Mitigation

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In a published opinion filed October 17, 2025, the Fourth District Court of Appeal (Div. 1) reversed the trial court’s judgment and directed it to grant a writ of mandate invalidating the City of San Diego’s (“City”) Supplemental EIR (“SEIR”) prepared for its second City-sponsored ballot measure to exclude the Midway-Pacific Highway Community Planning area (“MPH area”) from its Coastal Height Limit Overlay Zone, which generally limits building heights to 30 feet.  The Court held the SEIR violated CEQA because it failed to analyze potential significant environmental impacts of this significant plan update other than views and neighborhood character, omitting what it deemed required analysis of noise, air quality, biological resources, geological conditions, and other impacts, and improperly deferring analysis to future site-specific projects.  Save Our Access v. City of San Diego (2025) ____ Cal.App.5th ____.Continue Reading High Rise Anxiety: Fourth District Holds San Diego’s Supplemental EIR for Second City Initiative to Update Midway-Pacific Community Plan Violated CEQA By Failing to Adequately Analyze Numerous Potential Impacts of Removing 30-foot Coastal Height Limit

In a lengthy and highly technical published opinion filed August 5, 2025, the Fifth District Court of Appeal partly reversed and partly affirmed a judgment that had upheld the State Water Resources Control Board’s (“State Water Board” or “SWRCB”) adoption of the “State Policy for Water Quality Control: Toxicity Provisions” (the “Toxicity Provisions”), which policy in relevant part required use of a new “Test of Significant Toxicity” (“TST”) in analyzing a type of pollution known as “whole effluent toxicity.”  Camarillo Sanitary District et al. v. State Water Resources Control Board (2025) 113 Cal.App.5th 407.Continue Reading Fifth District Holds State Water Board’s Adoption of Regulations Requiring New Test for Whole Effluent Toxicity Violated Federal Clean Water Act Regulations Governing NPDES Permitting, But Not CEQA, APA or Porter Cologne

On June 30, 2025, Governor Newsom signed AB 130 and SB 131 into immediately effective law as budget trailer bills, marking a historic effort to accelerate housing production and to reform the CEQA review process that has been stifling housing and other essential projects across California. These landmark laws effect substantial changes intended to streamline the approval process for infill housing and essential infrastructure projects by establishing clearer timelines, reducing procedural hurdles, and expanding CEQA exemptions tailored to support sustainable development. While AB 130 largely focuses on improving and clarifying the entitlement process for housing projects, SB 131 adds CEQA exemptions and streamlining for a diverse set of projects and actions.Continue Reading State Budget Bill Includes Landmark CEQA and Housing Law Changes

In a partially published 102-page opinion filed June 26, 2025, the Second District Court of Appeal (Div. 7) resolved cross-appeals by affirming the trial court’s judgment invalidating Los Angeles County’s 2019 EIR certification and project approvals for the Centennial Specific Plan, a 12,323-acre development on the historic Tejon Ranch in the County’s Antelope Valley Area south of Kern County.  Center for Biological Diversity v. County of Los Angeles (Centennial Founders, LLC, et al., Real Parties in Interest) (2025) 112 Cal.App.5th 317.  The Court of Appeal agreed with the trial court in all respects, holding the EIR’s GHG and off-site wildfire impacts analyses were deficient, while rejecting challenges to its analyses, discussion, and mitigation for wildlife movement corridors and native vegetation and to its alternatives analysis.  (Per this blog’s standard practice, this post will discuss only the published portion of the opinion, which addressed only the GHG issues.)Continue Reading “Double Counting” or Redundant Mitigation?  Second District Holds CEQA Guidelines’ Additionality Requirement Precludes Applying Upstream Energy or Fuel Providers’ Obligatory Cap-and-Trade Compliance To Offset Land Use Project’s Estimated GHG Emissions, Invalidates “Prejudicially Misleading” EIR For Massive LA County Centennial Project On That And Other Grounds

In a published opinion filed March 14, 2025, the First District Court of Appeal (Div. 2) reversed the trial court’s judgment upholding a Mitigated Negative Declaration (MND) for a four-story, 75-room hotel/meeting hall/parking lot project on a 2.8-acre parcel in the City of Clearlake (“City”), due to the City’s failure to lawfully conduct a tribal cultural resources consultation with plaintiff and appellant Koi Nation of Northern California as required by AB 52.  Koi Nation of Northern California v. City of Clearlake (2025) 109 Cal.App.5th 815.Continue Reading First District Voids Clearlake Hotel Project MND for City’s Failure to Conduct Adequate CEQA AB 52 Tribal Cultural Resources Consultation

On February 13, 2025, the Second District Court of Appeal (Div. 7) filed its 71-page published opinion affirming the trial court’s judgment rejecting CEQA safety hazard and cumulative impacts analysis challenges – as well as Administrative Procedure Act (“APA”) and generic “arbitrary and capricious” writ challenges – to the California Air Resources Board’s (“CARB”) August 2020 decision adopting the “Control Measure For Ocean-Going Vessels At Berth” (the “Regulation,” codified at 17 Cal. Code Regs. § 93130 et seq).  Western States Petroleum Association v. California Air Resources Board (2025) 108 Cal.App.5th 938.Continue Reading Second District Affirms Judgment Rejecting CEQA And Other Challenges To CARB’s “Technology-Forcing” Emissions-Control Regulation For At-Berth Tanker And Other Ships

