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I’ve been thinking about Taco Bell a lot.  I think about it whenever I jog past my favorite coffee shop. I think about it whenever I feel pangs for a Hinano burger or a small batch sour IPA at The Daily Pint. I think about it whenever I look at my Yelp bookmarks.  As I’ve written before, local stores and restaurants are bedrock institutions of the urban experience. Cities are fundamentally gathering places. But we don’t “gather” by the millions. We gather by threes and fours and ones and twos in restaurants, cafes, bars, and coffee places. They are as fragile as they are important. A world of ubiquitous Taco Bells was envisioned not by stoned teenagers but rather by the 1993 cinematic specimen Demolition Man . In it, supervillain Wesley Snipes is cryogenically imprisoned like so much seasoned beef and thawed in 2032 in the West Coast megalopolis of "San Angeles." Sylvester Stallone is a cop who was similarly frozen and similarly thawed so he can rearrest Snipes. In this sanitized future, vices like swearing have been eradicated and, chillingly, only minimal personal contact is permitted. Among these futuristic trappings, the bewildered Stallone finds but one dining option: everything from fine dining to fast food, comes courtesy of a preposterously hegemonic version of Taco Bell.  The film does not quite explain how every other restaurant disappeared. But now I have an inkling: a viral pandemic may have screwed up the commercial real estate market.  The shutdown imposed to slow the contagion of the coronavirus has already hastened the demise of an untold number of local outlets, especially restaurants. Rent is due, and takeout surely doesn’t cover the bill — especially in ultra-expensive markets like much of coastal California.  Normally, after enough missed payments, landlords will evict. Vacancy does nothing for a landlord, so he or she has to find a new tenant. And, normally, if the landlord is savvy, or lucky, she gets a better tenant who can pay more and/or succeed longer. That’s sometimes sad, but it’s mostly fine. It’s capitalism.  Here’s where we make a run for the border. (There’s a slogan that hasn’t aged well.)  If a going concern—be it a decades-old dive bar or the experimental Peruvian pizza place--can’t survive at a given location in the pandemic economy, what could possibly take its place? And at what lease rates? Even if rents fall and/or landlords cut deals, literally no one other than enormous, well capitalized chains is going sign a lease any time soon.  The most direct way to avoid this catastrophe is for landlords to give their tenants some breaks. If landlords and tenants (and landlords’ mortgage holders) can share the pain, everyone can make less money, but possibly survive. The question here — and this of course applies to residential real estate too — is where will the buck stop? Will everyone cooperate for the long-term good? Or will banks stick it to landlords? Will landlords stick it to tenants? Will tenants stick it to …whom? Though small retail tenants are the ones who contribute the most to the urban fabric, they have the least leverage and are the least fungible. A bank is mostly an assemblage of 1’s and 0’s. But independent restaurants are like endemic species in old-growth forests. They can’t just hippity-hoppity over to the next grove when theirs is chopped down.  Assuming that Rambo is not about to parachute in and save America from the virus, I fear that the death rate for restaurants is going to be shocking — without a serious advocacy campaign, some effective local regulations, and/or a credible threat of having to drink Pepsi for the rest of eternity.  I’m trying to address Steps 1 and 3 right now.  As for Step 2, cities have traditionally allowed restaurants to perish before their eyes. They love to subsidize billion-dollar projects like stadiums, and they trip over themselves for Amazon . But they take for granted institutions that nourish their communities, economically, socially, and literally. Of course, these regulations and whatever emergency measures cities are concocting are too little, too late. At this point in the crisis, cities are going to have to rely on the resilience of restaurateurs and the enlightened self-interest of landlords. If that doesn’t materialize, though, and the restaurant apocalypse comes to pass because of unforgiving landlords, it’s going to be terrible. And it would be doubly terrible if landlords oust their tenants only to replace them with plywood and tax write-downs. And as people find other places to eat, planners will have to find new ways to bring life to their cities. Update: Since this blog was posted,  Senate Bill 939 has been introduced to create some protections for small businesses, including a moratoria on evictions and the right to renegotiate rents.

