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A pro-active approach to preserving open space and create a Natural Communities Conservation Plan is taking shape in Placer County in the Sierra Nevada Mountains. Members of the county's planning staff are working with the Sierra Business Council to design a countywide program that may serve as a model for other urbanizing counties in the Sierra. The program, known as the Placer Legacy, seeks to set up an NCCP before the county is forced to do so by a legal challenge or a government agency, and also is identifying open space lands for recreation and other uses. Rather than dealing with habitat and open space issues on a project-by-project approach, the program seeks to deal with such matters on a countywide basis. "It's not driven by the regulatory hammer of the Endangered Species Act," said Tracy Grubbs, the SBC's lead staff person on the project. Placer County grew from a population of 118,400 in 1980 to 206,000 in 1996. Population projections for the year 2020 call for 358,500 people. While the county stretches from the Sacramento suburbs to Lake Tahoe, most of the growth is occurring in the western section closest to Sacramento. Between 1984 and 1992, 19,000 acres of prime farmland were lost to development. And growth continues: developments in the city of Lincoln, for example, are projected to add 22,000 people to a current population of 8,500. (See CP&DR, May 1998.) The county's Board of Supervisors directed its planning staff in the fall of 1997 to address concerns about growth. What emerged was the outline of the Placer Legacy. Grubbs compared the situation to San Diego County, where the listing of the California gnatcatcher as threatened - and the likely listing of many other birds as well - forced the county to come up with a series of Natural Communities Conservation Plans (See CP&DR, December 1997). By the time the gnatcatcher issue arose in San Diego County, land values were high. The cost of land acquisition in San Diego County is estimated at between $300 million and $350 million. By beginning the process now, Placer County hopes to avoid those costs. Grubbs said the specific outlines of the program have not yet been set, such as which lands will be set aside in reserves and how to acquire the land. Various funding mechanisms are being contemplated, including a sales-tax increase and developer fees. In addition to providing habitat protection and corridors for willife migration, the reserves will also provide open space areas in the county. The SBC, with 500 business members throughout 12 Sierra counties, is helping to raise the estimated $1 million to create the plan, Grubb said. About half that amount has already been raised through grants, she said. Developers will benefit from the Placer Legacy, she said, because it will streamline the permit process. SBC is charged with coordinating public participation in the project, and has held open space forums throughout the county. Contacts: Tracy Grubbs, Director of Special Projects, Sierra Business Council, (530) 582-4800. Final Wilson Wetlands Report One of the environmental legacies of the last years of the Wilson administration is apparently a net gain in wetlands. A report issued at the end of Gov. Pete Wilson's term reports that the net gain of wetlands for 1996 and 1997 was 15,129 acres. × "California is the first state in the nation to quantitatively determine that it has achieved its goal of no overall net loss, and more importantly, a net gain in wetlands for the years 1996 and 1997," the wetlands report said. The total gain was 17,503 acres of wetland habitat, consisting solely of restoring historic wetlands and creating new habitats. But at the same time, federal Clean Water Act Permit 404 data and data from the California Department of Fish and Game showed a loss figure of 2,370 acres, so the actual net gain was 15,129 acres. The report does not include non-reported, illegal wetland fills, and impacts to small, isolated seasonal wetlands less than one acre in size. The December 1998 report said that more than 137,500 acres of existing wetlands have been enhanced since 1993. In addition, between 1993 and 1998, the state found that 61,904 acres of wetland habitats had been set aside for permanent protection. An earlier report found that the state had added about 78,000 acres between August 1993 and 1995 (see CP&DR, February 1996). Wilson signed Executive Order W-59 93 in 1993, which established the nation's first statewide comprehensive wetlands program. The policy called for 33 specific actions, ranging from performing wetlands inventories to regional wetlands restoration and enhancement efforts. According to the report, 17 actions were implemented in full and 12 actions were implemented in part. The report's statistics showed how much wetlands acreage has been lost. Inventory of wetlands found that 87,000 acres remained of the historic 188,600 acres of wetlands in San Francisco Bay. Figures for how many acres had been lost in the Central Valley were not included, but for Southern California an examination of 41 separate coastal wetlands found that 14,898 acres remain from an historic level of 46,865 acres, a 68 percent decrease. The report said that six regional wetlands restoration efforts are underway throughout the state, including in the Central Valley, San Francisco Bay and in Southern California. The report said the state had provided $5.6 million in funding for restoration and enhancement projects in the 1998-99 fiscal year for the Southern California Wetlands Clearinghouse, the regional conservation effort there. The report also pointed to increased wetlands acreage due to cooperative partnerships set up to help private landowners, and also to land acquisition by a variety of non-profit, private land trusts, as well as duck hunting and environmental organizations. The report gave much of the credit for wetlands restoration to private nonprofits such as the Trust for Public Land, the Audubon Society, and the Nature Conservancy. The bulk of the additions to the state's wetlands came from 1993 to 1996. According to a 1996 report from the Resources Agency, its goal was to have 225,000 acres of acquired, restored, and enhanced wetlands habitat by 2010.

