." Nuclear Option Whether any of these even requires state sanction remains open to debate. The governor's budget cites research, including an oft-cited 1998 study by the Public Policy Institute of California, suggesting that locally directed TIF financing does little, if anything, for the state's overall economic condition. With redevelopment eliminated, the state government would then, presumably, reallocate the recovered funds and thus leave cities to fend for themselves. This dire situation, against which the CRA is lobbying vigorously, would not be such a bad thing, according to Chapple. Indeed, without the crutch of redevelopment and the constraints of redevelopment law, cities could discover ways to create the net gain that is, according to the PPIC, currently eluding the state. "But most redevelopment agencies are not creative and they look at, ‘here's what the law says we can do; we can eliminate blight and do bricks and mortar development' and that's what they do," said Chapple. "You take away redevelopment and you force cities to do more creative and effective ways of economic development. "It's too bad that most planners have been just knee-jerk supporters trying to defend their redevelopment agencies," said Chappell. This sort of locally grown creativity, which would, according to Estolano, work properly only if cities did intensive evaluations of their competitive advantages and growth industries, could eliminate the competition between cities for big-ticket redevelopment projects. As redevelopment agencies extend themselves to attract development, they create the zero-sum effect that has draw so much criticism. Instead, Steven Levy, longtime economist at the Center for the Continuing Study of the California Economy, said that true economic development requires that localities stop competing with one another and instead recognize that their economic development strategies are all part of a greater whole. "To avoid cities' competing against each other while the Chinese and Indians are laughing at stupid Americans, the tax laws should be changed to divorce local revenues from land use decisions," said Levy. "The best thing cities can do is make themselves great places to live and work while not transferring scarce taxpayer dollars in what can only end up as a race to the bottom." Whither the TIF? It is unlikely, however, that even the most successful BID or stripped-down successor agency would be able to accomplish much without funding. This is especially true of the production of affordable housing – which is almost universally embraced – as well as the funding of infrastructure improvements. On these counts, the loss of state funding may leave cities with few options. "There are other types of ways to finance infrastructure or infrastructure financing districts in some areas, special districts in some, or impact fees," said Chapple. "They don't stretch very far, unfortunately. Then there's bonds, but there's a limit as to how much you can borrow against your general fund; that's why TIF has been so handy." The governor's budget does mention that cities could float redevelopment bonds with a 55 percent popular vote. But cities' bonding capacity may be limited in the current economic climate, and it's unclear how voters would respond. "There's nothing out there that would replace our ability to produce affordable housing and do the kind of infrastructure investments that we've been able to do in the past," said Blackwell. Blackwell said that if the governor prevailed and the TIF was not replaced, it would reduce by half the amount of low- and moderate-income housing that would be produced in San Francisco. And, he said, it would threaten the city's ability to manage "tens of thousands" of units that it already has. "This would be a massive hit unless there was some way to reconnect any use of TIFs back to housing," said Teitz. While such a prospect might unsettle public officials and advocates, the discussion as a whole has jarred the redevelopment community into a new mode of thinking. "It has been provocative and it has really made people think about the future of city-building," said Estolano. "We should take this opportunity to think about what are the core principles of city-building." Contacts: Fred Blackwell, Director, San Francisco Redevelopment Agency, (415) 749-2458 Karen Chapple, Associate Professor of City & Regional Planning, UC-Berkeley, (510) 642-1868 Cecilia Estolano, Chief Strategist on State and Local Initiatives, Green for All, (213) 977-1936 Madeline Janis, Boardmember, Los Angeles Community Redevelopment Agency; and Executive Director of the Los Angeles Alliance for a New Economy,  (213) 997-9400 Stephen Levy, Director and Senior Economist,  Center for the Continuing Study of the Calfornia Economy, (650) 321-8550 Michael Teitz, Emeritus Professor of City and Regional Planning, UC-Berkeley; former Research Director, Public Policy Institute of California