Budget Revision Copes with Revenue Shortfall; Allocates $1.5 Billion to Local Jurisdictions The COVID-19 pandemic prompted dramatic changes to Gov. Gavin Newsom’s proposed 2020-21 budget, originally released in January and recently updated in the “ May Revise .” With state revenues expected to fall by $54 billions for the current and upcoming fiscal years, compared to projections, the May Revise reduces the upcoming year’s budget from $222 billion to $203 billion. Most notably for local governments, the May Revise allocates some of the state’s federal CARES Act funding to local governments: $450 million will be allocated to directly to cities and $1.3 billion to counties, which may allocate further funds to cities. That's on top of $1.5 billion in CARES funding already allocated to large cities and counties . The May Revise maintains previously announced programs to preserve and increase the state’s housing supply, including initiatives to streamline permitting and to leverage existing state and federal housing funds. The May Revise maintains $500 million in low-income housing state tax credits; the SB 2 real estate transaction fee, estimated at $277 million for 2020-21, for affordable housing; allocates $452 million from Cap-and-Trade auction proceeds for infill development. The May Revise includes the following reductions to housing and land-use related programs: $250 million in mixed-income development funds over the next three years; $200 million in infill infrastructure grant funds; $115 million in other housing program funds. Overcrowded Housing Puts Essential Workers at Risk of COVID-19 While most Californians have been staying home to reduce coronavirus transmission, the Public Policy Institute of California reports that overcrowded homes among California's essential workforce means a large number of Californians face substantial risk of illness within their own households. Physical distancing and self-isolation can be virtually impossible in crowded homes. As the high cost of housing is a stark reality for nearly two-thirds of Californians, finding affordable housing can mean cohabiting with several other people. California's overcrowding rate is well above the national average; the share of housing units with more than one occupant per room is 8.3 percent compared with 3.4 percent across the nation. essential workers - who make up one-third of California's labor force --are required to be physically present. Essential workers are more likely than nonessential workers to live in overcrowded housing--16 percent versus 12 percent. That share is almost double for workers in farming (31 percent), and food preparation/serving (29 percent). A recent study confirms there is a clear link between COVID-19 deaths and essential workers who live in overcrowded homes, though the relationship is muddied by regional differences. Transportation Agencies May Lose $11 Billion Due to Pandemic  As California’s transportation agencies look to plan in the context of uncertain revenue streams because of the COVID-19 pandemic,  findings  from the Mineta Transportation Institute suggest that revenue shortfalls are not inevitable, even if the economy recovers slowly. The study used a spreadsheet model and well-known data sources to project transportation revenues under multiple economic recovery scenarios. The mean total projected revenues in 2030 range from $9.4 billion to a high of $11.4 billion in a scenario that pairs a fast economic recovery with Zero Emission Vehicle stimulus policies. Across all six scenarios, gasoline taxes remain at least half of revenues through 2030. But the user fees levied on ZEVs could replace and even exceed the state revenue that will be lost because of declining gasoline sales tax revenue. ZEVs are, on average, more expensive than standard cars, and that additional value accrues to the state through existing Transportation Improvement Fees. Opposition to Development Derives from Antipathy Toward Developers  A new study from the UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy finds new challenges for planners who are interested in addressing housing shortages through increased market-rate supply. Anti-developer sentiment, it turns out, is a powerful driver of anti-development attitudes. The survey of 1,300 randomized respondents in Los Angeles County evaluated how attitudes change in response to different context, or frames, including traffic and parking, neighborhood character, strain on services, and developer profit. The results showed that developer profit has the largest association with opposition to development by 20 points relative to a control group when survey respondents are told a developer will likely earn a large profit from the building. (See related CP&DR commentary .) CP&DR Podcast: Senate Bill 35; Horton Plaza; Telecommuting; Online Meetings; Project for Public Spaces On the recent episode of the CP&DR podcast , Bill Fulton and Josh Stephens discuss the latest planning news, and Josh interviews Meg Walker, senior placemaker at the Project for Public Spaces, about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on attitudes toward and the future of public space. Quick Hits & Updates In a split decision with wide-ranging implications, the United States Supreme Court  ruled that states are not allowed to copyright their building codes or annotated guidance for those regulations. The decision could help make these codes more widely available as a public resource, and has implications for software companies seeking to automate code compliance processes. To better understand the connection between concentrated disadvantage and neighborhood change and eviction, a study funded by UCLA's Institute on Inequality and Democracy analyzed publicly available California eviction court records for the state's largest counties over a decade. The findings indicate that court-based evictions are significantly more likely to occur in neighborhoods with low-income households and racial minorities than in areas experiencing rapid neighborhood changes. A federal magistrate has dismissed Oakland's antitrust suit against the National Football League over the Raiders' impending move to Los Vegas, finding no evidence that the NFL's actions - the $378 million fee it charged the Raiders, or its refusal to expand beyond 32 teams - interfered with competition or violated the city's rights. To accommodate much-need housing for farmworkers, Ventura County is exempting a proposed housing development from the county's Save Open Space and Agricultural Resources (SOAR) initiative that requires voter approval to rezone agricultural land. With 360 planned units, the Somis Ranch farmworker housing project would be the largest farmworker housing development in the county. The UCLA Center for Neighborhood Knowledge  published a resource for public agencies and community organizations that help vulnerable renters. The study identifies the neighborhoods with the highest concentration of renters in Los Angeles County at the greatest risk of losing their jobs and homes because of the COVID-19 crisis. The study also identifies the challenges of implementing new temporary renter protection policies and recommends steps local officials and communities can use to target resources in recovery efforts. Mayor London Breed announced a plan to improve conditions in San Francisco's Tenderloin district, following a lawsuit against the city for failing to address the crowds of people encamped on Tenderloin's sidewalks. The plan's goals include offering "safe sleeping alternatives," and hygiene stations, along with closing streets to encourage social distancing. UC Berkley's Terner Center is recommending a federally-supported emergency rental assistance directly to the millions of households who are unable to make rent due to pandemic-related job and income loss. The center's analysis shows that nearly 16.5 million renter households have at least one worker in an industry likely to be immediately affected by efforts to slow COVID-19 spread. Los Angeles is putting measures in place to protect tenants from landlords who have reportedly attempted to skirt eviction moratoriums. Under a law passed by the City Council, renters could win penalties of up to $10,000 per violation, with disabled or senior tenants eligible for more. Tenant advocates have complained about landlords posting legally unenforceable eviction notices and attempting to lay claim to stimulus checks from tenants who don't understand their rights. The  Berkeley City Council has signaled it may drop the option for developers to pay a fee in lieu of including affordable housing in otherwise market-rate projects if those projects are 10 or more units and within any of the city's federal Opportunity Zones. Created by the 2017 Tax Cuts and Jobs Act, an opportunity zone is a federally designated community where new investments are eligible for preferential tax treatment. (See related CP&DR coverage .)