The late James Michener once wrote a novel called THE SOURCE, which told the story of a single piece of land in Israel. The metaphor of the story was an archeological dig: the reader went back in time, as if removing layer after layer of soil, uncovering a different story with each stratum. I could never finish the book, to tell the truth: The writing was dry, and the book was a bit of a doorstop. Still, I admired the conceit that any given piece of ground had a good story to tell, or indeed many stories. A San Francisco-based nonprofit homebuilder, Mercy Charities Housing California, recently discovered the decidedly mixed joys of working on a piece of land that had many stories to tell. The case in point was the former Notre Dame High School, a building in San Francisco's Mission District, which the nonprofit converted last year into 66 units of low-income housing. While the homebuilder was not exactly bargaining for a major archaeological find, Mercy Charities found itself in the position of sponsoring a dig for antiquities at the same time that it was coping with the complexities of adapting an old, non-residential building into housing. Now known as Notre Dame Plaza, the former school is a local landmark in San Francisco's tough but gentrifying Mission District. The site is across the street from the Mission San Francisco de Assisi, popularly known as Mission Dolores, which dates from the 1780s. In the 1860s, the church gave the site to the Sisters of Notre Dame, who built a convent on the site, and later expanded it into a school in the following decades. Although the building survived the 1906 earthquake, city officials dynamited the school to prevent the spread of fire that was ravaging the city immediately after the quake. The present building, a broad-shouldered structure with a mansard roof, was built on the foundation of the earlier building in 1907, and operated as a school until the early 1980s. The idea to convert the old school into low-income housing came from the Sisters of Notre Dame themselves in the 1980s, but the idea was slow to catch. "In the early stages, everyone in the city thought it was crazy. I thought it was crazy," said Barbara Gualco, who later became project manager. Cost was an obvious concern: Converting the old school into housing meant partitioning the old classrooms into separate apartments, and Gualco acknowledged that adaptive reuse would cost only a little less than new construction. Eventually, however, the nonprofit became convinced that the project was feasible, and work began in 1996. Financially, Notre Dame Plaza is unusual among low-income housing projects in California, because it makes use of neither redevelopment housing set-aside money nor historic-preservation tax credits. HUD's Section 202 Program provided $6.12 million in both construction and permanent financing. (The project applied three times for the federal funding before getting a thumb's up from the feds). A second HUD grant, this time a Rental Project Rental Assistance Contract, provided $5 million in rental subsidies over 20 years. Residents pay no more than 30% of their income in rent. One resident is paying $150 in a district where comparable market-rate units are going for as much as $1,000. Additionally, the Mayor's Office of Housing provided a deferred loan of $4.74 million, which was funded by the city's "bed tax" on hotel rooms. "One of the joys of doing business in San Francisco is that the city has a huge commitment to housing," Gualco said. Although the project is not technically historic preservation, the building is a designated landmark, and the State Office of Historic Preservation took an active interest in both the building and the archaeological importance of the site. The state agency made an agreement with HUD to excavate portions of the site during rehab. Eventually, the church-based nonprofit spent about $100,000 of its construction budget on archaeology. The dig, as it turned out, was unexpectedly productive. The site yielded plentiful artifacts of the mission and the Spanish occupation of California, particularly the little-documented lives of Native Americans who lived and worked at the missions. Prior to the padres, a band of Chutchui Indians had lived on the spot. Archaeologists found glass tools dating back to the 18th Century, which demonstrated that the Spanish had forced the Native Americans to abandon their traditional stone tools and adopt European-style implements of iron and glass. Researchers also discovered a stone-and-adobe wall, identical to the walls of the original mission. By the early 19th Century, several thousand Native Americans from several tribes lived on the site. After the secularization of the mission in 1833, however, the community quickly disbanded, and the Mission area became a sort of Gold Rush-era urban entertainment zone: A bear-and-bull baiting ring stood on the current site of the Notre Dame Plaza, before the nuns and their students arrived. Archaeology and construction are not a natural mix, and the potential for conflict is great. In this case, however, the contractor and the archaeologists were mutually cooperative: the contractor re-arranged his construction schedule to accommodate the archaeologists. Construction ended about a year ago, and in April, the state historic-preservation agency nominated Notre Dame Plaza for the National Trust/HUD Secretary's Award for Excellence in Historic Preservation. Luckily, most affordable housing projects do not bear the weight of history as intimately as Notre Dame Plaza. Still, it is pleasing to think that the project was the vehicle that allowed the earth to speak, as it were, and divulge some ancient secrets. More to the point, perhaps, the old convent school has provided affordable housing in a city with rapidly rising rents and a high housing deficit. And this old building, which has seen disaster and prosperity and decline, will now be around to witness another century of stories in the historic core of San Francisco.

A new state commission is examining local govern issues and is expected to produce a proposed legislative overhaul of the Cortese-Knox by December. The 15-member Commission on Local Governance for the 21st Century was created last year as a by-product of legislation making it easier for the San Fernando Valley to pursue secession from the City of Los Angeles. The commission is officially charged with reviewing the Cortese-Knox Act, proposing methods to increase public participation in local government, and examining whether boundary practices in California do not cause racial discrimination. It is chaired by San Diego Mayor Susan Golding and staffed by Ben Williams, a veteran staffer from the Governor's Office of Planning & Research who last worked on military base closure issues. Other members include elected local government officials, professional planners and land-use lawyers, and former state legislators knowledgeable in the field. The commission was created by AB 1484, a 1997 bill carried by Assemblyman Bob Hertzberg, D-Van Nuys, whom most commission members acknowledge is the "godfather" of the new commission. The Local Governance Commission is one of several new efforts to examine local government organization and finance issues. Gov. Gray Davis has identified local government finance as a major issue for his administration (see accompanying story). In addition, the Senate Budget Committee scheduled six hearings around the state on local government finance in late January and early February. And Assembly Speaker Anthony Villaragoisa, D-Los Angeles, convened a meeting of a separate task force on local government finance in late January. There is little question that the commission will tackle well-known problems of government organization - especially issues associated with revenue distribution between cities and counties in annexations and new incorporations. "What we have on the books is a morass of contradictory provisions, a legal Winchester Mystery House," Hertzberg said in a statement. "I proposed the commission to give the issues the thoughtful examination they deserve. My intent is to work closely with the commission, and my goal is to use their work as a guide for future legislation." The bigger question is whether the commission will move beyond narrow issues to deal with state-local fiscal relations and the land-use implications of local government organization. On the one hand, many members of the commission appear to be eager to delve into broader issues, such as competition for sales-tax revenue and other attractive real estate development options. Commissioner Trish Clarke, a Shasta County supervisor, strongly stated in an interview that she hopes the commission will deal with land-use and revenue issues - even to the point of proposing that the commission take on the question of restoring property tax revenue that the state shifted from cities and counties to schools in 1992 and '93. On the other hand, commissioners appear wary of creating a set of recommendations that will wither on the shelf - as happened with the recent California Constitution Revision Commission, which dealt with similar issues. "We are painfully aware of the CCRC experience," said Michael Colantuano, a commissioner who works as a municipal lawyer for the Los Angeles firm of Richards, Watson & Gerson. He said he expected the commission to focus on "feasible and politically realistic" reform. Echoing the sentiments of several other commissioners, he indicated strong hope that Hertzberg, who has emerged as a leading legislator in the term-limited Sacramento environment, would aggressively seek to pass whatever legislative proposals