To some, infill development still occupies a quaint niche in the world of city-building. But over the past few years, greenfield development on the urban fringes has gone fallow and a host of economic, social, and regulatory forces have made infill more viable. Attempting to lead that charge is the newly formed California Infill Builders Association, a professional group made up of established and aspiring infill developers who seek mutual support in their effort to bring new development to urban areas. CP&DR Editor Josh Stephens spoke with CIBA President Meea Kang, of Domus Development of Sacramento, and founding board member Geof Syphers, who is chief sustainability officer for Codding Enterprises of Rohnert Part. What's the purpose and motivation behind the Infill Builders Association? Meea Kang: The purpose of the Infill Builders Association is promote the business of developing great neighborhoods in California cities and towns. We are focusing efforts to catalyze investments in city centers in urban areas as well as to promote the policies that support sustainable development. How did it come about? Why now? MK: SB 375 was a big impetus as far as the state realizing that it was time to look at how we're going to grow sustainably as a state as well as make room for the millions of new people who are moving to California. We thought it was a good opportunity as well to align forces, because we as builders often face similar barriers to building in infill locations. We are looking to engage local governments in terms of education and awareness around infill development. What are some of the barriers that make infill development more difficult than you think it should be? MK: The barrier list is quite long. Some of the ones that rise to the top are things like insufficient funding for infrastructure, and the fact that much of the new infrastructure is borne on the development. There's also issues around CEQA and getting local jurisdictions to work with us on exemptions and other avenues to facilitate a more streamlined process.  Sometimes the process of getting an infill project through the local planning commission can take years, and it really is not necessary especially if it means we are re-utilizing existing urbanized uses, which might be abandoned or under-utilized. Geof Syphers: Another one that at least needs to be in the top 10: a lot of the parking standards that are used in urban areas and even in fairly dense small towns were developed for outlying areas where there's no use nearby where parking could be shared. So a lot of the parking standards are much higher than they need to be, and that drives the cost of housing up. We need parking regulations that acknowledge the possibility of using transit and shared parking. What policy initiatives are you gong to be championing at the state level or the local level? MK: We are still working on our legislative agenda, and we are having a lot of conversations with a number of folks. We are looking at the possibility of a parking reduction bill. We're having a lot of dialog at this point. What do you like about SB 375? What do you think the challenges are going to be as people figure out how to implement it?  GS: I think there's a lot of expected answers to that question, but I think one of the things that's not talked about very much is that the local input from our smaller cities and towns is something that is often overlooked as part of ‘regional' or SCS planning. One of the things that we want to support is that the voices of local government in those towns do get heard. We want to make sure that those people have access to good, solid economic data about what decisions will make their economic picture better or worse over time.  We're doing some research in that area to find out in our cities and towns what over time – in boom years and in recession – tends to make the economic picture for things like property taxes and sales taxes more stable, more secure, and more predictable. Who are your members now and whom do you want them to be? GS: Our members now, whether folks who are recognized as leaders in the area of infill development--and particularly good-quality, greener infill development—and the folks that we want to have as members in the near future are the people who want to learn how to do that or who are just beginning to do that. Some of the bigger developers who want to move into that space because they really haven't been doing that in the past but now that they're seeing that things like AB 32 are helping steer them in that direction. They want to learn how to do it, and they want to learn to make money at it. There's a really solid business in doing this, and there's room for other folks to get into that game. How much inertia is there among the greenfield developers who have never done infill? How steep is their learning curve, and how willing are they to embrace this building type? GS: I'm a developer myself, so I can say this: developers are kind of like sheep. If somebody is doing it and they're making money, and they can figure out how they're doing it, they'll follow along. That's not a slight. Sure, there are those of us who have an altruistic bent that we want to slip in. But by and large this is a business decision. The challenge that some of the greenfield developers have is that they have a long period of time when they were going so fast that there was really no reason from a financial standpoint for them to stop and slow down and look at alternatives to their model. Right now, there's a big incentive to do that. There still is a very good market for infill. A lot of the products in infill are much stronger than in greenfield and outlying locations. That motivation at least gets them to the table. The next step is, what are the techniques: how do you finance things? How do you assemble property? How do