The City of Sacramento will have to rescind its denial of a controversial gas station in the Curtis Park neighborhood because City Councilmember Jay Schenirer publicly opposed the project before the City Council considered it in a quasi-judicial hearing.

Bill Fulton and Josh Stephens discuss the latest planning news, and Josh interviews Meg Walker , senior placemaker at the Project for Public Spaces , about the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on attitudes toward and the future of public space. Click here for access on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and other platforms. Related Articles The Silicon Valley Battle Over SB 35 San Diego's Iconic Horton Plaza to be Reborn as Tech Hub Will Telecommuting Stick? Planning Meetings Move Online  Will Silicon Valley Be Ground Zero For SB 35?

With coronavirus-induced remote work cutting traffic and air pollution by dramatic levels, California’s regional planning agencies are laying plans to keep telecommuting at high levels once the pandemic has subsided. And the state may soon follow suit. "The entire State of California is going through an amazing real-time experiment in cleaner air and less congested roads," Lucy Dunn, head of the Orange County Business Council, said at the California Transportation Commission meeting on May 13 . She and fellow commissioner Joseph Lyou, who was a longtime member of the South Coast Management District Board, challenged Caltrans director Toks Omishakin to come up with a plan to incentivize employees to work at home more in order to effectively increase Caltrans's road capacity Omishakin said Caltrans itself had pivoted toward telework -- 85% of its employees now work at home, up from 5% at the beginning of the COVID crisis -- and promised to "look into it". Most regional planning agencies already have a transportation demand management (TDM) program, which is designed to work with employers to provide such traffic-reduction techniques carpool and vanpool services and transit passes. These programs are often undertaken in conjunction with air pollution control districts. But TDM programs have experienced only marginal success, and the potential for remote work – as evidenced by its success during the COVID-19 crisis – appears much more promising than any other technique. “In our region, air quality, where the measuring stations are, we’re 73% better than it was a year ago,” SANDAG’s executive director Hasan Ikhrata said told San Diego’s Channel 7 . “We see an opportunity here for more employers to allow their employees to work from home at least some of the time and that could have a huge impact." SANDAG is currently doing a survey of employers to assess their interest. So far the regional planning agencies have taken the lead, but the state might step up as the COVID crisis winds down. “Businesses have implemented telework policies at a scale we’ve never seen before, and meetings that would have taken place in person are now remote,” Louise Bedsworth, executive director of the Strategic Growth Council, told the PPIC Blog recently . “We’ve seen that these sorts of changes can rapidly reduce air pollution and greenhouse gas emissions. Looking ahead, we can think about how to incorporate some of these changes into how we work.” Traditionally, employers have been skeptical of telecommuting – especially working from home -- because managers have struggled with the challenge of holding employees accountable for their productivity. But the COVID-19 crisis has created a gigantic experiment in how to make telecomuting work. Not all workers can work from home – a wide range of workers in agriculture, industrial plants, the medical field, hotel and restaurants, transportation and many other sectors must work onsite. But the best estimates suggest that about half of the American workforce is currently staying home – and many employers are finding that productivity is holding steady, at least for now. So California’s metropolitan planning organizations and councils of governments, which have traditionally focused on incentivizing alternatives to commuting alone, are quickly pivoting toward a more broad-ranging and sophisticated approach. First, they are providing support to companies and employees who experience barriers that preent them from telecommuting. And second, they are rethinking their commute incentives, which currently assume that employees travel to work every day by the same mode of travel. For example, one of the biggest hurdles many employers and employees face has to do with the technology associated with working at home. In many cases, neither the employer nor the e employee has the equipment required to work at home – and oftentimes employees do not have the broadband service required. “I called up the mayor of Delano and asked if their employees were telecommuting,” said Ahron Hakimi, executive director of the Kern County Council of Governments. “And she said, no, because we don’t have laptops. Well, that’s something we can help with. We can use the COG’s money to buy laptops. And we can help with broadband too.” Indeed, the move toward telecommuting has raised another question: Can funds meant to incentivize employees to commute in alternative ways be used to help them work at home instead, Or, as Brian Griesenbeck, director of data and analytics at SACOG in Sacramento put it, “Can we use vanpool money to provide broadband?” Indeed, Greisenbeck and other SACOG officials have highlighted an important barrier to encouraging more telecommuting: Most incentives and programs are focused on a single mode of commuting. Some funds must be spent providing carpool or vanpool services. Others must be spent on bicycle facilities or transit