the commission put forward. Clark agreed, stating that she hoped the commission's representatives will sit down soon with Gov. Gray Davis and his top-level staff: "The commission is made up of people that the governor might listen to and the Legislature might listen to." Whether or not the commission deals with broader issues, a proposal to overhaul the Cortese-Knox Act appears likely. The Cortese-Knox law, which last underwent major changes in 1985, governs boundary changes, annexations, incorporations, special districts, and all other actions of Local Agency Formation Commissions. City-county boundary relations have been somewhat strained in several parts of the state in recent years. Several counties have severed annexation negotiations with their cities in the last decade. In addition, the creation of new cities, such as Citrus Heights in Sacramento County, has been met with stiff opposition from counties fearing a loss of revenue. This problem led to the passage of the so-called "revenue neutrality" law in 1992, which requires that new cities - though they must be fiscally viable - cannot be created at the financial expense of counties. The result has been a dramatic slowdown in the creation of new cities. At present cityhood advocates in more than 20 communities around the state are awaiting action. The issue of apportioning revenues and service responsibilities between cities and counties is "a problem," said veteran land-use lawyer William Ross, who was appointed to the commission by the Democratic leadership in the Senate. "It needs to be fixed." At the same time, recent legislative amendments designed to deal with special district issues have been less than successful. A bill sponsored by then-Assemblyman Mike Gotch - who now represents the California Association of LAFCOs - expanded membership on most LAFCOs to include special districts and gave LAFCOs independent power to consolidate special districts. Advocates of special-district consolidation say the bill was one-sided - letting the special districts in on the one hand but giving LAFCOs little political incentive to consolidate them. In addition, in many cases, local advocates have taken special district issues directly to the Legislature, circumventing local LAFCOs. The commission has appointed a committee, chaired by Ross, to draft legislative amendments to the Cortese-Knox Act. The committee has split the law into five parts and is working on drafting proposals to amend each of the five areas. The commission met for the first time last August and has scheduled a total of 13 meetings around the state. Most recently, the commission met in Redding in January and February, hearing - among other things - a report from the City of Redding and Shasta County on the need for better city-county revenue cooperation. The commission's remaining scheduled meetings include March 5 in Burbank, March 25-26 in Monterey, April 30 in Oakland, June 4 in the Inland Empire, July 23 in Fresno, September 17 in Orange County, October 13 in Sacramento, and November 18-19 in Los Angeles. A complete list of commission members includes the following: Appointed by Gov. Pete Wilson: o Susan Golding, mayor of San Diego, who is chair of the commission. o Ruben Barrales, a former San Mateo County supervisor and now president of Joint Venture Silicon Valley, who is vice-chair of the commission. o Marian Bergeson, longtime chair of the Senate Local Government Commission, whom Gov. Gray Davis recently retained as Secretary of Child Development and Education. o Bert Boeckmann, a Northridge car dealer and financier of the Valley secession movement. o Trish Clarke, a Shasta County Supervisor and chair of the Shasta LAFCO. o Cody Cluff, president of the Entertainment Industry Development Corp. and formerly Wilson's appointee on the South Coast Air Quality Management District. o C. Timotby Raney, a member of the Citrus Heights City Council and a planner with EIP Associates in Sacramento. o Carolyn Ratto, a member of the Turlock City Council. o Larry Zarian, a former member of the Glendale City Council and board member of the Metropolitan Transportation Authority of Los Angeles. Appointed by the Senate Rules Committee: o Robert Hunt, an attorney with the Service Employees International Union in Los Angeles. o Nick Petris, an Alameda County attorney who served in the state legislature from 1959 until he was forced out of office by term limits in 1996. o Jacki Bacharach, former mayor of Rancho Palos Verdes and former board member of the L.A. County Transportation Commission. Appointed by the Assembly Rules Committee o Michael Colantuano, a partner with Richards, Watson & Gerson, a municipal law firm in Los Angeles. o William D. Ross, a prominent land-use lawyer in private practice in Palo Alto.. o John Shatz, general manager of the Santa Margarita Water District. The commission is being staffed out of the Governor's Office of Planning & Research by OPR veteran Ben Williams (916 322-9906). Web address: www.clg21.ca.gov.

San Francisco Airport officials have proposed an airport runway expansion that has a novel tradeoff for environmentalists. In exchange for filling up to 1,400 acres of San Francisco Bay for new runways, the airport proposes to restore 29,000 acres of bay wetlands that are located east and south of the airport. The proposal, which is to be formally presented at the end of January, is already proving controversial in the environmental community, and is strongly opposed by Cargill Salt, whose land could be taken by eminent domain to restore bay wetlands. A landfill of such magnitude has not occurred in the bay in 30 years. There is little dispute that the airport's runways need improvement. The runways are close together, and in poor weather the number of landings are limited due to concerns about visibility. Flight delays are common. The airport proposes expanding its four runways at a cost of between $1.3 and $1.5 billion. The longer runways are supposed to reduce noise for local residents, as well as to accommodate larger jets. The matter is still far from settled. "We're not opposed to the airport's project, but we have no intention of going out of business or being sacrificed so the airport project can proceed," said Jill Singleton, Cargill's Public Affairs Manager. Singleton said that 12,000 of the 29,000 acres at issue are part of the Don Edwards San Francisco Bay Wildlife Refuge, and that the company has perpetual operating rights on refuge properties. Craig Breon, an official with the Santa Clara Valley Audubon Society, has participated in meetings of local stakeholders that the airport has held over the proposal. Breon said that in June 1998, the airport told a group of local leaders that it was planning to expand only 300 to 400 acres into the bay. Now it's up to 1,400 acres. "That's difficult to take," he said. Breon said the airport should study how the landfill will impact water circulation and water quality. San Jose's water treatment plant is already undergoing a $100 million upgrade because its outflow is affecting wildlife in bay wetlands. Breon said the Audubon Society had not taken a position, but said, "I'm enthusiastic about the possibilities." Restoring Cargill's salt ponds to wetlands, he said, could increase wildlife and water quality for the region. Some endangered species might be delisted with the new acreage, he said. He suggested that Cargill may eventually decide to leave the region anyway because it may be more economical to make salt elsewhere. Other groups, such as Save San Francisco Bay, have taken a more hard-line approach in opposition to the proposal. The proposal has also been criticized by Will Travis, executive director of the San Francisco Bay Conservation and Development Commission, a state agency that limits new bay fill activities. Travis said that BCDC had threatened legal action several years ago when SFO proposed a $2.4 billion terminal expansion project. That expansion is currently underway. "BCDC objected, contending that spending billions to expand SFO's ground capacity would irrevitably increase pressure to fill the bay for more runways," Travis wrote in a recent op-ed piece in Engineering News Record. "BCDC stopped its legal opposition only after the then-director of the airport stated, 'Current runway configurations will adequately handle projected airplane operations well into the next century.'" But now, said Dan Seaver, a community affairs specialist for SFO,"It would appear that we will not have adequate capacity in 2010." Seaver said it takes between six and 11 years to build a new runway. As an alternative, Travis suggested running ferries from SFO to Oakland's Airport as a way to make better use of the underused Oakland facility. He noted that the two airports are nine miles apart by water. "Running high speed ferries between the two could allow flights that cannot land at SFO in bad weather to be diverted to Oakland and allow passengers on domestic flights landing in Oakland to make connections on international flights to SFO," he wrote. Any expansion of Oakland's airport would impact wetlands, said Breon. And San Jose International Airport is currently undergoing expansion, he said, but that is only to meet its own future growth needs. Travis suggested also looking at the possibility of joint civilian and military use of Travis Air Force Base in Solano County. Contacts: Dan Seaver, Community Affairs Specialist, SFO, (650) 794-5031. Craig Breon, Santa Clara Valley Audubon Society, (408) 252-3748. Jill Singleton, Public Affairs Manager, Cargill Salt, (510) 797-1820. Will Travis, Executive Director, S.F. Bay Conservation and Development Commission, (415) 557-8775.