On November 22, 2024, the First District Court of Appeal’s (Div. 4) partially-published opinion in People of the State of California ex rel. Bonta v. County of Lake (Lotusland Investment Holdings, Inc., et al. Real Parties in Interest) (2024) 105 Cal.App.5th 1222 (No. A165677) became final.  The published part of the decision addresses several significant CEQA topic areas, including the adequacy of an EIR’s discussions of impacts related to a large rural resort development project’s wildfire risks and water supply impacts, and the propriety of a lead agency’s condition of approval imposing a carbon credit purchase obligation to potentially mitigate the project’s significant and unavoidable greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in light of acknowledged uncertainty as to whether such credits would be available.  (As a matter of disclosure, Respondent County of Lake was represented in the trial and appellate proceedings in this case by this post’s authors, Miller Starr Regalia attorneys Arthur Coon and Matthew Henderson.)Continue Reading First District Addresses Significant CEQA Issues Relating to Wildfire Risk, GHG Emissions, and Water Supply Impacts in Lake County Resort Development Case

On October 7, 2024, the First District Court of Appeal (Div. 5) issued a 6-page “Order Denying Respondent’s Petition for Rehearing and Modifying Opinion [No Change in Judgment]” (the “Order”) in Sunflower Alliance v. California Department of Conservation, et al. (Reabold California, LLC) (2024) 104 Cal.App.5th 1135, a case upholding a CEQA Guidelines Class 1 categorical exemption for an oil well conversion project (my 9/9/24 post on which can be found here).  The main thrust of the Order, a copy of which can be reviewed here, is to bolster the Opinion’s refutations of certain of Respondent Sunflower Alliance’s arguments, including its argument made on rehearing that the Secretary cannot have intended for categorical exemptions to call for an “early stage” assessment of environmental impacts; the Court called Sunflower’s position “wrong,” citing numerous examples of categorical exemptions calling for such assessments, which it noted function as limits on the application of the exemptions, and are also consistent with the agencies’ duty to consider environmental impacts when evidence in their records suggests an exception to the exemption may apply.Continue Reading First District Denies Rehearing, Modifies Opinion in CEQA Guidelines Class 1 Categorical Exemption Case With No Change in Judgment

In an opinion filed August 27 and later ordered published on September 24, 2024, the Fifth District Court of Appeal affirmed a judgment denying a writ petition that challenged the State Air Resources Board’s (CARB) adoption of the Advanced Clean Trucks Regulation (Regulation) on CEQA and Administrative Procedures Act (APA; Gov. Code, § 11340 et seq) grounds.  California Natural Gas Vehicle Coalition v. State Air Resources Board (2024) 105 Cal.App.5th 304.  The Court held that CARB’s in-depth study of three alternatives (including the “no project” alternative) constituted a reasonable range for CEQA purposes; it further held that CARB’s alternative analysis wasn’t deficient for rejecting without in-depth study, as infeasible for policy reasons, an alternative proposed by opponents of the Regulation that would have applied a low-NOx vehicle credit to sales mandates applicable to zero-emission vehicles (ZEV).  Based on the same reasoning, the Court held CARB also need not have considered the now-NOx vehicle credit as a mitigation measure for the acknowledged significant near-term air quality impacts of the Regulation.  (The Court also rejected appellant Coalition’s APA arguments in a portion of its opinion that won’t be further discussed in this post.)  Finally, the Court held on CARB’s affirmative appeal that any error with respect to the admission of a specific “white paper” document into the administrative record was nonprejudicial, and therefore harmless, as it did not impact either the trial court’s or its own analysis.Continue Reading Fifth District Affirms Judgment Rejecting CEQA/APA Challenges to CARB’s Approval of ZEV Truck Sales Mandate Regulation; Holds Alternatives and Mitigation Analyses Need Not Include Low-NOx Vehicle Credit Contrary to Project’s Underlying Fundamental Purpose

In an opinion filed August 15, and modified and certified for publication on September 13, 2024, the Fourth District Court of Appeal (Div. 2) resolved cross-appeals from a judgment granting a limited writ by reversing with directions to deny the writ.  The Court thus found the City of Upland’s (City) Mitigated Negative Declaration (MND) for approvals of a 201,096-square foot parcel-delivery warehouse project legally adequate under CEQA.  Upland Community First v. City of Upland (2024) 105 Cal.App.5th 1.  In doing so, the Court not only upheld an environmental document (an MND) that is, in general, notoriously difficult to defend under CEQA’s applicable “fair argument” standard of review, but also upheld, as supported by substantial evidence: (1) City’s application of a stringent 3,000 MTCO2 e/year quantitative threshold of significance to the project’s GHG emissions, and (2) City’s determination that the project’s “net-over-baseline” GHC emissions would not exceed that threshold – despite some effort being required to “connect the dots” regarding the record evidence to show the City’s math in reaching that determination.  While ultimately irrelevant to the outcome in their favor, the Court also held that City and the project’s developer (Bridge) forfeited – by failing to timely raise – their alternative argument that the project’s GHG emissions were insignificant based on a different, qualitative “threshold,” i.e., City’s finding that the project was consistent with its Climate Action Plan (UCAP).  Finally, the Court rejected all of project opponent UCF’s appellate challenges to City’s MND based on allegedly faulty traffic and VMT analyses.Continue Reading Fourth District Reverses Judgment Granting Writ and Holds City of Upland’s MND For Warehouse Project Satisfies CEQA; Rejects Arguments That City’s Choice and Application of Quantitative GHG Significance Threshold Lacked Substantial Evidence Support