passes. Many employers provide parking subsidies for their employees. The system, Greisenbeck says, “treats people as tribal” – meaning employees are divided into tribes devoted to one form of commuting only. But he says, “most people commute in a variety of ways.” So the trick will be to combine different governmental programs to encourage the maximum amount of alternative commuting, including remote work. This may require an overhaul in program rules to make funds more flexible – perhaps not just using vanpool money to provide broadband, but also providing more flexible financial incentives to employees, so they might work at home one day, commute by bike or transit the next, and drive alone when necessary. Overall, regional planners see the potential for the telecommute movement to revitalize their moribund TDM programs. Such programs were popular in the ‘80s and ‘90s, when business district management entities often worked together with regional planning agencies to provide carpool matching and vanpool services as well as – in pre-Uber times – cars that could serve as a “guaranteed ride home” in case of an emergency. But in the last 10 to 15 years, TDM programs have not grown and regional planning agencies have had difficulty getting employers interested in them. Prior to COVID-19, telecommuting didn’t get much attention either. Ikhrata told Channel 7 that in 2016, SANDAG received a federal grant to do a pilot telecommuting program with 10 companies. “Frankly, we couldn’t get 10 to participate, only had four,” he said. Now, however, regional planners see the opportunity to seize the moment. Greisenbeck said SACOG might seek to help companies beef up their information technology horsepower and revamp their human resources policies to make sure telecommuting sticks: “How do we help businesses make this part of their culture?” Contacts: Hasan Ikhrata, SANDAG, Hasan.Ikhrata@sandag.org Louis Bedsworth, Strategic Growth Council, louise.bedsworth@sgc.ca.gov Brian Greisenbeck, SACOG,  bgriesenbeck@ sacog .org Ahron Hakimi, Kern County COG, AHakimi@ kerncog . org

State Population Growth Flattens; Inland Areas See Most Gains California added only 87,494 residents in 2019 to bring the state's estimated total population to 39,782,870 people as of Jan. 1, 2020, according to new population estimates and housing data released by the California Department of Finance . California's population grew by only 0.2 percent, continuing a historically slow growth trend since the Great Recession. Growth remains strong in the interior counties of the Central Valley and the Inland Empire, while remaining modest in the Bay Area, and slowing to near zero and even negative in most of the coastal counties. Los Angeles County, the state's most populous county, has now lost population the last two years, dropping 0.3 percent in 2018 and 0.1 percent in 2019. Changes in population rankings for cities reinforce the movement towards inland counties; Modesto passed Santa Clarita as 17th largest city. Elk Grove is now the 27th largest city passing Rancho Cucamonga, Garden Grove, and Santa Rosa. Rosevelle is now the 40th largest city passing Pasadena. California's statewide housing growth, as measured by net unit growth in completed housing units for 2019, was 94,662 units making 2019 the first time the state has added more housing units than people. Total housing in California reached 14.3 million, a 0.7 percent increase. Newsom’s Sacramento Delta Plan Draws Lawsuits  Three of the most powerful groups in California water sued the state this week over Gov. Gavin Newsom's two-month-old plan for the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta . Environmental groups are charging the administration with not doing to protect endangered species. Meantime, beneficiaries of diverted delta water filed their own lawsuits over restrictions on water pumping that will result in significant new restrictions on supplies. A spokeswoman for Newsom's Natural Resources Agency said the administration "stands behind" its plan for operating the Delta. Rounding out the triumvirate of litigation is Gov. Newsom's feud with the Trump administration. Newsom announced in February he would sue the federal government over Trump's plans to deliver more water through the Delta. The status quo - the voluntary settlement agreement brokered by Gov. Jerry Brown's administration - appears to be falling apart. At least according to the State Water Contractors who said Newsom's plan "effectively ends the historic Voluntary Agreement process that brought together water agencies, regulators and conservation groups to tackle decades-old water resource problems.” State Moves to Give Mountain Lions Protected Status Regulators have taken a significant step toward adding mountains lions to the protected list under California's Endangered Species Act. Mountain lions were granted "candidate status" in six regions by the state Fish and Game Commission, which puts the big cats as little as one year away from protected status. The decision is only applicable to areas between the Bay Area and regions of Central and Southern California, where biologists estimate there are fewer than 500 lions. If the lions are added to California's endangered list, the state will be required to draft a recovery plan that include infrastructure changes like wildlife crossings. Currently, protections are being granted in piecemeal fashion in the courts. A 1,750-acre home development proposal in Temecula, for example, was blocked because the proposal did not adequately preserve areas where mountain lions cross under a freeway. (See related CP&DR coverage .) Census Data Suggests Shortage of 1 Million Homes for Poorest Households The National Low Income