Requiring a landowner to provide an excess amount of infrastructure capacity - and reimbursing that landowner later with other county funds - does not fall under the state's conflict of interest laws if a county supervisor is one of the landowners, according to a new opinion from the state attorney general's office. According to the attorney general, such a requirement - permitted under the state's Subdivision Map Act - is not a contract between the developer and the landowners and therefore does not fall under Government Code §1090, which prohibits public officers from being financially interested in contracts made by the boards to which they belong. The AG's opinion was requested by San Benito County in connection with a proposed agreement involving excess storm drain capacity. Under Government Code §66485-66487 - part of the Subdivision Map Act - local governments can require landowners to provide excess infrastructure capacity and then pay the landowners back later (often with funds provided by nearby landowners wishing to develop). "If a local ordinance imposes the requirement authorized by section 66485 and the local agency determines that the supplemental capacity is needed to benefit property not within the subdivision, the subdivider must provide the supplemental capacity as a condition for obtaining approval of the subdivision map," noted Deputy Attorney General Gregory Gonot in the opniion. "Under the agreement, the subdivider must be reimbursed for the expense of constructing the supplemental capacity for the benefit of later subdivisions and uses of adjacent property." However, Gonot added: "Even in the reimbursement could be viewed as a benefit, neither the subdivider nor the local agency has any choice in the matter; once the local agency orders the supplemental capacity, it is required by law to provide for reimbursement through an agreement." He said the situation is analogous to the situation laid out to the eminent domain procedure included in Santa Clara Valley Water District v. Gross, 200 Cal.App.3d 1362 (1988). In that case, the appellate court concluded that participating in a process required by statute does not constitute the making of a contract under §1090 even if a benefit may be conferred. "Similarly, here, the supplemental capacity reimbursement procedure for subdivisions is mandated by statute," Gonot wrote. "The reimbursement amount is dictated by the costs of construction; it is not subject to negotiation so as to cause an appearance of impropriety. The supervisor in question may only recover his actual costs - no more, no less - in being required to benefit property located outside the subdivision. Attorney General's Opinion 98-1001, 98 C.D.O.S. 8739 (issued November 25, 1998). Contact: Gregory L. Gonot, Deputy Attorney General, ((916) 324-7860.

The Second District Court of Appeal has reaffirmed its decision to overturn a $2 million takings judgment against the Coastal Commission - even after reconsidering the case in light of a California Supreme Court ruling in another coastal case. However, the property owners' lawyers appear determined to fight on to the California Supreme Court on the very issue that caused the remand in the first place. Lawyer Thomas Banks said his client, Peggy Ann Buckley, plans to appeal the case to the California Supreme Court because the Coastal Commission's action in the case was "arbitrary and capricious" - not an honest mistake as the Coastal Commission claimed. However, in the ruling that sent the Buckley case back to the Second District, the Supreme Court ruled that a government agency's motivation cannot be the basis of a takings decision, unless the agency acted in bad faith. In an interview with CP&DR, Banks said he would argue that the ruling should be reversed because, in his view, the Coastal Commission had deliberately asserted jurisdiction knowing it did not have the power. "It was not a mistake on their part," he said. The Second District's new ruling in Buckley v. Coastal Commission is essentially unchanged from the original ruling, which was issued more than a year ago. The court concluded that the evidence on the record does not establish that the Coastal Commission's actions in denying the Buckleys permission to build a single-family house constituted a taking. The court also ruled that the Coastal Commission did not have jurisdiction over the project because it is located within a single-family zone, meaning jurisdiction lies with the Los Angeles County Regional Planning Commission. The Coastal Commission had sought jurisdiction over the rear portion of the property, which it claimed was in a designated "environmentally sensitive habitat area". In the new ruling, the Second District addressed questions raised by the California Supreme Court's ruling in Landgate v. California Coastal Commission, 17 Cal.4th 1006 (1998) (CP&DR Legal Digest, June 1998). In that case, the Supreme Court overturned a trial judge's ruling that a temporary taking occurred when the Coastal Commission erroneously asserted jurisdiction over another Malibu property owner's plans to build a home in the coastal zone. While acknowledging that the Coastal Commission did make the error, the Supreme Court concluded that it cannot consider the commission's motives and must assume that the commission made an honest mistake in asserting jurisdiction. In revisiting the Buckley case, the Second District concluded the Landgate ruling only reaffirmed its earlier decision to overturn the trial judge's takings judgment. "Similar to Landgate, the present matter essentially involved a clash of wills between the County and the Commission and, to a certain extent, the Buckleys," wrote Justice Michael G. Nott for a three-judge panel of Division Two of the Second District. "However, the record does not support a finding that there was anything improper about the Commission's position that the rear portion of the lot was indeed an environmentally sensitive habitat area. Nor is there any support for the proposition that the Commission's motives were in bad faith. Banks said that the Buckley case is "dissimilar" from the Landgate case and he disagreed with the court on the question of bad faith. The case began when Peggy Ann and John Buckley, a married couple now separated, bought a 2.75-acre lot in Malibu in 1988. The front 1.15 acres was level but the back portion, about 1.6 acres, descended into a steep ravine. In 1989, the Coastal Commission attempted to assert juridsiction. After acknowledging that L.A. County had jurisdiction because it was a single-family zone, the Commission claimed jurisdiction over the back portion of the property because it is located in an environmentally sensitive habitat area, or ESHA - a common designation in the Malibu area. Subsequently, the county issued an exemption based on the Buckleys' assertion that they would not use the back portion of the property. (Such exemptions, commonly known as "Calvo exemptions," are permitted under Public Resources Code §30610.1 and §30610.2) The county approved a plan to grade the front of the property and build a 15,000-square-foot residence. The Buckleys then decided to sell the lot. In 1990, the Buckleys applied to the Coastal Commission for a permit to grade the back portion of the property to create a garden, a riding ring, and a guest house. In 1991, the Coastal Commission denied the application based on evidence that a landslide had developed in the ravine and threatened adjacent properties. The Buckleys did not appeal the ruling and the county soon reasserted jurisdiction over the entire property. The county issued a grading permit for the front portion of the property. and the Buckleys began grading. The Coastal Commission issued a stop-work order. But the county then issued a grading permit for the back portion of the property and the Buckleys began grading it. At that point, the state attorney general claimed the Buckleys were in violation of the Coastal Act. As the landslide threat continued, engineers and geologists from the county and the Coastal Commission concluded the grading plan was inadequate. The Buckleys continued grading; the Commission filed another stop-work order. At that point, the Buckleys