you get the infrastructure built? But the same people who do greenfield development can do infill. It just requires some training and learning. It seems like the policy has evolved in California. Are the lenders also evolving? MK: I think that the lenders are coming around. I think what you're going to see now where lenders are nervous are funding large new, sprawl, single-family home developments that are farther and farther away from job centers. GS: I think this is a hard time to call anything normal in the lending community. Everything is changing. The very ground of what is normal is changing month-by-month. I think to compare today to 3-4 years ago is kind of silly. It's better to compare it to the middle or end of our last recession. If you do that, you'll see that actually the lending community is coming around. There's a far bigger appetite than emerging from the last recession to get involved with infill projects. And yet, infill development is still slower than we'd like it to be. Is sprawl finally dead in California? GS: Sprawl in the sense of taking farmland and building ranch homes on it that are far away from anything – that business model is dead. People don't want to live in those houses anymore. The new homebuyers are looking for places where their kids can walk to o school where they can get to work with a short drive or a ride on the train. That can be some of the existing suburban communities that we have, if they're built well and reconstructed well with infill projects. They can certainly be some of our urban areas in our bigger cities. I would say that the 3-acre plot that's six miles to the nearest grocery store is dead. The gas bills, the headaches and stress of being in traffic jams all the time. I think that model is dead. MK: However, that doesn't mean that everyone is going to leave those homes and move into the city. I think there's still choice. Any prognostications for the new year and the new administration in Sacramento? Editor's Note: This interview was conducted before Gov. Brown was sworn in. MK: We're very excited about governor-elect Jerry Brown. He's shown a history of being bold in Oakland and the encouragement he had for building housing in the downtown. We hope that he can apply some thoughtful thinking on land use in California that will make infill housing the preferred choice of development in California. GS: We have a partner in the governor's office that is going to look very serious at how to spend California's resources far more efficiently. Our money, our energy, our water, all of those resources. MK: The co-benefits of doing good infill development go far beyond just the sticks and bricks of the housing itself. The fact that we can preserve California's open space by building on already-utilized land, the fact that we can support existing communities in providing more revenue to promote their growth, infrastructure, schools, all of it. It makes sense for California.  Contacts & Resources: California Infill Builders Association   Meea Kang, President, CIBA; President, Domus Development  info@infill-builders.org Geof Syphers, Board Member, CIBA; Chief Sustainability Officer, Codding Enterprises ,  (707) 795-35 50 This interview has been edited and condensed.

Reports indicate that Gov. Jerry Brown will name Ken Alex director of the Governor's Office of Planning and Research. If confirmed, Alex will succeed Cynthia Bryant, who served under former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger. The governor's office has yet to make a public announcement and would neither confirm nor deny Alex's appointment.  Alex arrives at OPR with over a decade of immersion in environmental and energy law and policy. Since 2006 has served, under then-Attorney General Brown, as a senior assistant attorney general, heading the office's global warming unit. From 2000 to 2006, he headed the California Attorney General's task force on energy. Alex has litigated countless environmental cases, including a landmark 2007 lawsuit brought against San Bernardino County's general plan. The suit, which settled, successfully linked greenhouse gas emissions to the California Environmental Quality Act (see CP&DR  Vol. 22, No. 7 July 2007 ) and established a precedent for including GHG analysis in CEQA reports.  Alex will arrive at a pivotal moment for OPR , which provides legislative advice and conducts policy research on a range of land use issues. The office is one of the chief resources that localities have for guidance on implementation of laws such as AB 1358: The Complete Streets Act < pdf =">pdf"> and SB 375. OPR recently published a flow chart designed to help local governments understand the California Environmental Quality Act provisions enacted by SB 375 < pdf =">pdf"> .  It also houses the Strategic Growth Council, which oversees the disbursement of Prop. 84 local planning grants (see CP&DR Vol. 26, No. 1, January 2011 ).  OPR's prominence has waxed and waned under different governors. As CP&DR Publisher Bill Fulton noted at the recent UCLA Land Use Law and Planning Conference, OPR was a major force in planning during Brown's first tenure but was eviscerated under Gov. George Deukmejian. The advent of climate change legislation such as AB 32 and SB 375 has, however, given the office more prominence (see CP&DR  blog Dec. 2010 ). It was the subject of three reform bills in 2010, none of which passed.