Housing Coalition’s recently released annual report suggests that improvements in the economy have mostly favored full-time workers and stockholders, and have not resolved the longstanding needs of low-income people who continue to struggle to find affordable and accessible housing - particularly in California. No state has an adequate supply of rental housing affordable available for extremely low-income households (residents with incomes at or below the poverty line or 30 percent of area median income, whichever is greater), the data shows. The shortage ranges from 8,202 rental homes in Wyoming to nearly one million in California, where there are 23 affordable homes for every 100 extremely low-income renter households. The states with the greatest percentage of extremely low-income renter households with severe cost burdens are Nevada (81 percent), Florida (79 percent), and California (77 percent). CP&DR Coverage: Developers Prevail in SB 35 Suits The battle over implementing SB 35 is playing out most ferociously in Silicon Valley – and in two new court rulings over the past month, both written by the same judge, developers have won the latest round. Both cases revolve around the question of how cities must apply objective design standards in an SB 35 case – and the rulings suggest that cities apply objective design and planning standards in a very clear way in order to stay out of legal trouble.  Quick Hits & Updates  UC Berkeley is facing criticism from local officials and some members of the community as it begins the scoping process for its new long-term development plan, which proposes to expand the university community by 23 percent in the next 15 years. UC Berkeley says it has no choice in the timing, as the university is required to conform to CEQA laws despite limited community engagement due to the COVID-19 lockdown. After years of legal battles and decades of neighborhood complaints, a West Fresno meat-rendering plant will shut down permanently by 2023 or incur hefty penalties. potentially clearing the way for housing and green space in a historically underprivileged part of town. Texas-based Darling Ingredients looked to be moving its plant to a more rural area until a relocation deal with the city fell through. The California State Transportation's $95 million grant to Inglewood for an elevated people mover to serve the new SoFi Field NFL stadium brings the amount of total secured funds to roughly $330 million of the nearly $1 billion needed to complete the project. Design plans are already underway, and officials say they don't expect the coronavirus pandemic to alter or delay construction plans. Inglewood expects to have the trains running sometime from 2024 to 2026. Los Angeles Metro's Crenshaw Line Northern Extension is supposed to break ground in 2041, but West Hollywood City Council is considering bumping up construction by as many as 15 years. West Hollywood is expected to contribute up to 25 percent of capital costs within the city to fast-track the project. Officials have their on multiple funding sources, but no specific funding from West Hollywood has been approved thus far. Amidst a housing crisis, Santa Monica emerges as a bright spot for its successful Affordable Housing Production Program (AHPP). A study published in the Housing Studies Journal found that inclusionary housing production by market-rate developers jumped by 15 percent in Santa Monica since the city adopted its 2010 General Plan, which included provisions that tied allowances in Floor Area Ratio, height and density to affordable housing unit requirements.  Despite last year's rainy reprieve, researchers who analyzed tree ring records, meteorological records, and climate models concluded that California is in 'megadrought' conditions not seen for 400 years, with one key difference: rising temperatures. The study, published in Science journal, corroborates what scientists have long warned policymakers: extreme warming will prolong natural dry cycles in the Western U.S. and areas of Mexico. A judge in Riverside County threw a lifeline to imperiled Southern California mountain lions, blocking a proposed 270-acre development in Western Riverside County. Part of the development sits on one of the only passages left for wildlife to move between coastal and inland mountains. The ruling came just days before state officials voted on whether to grant mountain lions protection under the Endangered Species Act. UC Berkeley released initial conceptual drawings for a 16-story housing complex and park at Peoples Park , a landmark in the Free Speech Movement of the 1960s. The design tries to balance the need for student housing, supportive housing and services for people who are formerly homeless, with the need for open space, according to the project's website. The City of Berkeley is considering increasing the zoning density to allow up to three 12-story buildings in the near vicinity. In a bid to restore dwindling fish populations in the Klamath Rive r, a nonprofit group is spearheading the removal of four dams in Northern California and Southern Oregon. The massive project, which was set into motion in 2016 and just received key approvals from the State Water Board, will normalize water temperatures, reduce fish disease, and reduce toxic algae growth. Laguna Beach officials are bucking a county directive to house homeless people at local hotels during the ongoing pandemic. While not the first city to oppose the order, Laguna Beach is the first to file a lawsuit. The county announced plans to fight the lawsuit, according to a statement from the OC Emergency Operations Center. OC officials secured 76 rooms at the Laguna Hills Inn as part of a roughly 550-bed countywide plan.