went to court, filing a declaratory relief action. The Coastal Commission subsequently filed an action for injunctive relief and civil penalties and fines. The Buckleys cross-complained and the cases were consolidated. L.A. County Superior Court Judge William Huss ruled that the Coastal Commission had no jurisdiction. Subsequently, a trial court awarded $1.3 million in damages for a taking and more than $800,000 in attorneys fees and other costs. On appeal, the Second District ruled that the Coastal Commission is not permitted to designate only a portion of a lot as covered by the Calvo exemption. However, the appellate court overturned Judge Huss's ruling that a taking occurred. The court concluded that the Coastal Commission's actions resulted in neither a temporary nor a permanent taking. First, the court said that Judge Huss erred in deciding that the commission's mere assertion of jurisdiction was a per se permanent regulatory taking of their property. "After the trial court ruled that the Commission had no jurisdiction over the lot, the Commission's stop work orders no longer had any effect," Justice Nott wrote. "Any taking that might have occurred was ended by that ruling." On the question of a temporary taking, Justice Nott wrote: "Because the Buckleys could have developed the front portion of the lot, or sold the lot with the County permits in place, the grading restriction imposed by the Commission, though erroneous, did not prevent all economically viable or productive use of the lot." Banks, Buckley's attorney, wants the California Supreme Court's opinion. Although Banks's viewpoint would appear to contradict the Landgate decision, the Supreme Court was deeply split on Landgate, with the Coastal Commission winning on only a 4-3 vote. The majority, led by Justice Stanley Mosk, concluded that the courts should not examine the motive of the government agency's actions but whether there is "a sufficient connection between the land use regulation in question and legitimate governmental purpose". In separate dissents, Justices Ming Chin and Janice Rogers Brown both took the majority to task for not adhering to the U.S. Supreme Court's takings rules in cases such as the landmark First English Evangelical Lutheran Church v. County of Los Angeles, 482 U.S. 304 (1987). Justice Chin concluded that he did not consider the delays in the Landgate case - the result of a similar jurisdictional dispute between the Coastal Commission and L.A. County - to be "normal" delays as required under Lucas. Brown chastised the majority for being "unwilling to come to terms with the true meaning and operative effect of Lucas and First Lutheran". The Case: Buckley v. California Coastal Commission, 98 Daily Journal D.A.R. 12206 (issued December 2, 1998). The Lawyers: For the Buckleys: Thomas Banks, (310) 451-8831, and Eliot G. Disner, Shapiro, Rosenfeld & Close, (310) 273-6333. For Coastal Commission: Terry Furimoto, Deputy Attorney General, (213) 897-2706.

By importing water from at least three sources, the largest housing subdivision ever processed by Los Angeles County could actually enhance the health of the wild river that splits the project site, according to proponents. Opponents of Newhall Ranch, however, see the proposed 12,000-acre development as a threat to the Santa Clara River, the region's last undammed river, and to Ventura County farmers and urban water customers. No matter who is right, Newhall Ranch is being closely watched statewide by people who want to see more thorough studies of water sources before major developments receive approval. The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors in late November signaled its intent to approve a specific plan, general plan amendment, zoning changes, and a conditional use permit for Newhall Ranch, near Magic Mountain in northwest Los Angeles County. The proposal, from Newhall Land & Farming Co., calls for 21,600 homes and 1,000 acres of commercial, industrial and mixed-used development on both sides of Highway 126 just east of the Ventura County line. Newhall hopes to build the community for about 60,000 people over 25 years. Ventura County leaders have a number of gripes with the project, especially its potential use of groundwater. If Newhall Ranch drinks up liquid from underground, Ventura County citrus farmers will have less to pump and the Oxnard aquifer, which serves existing urban areas, will suffer, said Ventura County Supervisor John Flynn. "Our basic water supply is threatened by this project,'' charged Flynn, a leading project opponent. "I have not seen any proof of water they may have for their project except for groundwater." Nonsense, counters Newhall Ranch Senior Vice President Jim Harter. The environmental impact report, which is receiving a final touch-up, clearly identifies where the project will derive its water, he said. Newhall Ranch may import water from elsewhere in California, exercise a contractual right to tap nearby Castaic Lake, or buy from the State Water Project, Harter said. The completed project will need approximately 18,000 acre feet of water. Newhall Ranch does not need groundwater, Harter asserted. "That's a totally false assumption. It's only political rhetoric,'' advanced by Ventura County officials who want to stop the project, he said. Moreover, CH2M Hill has examined water practices in the Santa Clarita Valley and determined a perennial safe yield of the aquifer. No one suggests pumping beyond that safe yield, Harter said. In fact, he said, bringing more water into the area would add to the aquifer and Santa Clara River. When homeowners water their yards, some of the imported water will run off into the river and some will trickle into the aquifer, he said. "The water practices in the Santa Clarita Valley actually benefit Ventura County," Harter asserted. That position is a tough sell to Ventura County politicians, farmers and environmentalists who have lined up in opposition to Newhall Ranch. They contend Newhall has not adequately identified its water source and fear once the project gets going, groundwater will be the easiest source. Newhall Ranch is "very, very similar" to the Diablo Grande resort project in Stanislaus County, said Susan Brandt-Hawley, an attorney for Stanislaus Natural Heritage Project. Brandt-Hawley successfully challenged the Diablo Grande EIR on grounds that it deferred a decision on how the project would get water. Diablo Grande was first proposed during the early 1990s as a high-end resort consisting of 5,000 housing units, a hotel and conference center, golf course and other resort amenities on 30,000 acres in the usually parched mountains west of Interstate 5. The county-approved EIR required only that Diablo Grande identify a long-term water supply to move beyond a "five-year buildout," which comprised mostly roads and golf courses. However, the Fifth District Court of Appeal in 1996 said postponing "any analysis whatsoever of the impacts of supplying water to this project until after the adoption of the specific plan calling for the project to be built would appear to be putting the cart before the horse." The court said decision-makers must know the sources of water -- and impacts of using that water -- when approving a proposed development, Brandt-Hawley said. "They need to do more than defer and give a general laundry list of where they are going to get it," Brandt-Hawley said. The laundry-list approach does not tell the Board of Supervisors of impacts or provide them with options for a smaller project, she said. Randele Kanouse, an East Bay Municipal Utility District lobbyist who argues for stronger analyses of development's water sources, said builders should not be allowed to rely on the State Water Project. "The State Water Project has existing contracts to deliver 4.2 million acres feet of water a year, and the most it has ever delivered is 2.4 million acre feet," he said. Kanouse had not looked at the Newhall Ranch EIR recently but said his earlier review left him with many questions. Environmental impact reports almost never consider water sources during three- to five-year stretches of drought, which are common in California, he said. Ron Bottorff, president of Friends of