Land Use

California Coastal Commissioners Fire Executive Director Charles Lester

Personnel Dispute is Commission’s Biggest Political Controversy in Over a Decade

Following months of public controversy and a marathon 10 1/2 hour hearing Wednesday in Morro Bay, a closely-divided California Coastal Commission voted to fire its Executive Director, Charles Lester.  The Commission vote to remove Lester was 7-5. Lester, who as Executive Director has led the Commission staff for the past 4 1/2 years, is the …

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NIMBYs Gone Even Wilder!!!

Newport Beach Wants to Honor Veterans and Seniors by Excluding Them

Christmastime is here, and what better way to foster goodwill towards all than by trying to exclude affordable housing from your community. And not just any affordable housing: affordable housing for seniors and veterans: A plan for a 12-unit affordable housing project for veterans and seniors in the Newport Shores neighborhood was blasted by residents who complained …

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California Supreme Court Hands Air District, Environmentalists Qualified Win

Justices’ Unanimous Opinion Addresses Key “Scope of CEQA” Issue

In a closely-watched case, the California Supreme Court today issued a unanimous decision on the scope of the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), California’s most important and heavily-litigated environmental statute.  That decision is unlikely to fully satisfy either side in the litigation, though over the long-term it would seem to favor local regulators and their …

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Climate Actions For Governor Jerry Brown’s Final Term

New report on how California’s executive branch agencies can build on climate progress to date

In Paris this month, much of the talk related to California’s successful efforts to date in reducing carbon emissions while growing the economy.  Certainly the state has made significant progress in areas like renewable energy and electric vehicles, and Governor Brown and his administration deserve a lot of credit. But more progress will be needed …

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The Uneasy Case for NIMBYism

A Growing Class Conflict Lurks Underneath the Land Use Debate

Paul Krugman is turning his attention to housing affordability, and the results as usual are salutary. When discussing the skyrocketing cost of housing in New York City, he observes: There’s still room to build, even in New York, especially upward. Yet while there is something of a building boom in the city, it’s far smaller …

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NIMBYs Gone Wild!!

New Proposed Initiative Would Make Los Angeles a BANANA Republic

Los Angeles is in the midst of an affordable housing crisis: the city’s renters pay on average nearly half of their disposable income on rent alone. This threatens the city’s social and economic health: you simply cannot have a great city and hollow out its middle class. But NIMBYs never rest, and in the midst …

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Muddling Through on Land Use Reform

Will Reform of Parking Regulations Ever See the Light of Day?

More than half a century ago, Charles Lindblom described the policy-making process as “The Science of Muddling Through.” California just demonstrated this with a new law, AB 744 (Chau), that holds important potential but in and of itself will not change the landscape. (Here is the most recent bill analysis). The law says that for …

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Recreational marijuana legalization in California

Will a proposed ballot initiative on recreational marijuana legalization in California help the environment

In the wake of the enactment by the legislature of a regulatory structure for medical marijuana, it looks like voters in 2016 will probably be able to decide whether to legalize recreational use as well. Leading advocates for legalization of recreational marijuana have submitted a language for a ballot initiative to the California Secretary of …

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New Report: Grading California’s Rail Transit Station Areas

Next 10 releases Berkeley Law study on transit-oriented development

If we build it, they will come. For many years, that was the mantra of rail transit planners. Just build the rail line, and development will happen around the stations. And then more people will ride, and the system will be a good investment. But in California, too often that hasn’t been the case. Much …

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Evangelicals Versus Property Rights

Guess who invented the idea that property rights evolve with changing social values?

Today, evangelical Christians tend to be aligned with conservatives in defense of private property. But that was not always true. In the 19th and early 20th Centuries, evangelicals launched a major attack on property rights. As historian John Compton documents in a recent book, they also adopted the idea of the “living Constitution” to justify …

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