When it opened in 1985, development of the Horton Plaza shopping mall in San Diego was hailed as a blueprint for how retail can revitalize a downtown area. The mall in its heyday attracted millions of shoppers to the city’s core with its unorthodox, multicolored and multi-patterned postmodern architecture. The American Institute of Architects described architect Jon Jerde’s design as a “razzle-dazzle and unvarnished mix of architectural forms” that “raises basic cornball stuff momentarily to an effective level of ephemeral design.” It effectively turned San Diego’s downtown from a seedy area “that nobody wanted to come to” into a bona fide destination, according to San Diego City Councilmember Chris Ward. Now, the city and owner Stockdale Capital Partners are seeking a new version of “razzle-dazzle” in the form of the technology industry. Amid shifting shopping habits and changing opinions of what makes an urban core appealing, a developer is looking to significantly change the six-block concrete fortress by converting it into a mixed-use technology campus and opening it up to the neighborhood. The building’s zebra stripes and pink- and coral-colored arcades will give way to something a bit more sleek and corporate. “Horton Plaza used to be something special,” said Daniel Michaels, managing director at Stockdale, at a May 2019 meeting of the San Diego City Council. “Everyone knows that. I grew up going there as a kid. We want to make it special again and make it economically impactful to the community, and we think this does just that.” The jobs component is an important one for the project, as officials have bemoaned the fact that the city loses much of its young talent pool coming out of San Diego’s universities to tech-heavy cities like San Francisco and Seattle.

The battle over implementing SB 35 is playing out most ferociously in Silicon Valley – and in two new court rulings over the past month, both written by the same judge, developers have won the latest round. Both cases revolve around the question of how cities must apply objective design standards in an SB 35 case – and the rulings suggest that cities apply objective design and planning standards in a very clear way in order to stay out of legal trouble.

Gov. Gavin Newsom suggested this week that certain restrictions will lift soon, possibly "in a matter of days." Obviously this will be a long process. But Californians can now poke their heads out the front door and assess the damage. It won’t be visible, like a Winnebago that’s been deposited on your front lawn by a tornado, and the storm won’t clear at once. We’ll probably still be carrying mental umbrellas down the sidewalk for a long while, dipping past each other reflexively to maintain distance. That’ll be good for the obliques. The impact on cities is less certain – though strong opinions abound. Pretty much everyone has become an urban planner since the outbreak began. You think of public space and contact with your neighbors differently when you think your neighbors might kill you, I suppose. We’ve all heard all the arguments : contagion thrives on density; the suburbs are healthier; public transit is dirty. We’ve also heard that density does not equal crowding; unhoused people are especially vulnerable; walking beats driving. People who don’t even know the word “density” are wondering if our cities are too dense. Some people who absolutely know the word density are exploiting the situation to add new moral heft to the idea of some suburban utopia that has never happened and never will happen. (James Brasuell at Planetizen did a heroic job compiling pieces on the density debates—and his catalog is probably just a faction of what’s out there.) This crisis is a failure of many things. It is a failure of public health policy. It is a failure of information dissemination. It’s arguably a failure of foreign policy. It’s definitely a failure of procurement. It is a failure of leadership at the highest levels. But it is not a failure of urban planning. And don’t let anyone tell you differently. Should planners be mindful of public health? Of course. But cities should not be expected to fix, or prevent, a pandemic any more than doctors should be expected to fix traffic on Highway 101 or the poverty rate in Watts. To prepare for the next pandemic we can stock up on ventilators and masks. We can invest in virology research . We can draft pandemic action plans and quarantine guidelines.  We can shelter at home sooner. We can choose not disband the federal Pandemic Response Team. We can treat viruses the way we treat geopolitics: we can unleash the medical-industrial complex and maintain an arsenal and we can make battle plans. And the “American way of life” can go on, hopefully with a little more wisdom and a little more compassion. If we take proper precautions—at every level of government and in every government—we won’t need to end public life as we know it, and we won’t need to colonize east Riverside and north Fresno with single-family homes. If we don’t take these precautions, all the arguments about density will be moot anyway. What that means is that, while world’s armchair planners and armchair epidemiologists carry on with their debates, actual planners should remain faithful to their missions. We don’t need to “ rethink ” cities because of the virus. We’ve been rethinking cities for a long time. As USC’s famously acerbic urban planning professor Lisa Schweitzer notes, “The issue is that density and its downsides require urban innovation, and in truth people innovate around density’s downsides all the time.” In California, planners have spent the past two decades trying to reintroduce density to cities. The results: SB 375 , vehicle miles travelled metrics , hundreds of billions of dollars for transit, more ambitious housing targets, and much more. These efforts are just beginning to bear fruit. We know how many