the Santa Clara River, said Los Angeles County supervisors are not considering Newhall Ranch's impacts. "I don't see how we can keep approving vast development plans without identifying sources of water for them," he said. "I don't think they (Newhall Ranch) can get enough water in extreme drought years without over-pumping the aquifer." Such pumping would damage the underground portion of the river, he said. But Harter, the Newhall Ranch executive, said environmentalists have sounded a false alarm. "We don't need water at this stage because this is a general plan amendment and zone change," Harter said. Newhall must prove it has a stable water supply when it presents tract maps to the county for approval. The specific plan, EIR, and general plan amendment all contain safeguards to ensure Newhall Ranch does not result in a net loss of groundwater, he said. Experts have provided enough information about water sources and related impacts to satisfy the California Environmental Quality Act, he said. "Ventura County's concerns have been very adequately addressed by Los Angeles County," Harter said. Brandt-Hawley, however, said it is too late to study the water issue after the county approves the general plan amendment and rezoning because the project is assured at that point. "You are supposed to look at the bottom line first," she said. Los Angeles County officials never looked at the bottom line from Ventura County's perspective, said Flynn, the Ventura County supervisor. "Those people didn't give one inch. The same issues exist today as when the (draft) EIR was completed," he said. Flynn is convinced Newhall Ranch will turn to groundwater during drought years, which could prevent the underground river from going over a rock formation and into a vital agricultural valley. Los Angeles County officials expect to give Newhall Ranch final approval early this year. Newhall has started market research for the first phase of development and intends to begin building in 2001, Harter said. While Los Angeles County formalizes its approval, Ventura County supervisors, who are not unanimous in opposition to Newhall Ranch, continue to talk with their attorneys about a lawsuit, Flynn said. Supervisors also are talking with environmental groups, including the Sierra Club and the Environmental Defense Center. "It could be a definite issue for the future of agriculture in the state of California," he said. Bottorff, from friends of the Santa Clara River, suggested Ventura County will get a friendly reception from environmental groups such as his, which serves as an umbrella organization for the Sierra Club, the Audubon Society, Santa Clarita Organization for Planning the Environment and others. Both Flynn and Bottorff contend Newhall wields too much political influence. Newhall, which owns 93,000 acres, including 7,000 acres in Ventura County contiguous to Newhall Ranch, gets what it wants from Los Angeles County and the state, Bottorff said. Dave Van Atta, planning deputy for L.A. County Supervisor Mike Antonovich, who represents the area, said the county would not hesitate to reject a specific Newhall Ranch subdivision if the company does not have a permanent water supply nailed down. To do otherwise would violate the county's development monitoring system, he said - adding that a violation of the system would increase the likelihood of a successful lawsuit from Ventura County and citizen activist groups in the area. Contacts: Jim Harter, senior vice president, Newhall Ranch, (805) 255-4000. John Flynn, supervisor, Ventura County, (805) 487-6331. Ron Bottorff, president, Friends of the Santa Clara River, (805) 498-4323. Randele Kanouse, lobbyist, East Bay Municipal Utility District, (916) 443-6948.

The California Supreme Court has agreed to review an appellate court decision that ruled the City of Los Angeles should not be held liable for landslide-related damage to a property in the Pacific Palisades even though it violated municipal code requirements. In Haggis v. City of Los Angeles, Supreme Court Docket No. S074364, property owner Paul Haggis argued that his house was damaged by a landslide triggered in the 1994 Northridge earthquake, and later condemned and demolished by the city. After the house was demolished, Haggis filed a claim with the city under the Tort Claims Act. The city denied the claim and then Haggis sued, arguing that the city violated four municipal code section between 1966 and 1979, thus preventing Haggis from discovering the true condition of the property when he purchased it in 1991. In particular, Haggis argued, that in the '60s and '70s the city failed to record notices of substandard condition; issued permits to permit reconstruction and expansion of the house after prior landslides without requiring dangerous conditions to be corrected; and failing to halt or prevent work on the property until the substandard conditions had been supplied. But the appellate court ruled in favor of the city, concluding among other things that the statute of limitations had run out. The appellate court ruling was reported in the CP&DR Legal Digest, November 1998.

As California's post-recession economy picks up steam, many city and county planning departments are revisiting an important policy document that serves as one of the pillars of the community's planning. Contrary to expectation, however, this policy document is not the general plan. It's the zoning ordinance — a document that serves as the workhorse of day-to-day land-use planning but can easily be rendered obsolete or irrelevant by a rapidly changing economy or a highly political planning environment. It remains to be seen, however, whether communities are open to a wholesale rethinking of the concept of zoning. Though some policy analysts are pushing for performance-oriented standards, such standards have proven difficult to administer — and could create an open-ended system of analysis similar to environmental impact reports. Most communities appear to feel more comfortable tweaking the existing ordinance by simplifying it and focusing on potentially controversial land uses. Without question, however, there is concern and discontent in the planning community over the traditional site- and use-specific approach to zoning regulations. In residential subdivisions, deed covenants — administered by homeowner associations — are becoming the norm. Meanwhile, in commercial areas, the concept of separate uses has become increasingly irrelevant, as businesses combine activities in unpredictable combinations under one roof. "I've heard more than one planning director say, ‘I don't care what goes on in the building so long as it looks nice'," says Paul Crawford, a principal with Crawford Multari & Clark in San Luis Obispo, who says he is currently revising 12 different zoning ordinances around the state In response to this concern, communities and policy advocates throughout California and the country are using various methods to reform zoning. Among them are the following: o Perhaps the most common step communities are taking is to revisit the all-important "list of uses" — the list specifying which land uses are permissible in each zoning district. Given the rapidly changing economy, it's hard for any community to keep such a list current. Furthermore, changing poltiical circumstances make it hard to predict which uses might be controversial in the future. o Partly because of the difficulty in keeping such lists current, some communities appear to be considering a move toward "performance zoning," which emphasizes minimizing the impact of a building and its use on neighbors. o Along the same lines, a team of market-oriented public policy researchers in Los Angeles are calling for a move away from cumbersome zoning regulations toward performance standards based in nuisance law. o And at the same time, many advocates of The New Urbanism are proposing that zoning ordinances move in the opposite direction. They do not challenge the basic concept of zoning ordinance as a dense and comprehensive set of regulations, but rather propose that the ordinance be altered to favor traditional-style development patterns. Underlying much of the problem appears to be not just rapid economic change but also the peculiar nature of zoning as a tool to implement community planning. Critics across the spectrum agree that zoning decisions are often much more political "in real life" than the actual policy language would suggest. They say that zoning ordinances often appear to provide certainty and consistency, but many times they are used to provide political cover for potentially controversial land-use decisions. "The overall framework of zoning doesn't work, but the politics of local government has enveloped it," says Samuel Staley, a researcher with the Reason Public Policy Institute in Los Angeles, which recently issued a report proposing market-based alternatives to traditional zoning. Lloyd Zola of LSA Associates in Riverside, a longtime California planning consultant, agrees that local politics often distorts the seemingly clear regulatory framework of a traditional zoning ordinance. Often, he argues, the code will include permitted uses, but require conditional use permits in individual situations that provides local planning commissions with an "out" in case of public opposition. "There should not be a situation where a use is permitted in a plan when you wouldn't want it actually approved," says Zola, who has been wrestling with the development code for the Eastside Reservoir recreation plan for the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California. Increasingly, advocates of reform point to the concept of "performance zoning" as a possible alternative to the traditional use-based zoning ordinance. Under the performance zoning concept, individual development projects must meet community performance and impact standards, rather than conform to a specific list of uses. Performance zoning is preferable, Zola suggested, because no longer is the "list of uses" used as cover for a political problem: "Right now, we're using the type of use as a substitute to try to answer a question like how many truck trips are there?" Design their elegance as a concept, performance zoning standards have not proven popular. Many communities that have adopted them are now moving back toward traditional zoning ordinances, while their popularity has not spread. In recent years, for example, the pioneering performance zoning system in Fort Collins, Colorado, has been cut back. And a perfomrnance system in Tallahassee, Florida, has been replaced by a traditional ordinance. The reasons vary — but in large part they boil down to the apparent fact that performance standards can be difficult to administer and don't provide a clear picture of what a landowner may do with his or her land. Landowners in Tallahassee complained that they had to hire engineers and other consultants to determine what was permissible. "There is a fear among planners that they can't control the future with performance zoning," observed Staley. Though he's an advocate of performance standards, he acknowledged that traditional zoning regulations provide "an illusion of certainty" that is politically attractive to communities across the country. If performance standards are harder for landowners to understand, they are also harder for planning departments to administer. "For the counter planner, a traditional zoning ordinance is simple," says Zola. "You look down the M-1 list and you see whether it's allowed or not. You can operate with a less experienced, more entry-level staff. It requires far less discretionary thinking." By contrast, he adds, "it's harder to measure, enforce, and make performance determinations for every use with performance standards." In lieu of such radical departure, many communities appear to be pursuing a more incremental approach by trimming and refining the "use list". Consultant Crawford says he is working with many cities and counties to cut down the "encyclopedic list" to a more "generic list" — for example, collapsing 8 or 10 categories of "retail commerce" to just one or two. Such an approach allows a city or county to process most land uses routinely, while still calling out potentially controversial uses for special consideration. "Pet stores are a hot item everywhere right now," Crawford says. "I'm not quite sure why." Crawford acknowledges that the fine-tuning approach isn't self-executing, and that zoning ordinance "tune-ups" are still required on regular basis. But, he says, "we're trying to design them to make them easier to update." Meanwhile, Staley and Lynn Scarlette of the Reason Public Policy Institute are attempting to fine-tune their own efforts to persuade planners to move in a more "market-oriented" direction. Staley said Reason hopes to build on the appeal of performance-based zoning by creating a model ordinance that would focus on resolving nuisance-oriented problems rather than controlling every aspect of a business's activities. But he says Reason is not wedded to a specific solution — a critique he has of New Urbanist zoning ordinances, who he claims simply want to replace the old segregation of uses approach with a new, integrated-use approach: "If you're just saying, here's the problem and here's the answer, you'll run into trouble. That's what's happening with the New Urbanists. Contacts: Paul Crawford, Crawford, Multari & Clark, (805) 941-2622. Lloyd Zola, LSA Associates, (909) 781-9310. Samuel Staley, Reason Public Policy Institute, (937) 848-8896.

The City of South San Francisco isn't required to compensate a property owner for the city's own leasehold interest in the property - as well as the value of the property itself - in an eminent domain action, the First District Court of Appeal has ruled. The case involves South San Francisco's decision to take the property of the Mayer family by eminent domain - property that the city had already leased from the Mayers for use as a city conference center. The Mayers leased the property to the city in 1989 for 20 years. The city paid no rent for the first 18 months, during which the city constructed the conference center at a cost of $7.5 million. (The property had previously been used as a warehouse.) The city agreed to pay all expenses and surrender all improvements to the Mayers at the end of the lease term. The lease did contain a condemnation clause in case the city wanted to take the property. In 1997, the city initiated eminent domain proceedings against the property but specifically not against the leasehold. The city valued the property at between $4.3 million and $5.15 million, which did not include the value of the leasehold. The Mayers valued the property at $9.5 million, including the value of the leasehold interest, which the city had not condemned. San Mateo County Superior Court Judge Shelton Phrasel ruled in favor of the city and the First District, Division Two, affirmed. In court, the Mayers argued that under the lease agreement the city could not initiate eminent domain proceedings against the property alone and not against the leasehold as well. But the First District disagreed. Instead, the court agreed with the city's argument that it is possible to condemn only the property and not the leasehold based on three strands of eminent domain law - specifically, (1) the requirement that property be condemned only for a "necessary" public purpose, (2) the notion that a public agency cannot be required to either purchase an interest it already owns or purchase more property than is "necessary", and (3) the legal prohibition against reading a contract to require a city to exercise its eminent domain power in any particular way. The Mayers argued that a public agency must take its own contractual obligations into account when it exercises the power of eminent domain because if it does not it would place landowners at a severe disadvantage in eminent domain proceedings. But the First District concluded that "none of Mayer's parade of horribles convinces us that the City should be required to compensate Mayer for the value of the leasehold interest." The Case: City of South San Francisco v. Mayer, No. A081531, 98 Daily Journal D.A.R. 11910 (issued October 27, 1998; publication ordered November 23, 1998). The Lawyers: For South San Francisco: David Skinner, (510) 351-4300. For the Mayers: George Yuhas, (415) 773-5446.