housing units we still need, give or take a half-million. And we know about the ambiguities of density. Expertise is one thing. Public relations is another. As UCLA Professor David Shulman suggested when I interviewed him about the impending housing crisis: “If this gets seared into people’s consciousness, it could reduce density. Opponents will have new arguments against — valid or not, they’ll have an argument.” The density skeptics will remind us of this virus as often as possible. In response, planners are going to have to take a cue from the state’s medical community: they’re going to have to work like crazy not only to administer treatment but also to get the word out. Many planners are low-key sorts, happy to focus on details and the often-quiet work of policymaking. In the post-covid19 world, low-key isn’t going to cut it. COVID is a crisis, but it’s also a call to arms. Planners will have to explain, more forcefully and proactively than ever, why density is good. They will have to explain, in consultation with the actual epidemiologists, why concerns about contagion are reasonable but why they should not be conflated with density nor should they overwhelm the abundant, multifaceted, benefits of density – benefits that range from economic to social to aesthetic to, yes, physiological. Planners must not merely defend their field and their principles, as they so often do. They must champion them. They must present enthusiastic visions to regain what we had two months ago and to strive for more henceforth. I know this will require a monumental effort, especially when planning departments may be under-funded and under-staffed . But it will be worth it. When we get out of this, every day is going to feel like a parade. Planners can lead it. They should march right past the naysayers, megaphones in one hand, and invisible umbrellas in the other.

Court Rules in Favor of Los Altos Development, Bolsters SB 35 In what may well be a harbinger of how courts interpret Senate Bill 35, a Santa Clara Superior Court found Los Altos violated the law when the city denied a 15-unit development proposal. The developer had sought expedited approval under SB 35. Besides the ruling itself, the decision was striking in that the lead judge in the case found that Los Altos acted in bad faith under the Housing Accountability Act by blocking the project without merit in a way that goes beyond making a "benign error." The city initially claimed the project did not qualify because it didn't have enough affordable housing. When that claim failed scrutiny, city officials took issue with the number and accessibility of parking spaces. The decision isn't binding precedent, but pro-housing advocates hope judges, developers and city officials - who are still figuring out how to interpret the relatively new Senate Bill 35 - will look to the Los Altos ruling for guidance on how the law can be used in conjunction with other state housing laws. The suit was brought by pro-housing group California Renters Legal Advocacy & Education Fund. (See prior CP&DR commentary on SB 35.) Federal Government Narrows Protections on Bodies of Water The Trump Administration has published a revised rule defining which water bodies are subject to federal jurisdiction under the “Waters of the United States” regulations. The rule eliminates protections for many ephemeral bodies of water and indicates that wetlands, an important concern of environmental lists, must touch another navigable body of water to be considered under federal jurisdiction. The Navigable Waters Protection Rule, a replacement for the Obama Administration's waters of the United States rule, was published in the Federal Register on April 21. The Southern Environmental Law Center plans to file suit against the rule, which "leaves any waterways vulnerable to pollution, fill, and destruction," said a spokesperson for the center. The revision was welcomed by the construction industry, which had complained the 2015 rule was too broad and could restrict projects. The new navigable waters rule lists four categories of waters that would be subject to federal jurisdiction: territorial seas and waters used in interstate or foreign commerce; certain tributaries; lakes and ponds; and wetlands that abut any of the other three types of waters. Wetlands must touch another navigable body of water to be considered under federal jurisdiction under the rule. In some cases, wetlands separated from waters by a constructed feature, such as a levee, might also be judged a federal responsibility. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) California Cities Fare Poorly in National Air Pollution Ranking Newly released nationwide rankings by the American Lung Association of cleanest U.S. cities had only one California city, Salinas, on its list of best cities for ozone levels, year round particle pollution. But even Salinas didn't make the top 25 for cleanest year-round particle pollution. California wasn't alone--the entire West Coast fared poorly. Out of hundreds of cities, the cleanest cities were clustered along the East coast and in mideast regions, becoming increasingly less dense west of Colorado. Only four western cities made the cleanest cities list--two of which are in Alaska. Meanwhile, West Coast cities dominated lists for worst ozone, and worst year-round particle pollution. Los Angles-Long Beach, Visalia, Bakersfield, Sacramento-Roseville, and San Diego-Chula Vista-Carlsbad were top five for worst in ozone pollution levels. Bakersfield, Fresno-Madera-Hanford, Visalia, Los Angeles-Long Beach, and San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland, CA were top 5 by year-round particle pollution, but fared slightly better in short-term particle pollution levels. CP&DR Coverage: Hearings Go Online Under Loosened Brown Act  Planning departments statewide have shifted their meetings and official hearings, including city council and planning commission meetings, online in order to comply with stay-at-home orders while planners carry on with business during the COVID crisis. While many departments had already broadcast public meetings via webcast and accepted public comment remotely, the Brown Act had required that official meetings take place in-person and be open to the public. Revised rules allow online meetings to proceed so long as the public has sufficient advance notification, requiring public agencies to "use sound discretion and reasonable efforts to adhere as closely as reasonable possible to the provisions of the Bagley-Keene Act and the Brown Act...in order to maximize transparancy and provide the public access to their meetings." Quick Hits & Updates  The Public Policy Institute of California estimates that San Joaquin Valley's groundwater sustainability plans are too optimistic about the availability of new supplies. Few plans focus on demand, and those that do give few details on their approach. According to PPI's independent analysis, a realistic plan to end the region's groundwater overdraft will entail fallowing at least 500,000 acres of farmland. A consultant with California High Speed Rail is under investigation by the FBI following reports that its executives retaliated against employees for bringing forth negative information about the firm. California High-Speed Rail Authority disclosed the investigation at a meeting of its Board of Directors where it separately approved a plan to help fund the modernization of Los Angeles Union Station. San Francisco, Inglewood, and Los Angeles are the biggest award recipients of the latest round of Transit and Intercity Rail Capital Program (TIRCP) grants, worth up to $4.9 billion after matching federal, state, and local funds. BART will get a $107 million infusion for new rail cars. Antelope Valley was awarded $6.5 million for electric buses, and Inglewood Transit will direct $95 million towards an APM system. HCD released the State of California Draft 2020-2024 Federal Consolidated Plan for public comment, which has been updated to include placeholder information for potential CARES Act funds. Due to the impacts of the COVID-19 pandemic, HUD has allowed the Department an extension on submitting the Consolidated Plan until June 30. The San Francisco Planning Commission voted in favor of initiating the rezoning of Balboa Reservoir, a 17.6-acre property the city has been trying to build on since 1980. Virginia-based investment firm Avalon Bay designed and submitted a plan that includes over 1,000 homes, half of which would be affordable housing, and 150 units reserved for City College of San Francisco staff. LA Metro’s Crenshaw Line likely won't be up and running until late 2021--a year later than the expected opening date—wrote Metro CEO Phil Washington in a letter to stakeholders. Though the letter cites the project's complexity as a reason for delays, documents indicate that by Metro's own accounting, only 1 percent of construction has been completed since October 2019. As public transit ridership plunges amid the coronavirus pandemic, two major transit projects in the San Diego region are on hold. San Diego MTS announced a hold on ElevateSD, a $24 billion rail and bus extension, and SANDAG has suspended plans to release a highly anticipated $100 billion blueprint for modernizing the region's transportation system. Climate change has doubled the number of extreme-risk days for California wildfires, according to an analysis led by Stanford University. Temperatures rose about 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit statewide while precipitation dropped 30 percent since 1980, changes scientists say they can confidently attribute to climate change. The study noted, however, that actions to mitigate climate change can have a substantial impact down the road. California has approved over $500 million in tax-exempt financing for a high-speed train to Las Vegas, clearing a path for investors to sell bonds for the private rail project if they succeed in securing a similar bond from Nevada. The $600 million allocation - which can be leveraged into as much as $3.2 billion in unrated tax-exempt bonds - is 15 percent of California's annual bond allotment. San Diego's Planning Commission is hoping to harness the tiny house movement to quickly expand the city's housing stock without having to rely on taxpayer-subsidized homes. If the City Council agrees with the Planning Commission and approves the new law this spring, it wouldn't take effect in coastal areas until the Coastal Commission also gives its assent. Judges across California have upheld Project Roomkey, an initiative that places homeless people in empty hotels and motels to protect them from unchecked spread through encampments. In a narrow ruling, a judge issued a temporary restraining order directing the City of Norwalk to comply, ruling that on balance, the interests of the county in implementing the order outweighed any harm the city could suffer. San Diego officials are seeking to streamline approvals for new housing developments under a San Diego International Airport flight path. The new rules are designed to give developers greater certainty about what kinds of projects are allowed under a flight path by creating a special overlay zone where limits on the size of projects would account for airport rules that would typically require a City Council vote to override. HCD released a summary of the requirements that AB 686 added to Housing Element Law that local governments and interested stakeholders can use to understand the changes. The memo provides a review of the added fair housing program requirement (which started January 1, 2019), the Assessment of Fair Housing, and the sites inventory analysis for all housing elements due on or after January 1, 2021.

CP&DR Vol. 33 No. 4 April 2018

CP&DR Vol. 35 No. 4 April 2020