The proposed expansion of Farmers Market in Los Angeles raises an important question: Can "theme-park" architecture co-exist with "real" urbanism? By now, everyone is familiar with the coming urban apocalypse known as "Disney-fication" or "the theming of America." Outside of Las Vegas and Hollywood Boulevard, this phenomenon has largely been limited to suburban "entertainment centers," which are usually anchored by multiplex theaters and sell fast food and other "impulse" items amid an atmosphere of dislocated, cinema-like fantasy. Entertainment centers are now in vogue with developers, who want to develop them everywhere. The Grove at Farmers Market is arguably the first large-scale entertainment center to be built in a mature, urbanized area in Los Angeles. But how well will this new project co-exist with the original Farmers Market, a landmark collection of small wooden buildings that has stood here for 60 years? And how well will this themed development fit into the surrounding Fairfax District? Fairfax, after all, is one of a comparatively few pedestrian-oriented streets, bustling with Orthodox Jews, émigré Israelis, and Hollywood types. In other words, Fairfax is one of the unquestionably "real" places in Los Angeles. Alarmists and worst-case scenarists may wish to cite "Unreal America: Architecture and Illusion" by the doyenne of architectural critics, Ada Louise Huxtable. In the introduction, she writes that "surrogate experience and surrogate environments have become the American way of life. Distinctions are no longer made, or deemed necessary, between the real and the false...." Elsewhere, she adds that "themed parodies pass for places now, serving as the new planning and design models, even as real places with their full freight of art and memories are devalued and destroyed." Huxtable's argument is not black-and-white, however. Her view is nuanced enough to admit the originality of Citywalk, a built-to-order shopping street that has long been excoriated by some as a privatized ripoff of a Hollywood street scene. I'm not as worried about the phony vs. the real as Huxtable appears to be. Architecture, in fact, has traditionally retailed in forms and images that are clearly unreal, starting with the bank in the form of a Roman temple, the suburban house in the form of a Tudor cottage, or the public library in the form of a Renaissance Florentine orphanage. Yesterday's phony building often becomes today's landmark. Indeed, the venerable Farmers Market itself is a group of roadside buildings of the 1930s, decked out to resemble a group of barns. That said, the issue of phony vs. real did leap out at me when I took a first glance at the new master plan for The Grove at Farmers Market. Here, the developers - upscale retailing guru Rick Caruso and the long-time owner of Farmers Market, the Gilmore family - plan to create what will be virtually a new urban district made up of ready-made fantasy streets with rows of tarted up, faux-historical buildings. The site plan, designed by the San Francisco-based architectural firm of Kaplan McLaughlin Diaz, certainly looks urbane; it almost could be a miniature city unto itself. But the street grid of this new "city" is not simple or straightforward. Like the streets in a Hollywood stage set, they twist and turn, including a curved with an "endless" vista that could have been borrowed from the backlot of 20th Century Fox. The "center" is Town Square, a well designed and well-scaled urban space of roughly 200 by 300 feet, which has the simplicity, albeit of a self-conscious kind, of an old courthouse square. A pair of parking structures conceals an oil field on the property; at six stories, they are by far the tallest structures in the project. Another constraint of the site is an historic adobe, with existing gardens. The master-plan architects have made the garden into a visual centerpiece for a three-story office building and several restaurants. Another quaint touch is the so-called "Red Cars", which are actually rubber-wheeled jitneys that carry shoppers back and forth between the new multiplex and the original Farmers Market buildings. If the shopping mall is inward looking, the site planners have been conscientious about maintaining an urbane edge on Third Street. The project actually creates a "street wall" of construction where none previously existed, and breaks the monotony every 200 hundred feet or so, when "streets" or passages into the mall open onto Third Street. The site plan seems more intent on framing views or present certain illusions rather than being strictly functional. In this case, creating surprises and enchanting scenes is functional, in a sense: Caruso, the developer, has said that he wants shoppers to stay three or four hours at his centers, rather than rush in, make a purchase, and rush out. Keeping customers on the premises means creating a place where visitors like to hang out. The toughest issue with the scheme is not the site plan but the buildings themselves. These buildings are two cuts above the kind of nostalgic fluff found in many present-day developments. The designers at Kaplan McLaughlin have demonstrated they can design historicist buildings in a literate and witty style. Yet the original Farmers Market buildings, with their naïve detailing, are no match for the sophisticated razzle-dazzle of the new buildings. It's not as if the old buildings are particularly distinguished; they are not. But Farmers Market is a genuine landmark that may appear swamped by the village of fantasy retail that it has engendered. The developers were wise to try and recreate the old Farmers Market. Still, The Grove at Farmers Market does come on a little strong. But The Grove is not Disneyland: the project is designed to fit into a real city street. The project has replaced the long parking-lot frontage along Third Street with some interesting elevations and open spaces. At the end of the day, projects are worthwhile because they provide some of the basic pleasures and functions of good urbanism. That is why The Grove may be successful even after this technicolor project has bleached in the sun for a few years. As for theme-parks and authenticity, we should keep in mind that, two generations ago, Farmers Market was a roadside novelty. Today's fantasy street may be tomorrow's real thing.

A major land deal to preserve thousands of acres of Southern California desert land is in the works between a land conservation organization and the Catellus Corporation. Acquisition of the land is considered as significant for Southern California as the Headwaters Forest acquisition has been in Northern California. U.S. Senator Dianne Feinstein threw her support behind the proposal in mid-December. Feinstein, a longtime supporter of efforts to create two national parks and a national preserve in the desert in 1994, sits on the Senate's Interior Appropriation Subcommittee, and could be crucial to getting the $36 million in federal funds for the deal. Catellus, formerly the real estate division of Santa Fe Pacific Corp., owns thousands of acres of land in the desert including land inside the Mojave National Preserve. The Wilderness Conservancy, which is trying to broker the deal, had previously purchased 14,000 acres from Catellus inside the boundaries of Joshua Tree National Park. Under the proposed deal, Catellus would sell 430,000 acres in the desert to Wilderness Conservancy, based in Yucaipa. The land would include 86,000 acres inside the 1.6-million-acre Mojave National Preserve, 140,000 acres of desert habitat between Barstow and Needles and 206,000 acres in 19 federal wilderness areas in the desert. The land is home to the endangered desert tortoise. The conservancy also hopes to acquire another 45,000 acres of land from other sources for a total acquisition of 475,000 acres. The Catellus-owned land is scattered throughout some 4 million acres of federal land, according to David Myers, executive director of the Wilderness Conservancy. Much of the Catellus land consists of alternate sections given by the federal government to the railroads in the 19th Century as an incentive to build new track. If the land were developed with homes and fences, it would mar views and impact wildlife corridors in the surrounding federal land, he said. "Four million acres would be impacted by the purchase of 400,000 acres," he said. Catellus has sold some of its land in San Bernardino County to private landowners, and new landowners have erected gates and fences, which limit access to nearby public lands. "For sale" signs for Catellus property have been erected inside the Mojave National Preserve, Myers said. Under the deal, the Wilderness Conservancy also plans to buy the remaining 20,000 acres of private land inside Joshua Tree National Park from other small private landowners. The conservancy would donate land back to the national park, and would put up $11 million in cash for land acquisition from Catellus. The group is seeking $36 million from the federal government for the remaining costs for land acquisition. The money would come from the federal Land and Water Conservation Fund. Mojave National Scenic Area and Joshua Tree and Death Valley National Parks were created in 1994 when Congress approved the Desert Protection Act. The measure also created over 100 new wilderness areas. Myers planned to meet with Catellus's president in mid-December. The company has not committed to the deal. But one Catellus executive told the Los Angeles Times that "it's a pretty good offer." The Wilderness Conservancy is one of the west's largest land trusts, with title to 150,000 acres in Southern California. Contacts: David Myers, Wilderness Conservancy, (909) 797-8507.