In a partially-published, 150-page slip opinion resolving appeals in consolidated cases, and filed February 25, 2020, the Fifth District Court of Appeal affirmed in part and reversed in part a trial court decision finding CEQA defects in the 1800-plus page EIR prepared for Kern County’s adoption of an ordinance designed to provide a streamlined, ministerial permitting process for new oil and gas wells in the county.  King and Gardiner Farms, LLC v. County of Kern, et al. (California Independent Petroleum Association, et al., Real Parties in Interest); Committee for a Better Arvin, et al. v. County of Kern, et al. (California Independent Petroleum Association, et al., Real Parties in Interest) (5th Dist. 2020) 45 Cal.App.5th 814.  The published portion of the opinion held the EIR improperly deferred the formulation and implementation of mitigation for significant water supply impacts; failed to adequately mitigate farmland conversion impacts due to improper reliance on agricultural conversion easements (ACEs) as offsetting mitigation; and failed to adequately analyze noise impacts by relying solely on an absolute cumulative numerical limit threshold of significance, rather than also analyzing the significance of the magnitude of project noise increases over ambient levels in differently affected settings.  (Approximately 53 pages of the opinion, a portion finding CEQA violations with respect to air quality and related health risks due to failure to adequately discuss PM 2.5 emissions impacts and related mitigation, and failure to recirculate the DEIR after adding significant new information in the form of an appended Cumulative Health Risk Assessment, were not certified for publication; consequently, those portions set no precedent and will not be discussed in further detail in this post.)
Continue Reading Fifth District Holds EIR For Kern County’s Ministerial Oil and Gas Well Permitting Ordinance Violates CEQA Due To Improperly Deferred Mitigation For Water Supply Impacts, Inadequate Mitigation For Farmland Conversion, And Inadequate Analysis of Noise Impacts

The City of Sacramento received an early Christmas present with the December 18 publication of the Third District Court of Appeal’s opinion in Citizens for Positive Growth & Preservation v. City of Sacramento (2019) 43 Cal.App.5th 609, which was originally filed on November 26, 2019.  The decision affirmed a trial court judgment upholding the City’s 2035 General Plan against the plaintiff group’s Planning and Zoning Law and CEQA challenges.  The opinion’s most significant CEQA holding was that plaintiff’s challenge to the EIR’s transportation impacts analysis was moot because the applicable law currently in effect at the time of judgment in the appellate court – specifically, Public Resources Code § 20199(b)(2) (enacted as part of SB 743) – provides that auto delays measured by LOS or similar measures shall not be considered significant environmental impacts.  The Court of Appeal also rejected all of plaintiff’s other CEQA challenges, including those to the City’s non-adoption of the no-project alternative, its decision not to recirculate the EIR after adding numerous supplemental changes to the draft 2035 General Plan, and its Final EIR’s GHG and cyclist safety analyses.
Continue Reading Out With The Old (And In With The New … Next Year)! – Third District Rejects CEQA And General Plan Consistency Challenges to Sacramento’s 2035 General Plan Update And Related EIR, Holds Traffic Analysis Challenge Based On Lowering of Acceptable LOS Is Mooted By Public Resources Code § 20199, But New VMT Standard Doesn’t Yet Apply

In an opinion filed October 19, and later ordered published on November 15, 2018, the Third District Court of Appeal affirmed a judgment upholding Plumas County’s First comprehensive update of its 1984 general plan, and rejecting arguments that the update violated the California Timberland Productivity Act of 1982 (the “Timberland Act” or “Act”) and that the related EIR violated CEQA.  High Sierra Rural Alliance v. County of Plumas (2018) 29 Cal.App.5th 102.
Continue Reading Third District Holds Plumas County General Plan Update EIR Complies With CEQA And Update’s Compatible Use Determinations Do Not Violate Timberland Act

The Fourth District Court of Appeal (Div. 1) held in a published opinion filed October 24, 2018, that CEQA Guidelines § 15164 validly establishes an addendum process that is consistent with the CEQA statute, implementing and filling gaps in Public Resources Code § 21166.  The Court also held that new findings under Public Resources Code § 21081 addressing a project’s significant impacts are not required when a lead agency approves an addendum to an EIR.  Save Our Heritage Organisation v. City of San Diego (The Plaza de Panama Committee, Real Party in Interest) (2018) 28 Cal.App.5th 656.
Continue Reading Fourth District Holds Addendum Process Authorized By CEQA, No New Findings Required

In a lengthy published opinion filed on August 22, 2018, the First District Court of Appeal (Div. 4) affirmed the trial court’s judgment rejecting various CEQA challenges to the City of San Francisco’s (“City”) Program EIR analyzing the environmental impacts of its 2009 General Plan Housing Element, which it adopted on June 29, 2011.  San Franciscans for Livable Neighborhoods v. City and County of San Francisco (2018) 26 Cal.App.5th 596.  San Franciscans for Livable Neighborhoods (“SFLN”), an unincorporated association comprised of more than a dozen neighborhood organizations, had challenged the EIR – mostly unsuccessfully – in the trial court.  It then appealed from adverse portions of the judgment concerning the EIR’s baseline and impact analyses for traffic, water supply, land use, and visual resources impacts; the City’s decision not to recirculate the EIR; the EIR’s alternatives analysis; and the feasibility of certain proposed mitigation measures.
Continue Reading “Growing Pains”: First District Holds Program EIR for San Francisco’s General Plan Housing Element Amendment Complies with CEQA

In an opinion filed March 20, and later certified for publication on April 12, 2018, the First District Court of Appeal (Division 3) affirmed a limited peremptory writ of mandate issued by the Contra Costa County Superior Court requiring the County to set aside an EIR and land use permit for Phillips 66 Company’s “Propane Recovery Project” at its oil refinery in the City of Rodeo, pending County’s correction of specified inadequacies in the EIR’s air quality analysis. Rodeo Citizens Association v. County of Contra Costa (Phillips 66 Company, Real Party in Interest) (2018) 22 Cal.App.5th 214.  Unsatisfied with the trial court’s grant of limited relief and denial of its additional CEQA challenges to the EIR (based on an allegedly defective project description and deficient GHG and hazard analyses), plaintiff/appellant Rodeo Citizens Association (“RCA”) appealed as to those issues, but the Court of Appeal rejected its arguments and affirmed the writ as issued by the trial court.
Continue Reading First District Rejects Numerous CEQA Challenges To RFEIR For Propane Recovery Project At Phillips 66 Company’s Rodeo Oil Refinery, Affirms Judgment Issuing Limited Writ

In a published opinion filed November 15, 2017, the First District Court of Appeal (Division 5) affirmed the trial court’s order granting a petition for writ of mandate setting aside the California Department of Parks and Recreation’s (Department) approvals and EIR for the “Upper Truckee River Restoration and Golf Course Reconfiguration Project” (the “Project”).  Washoe Meadows Community v. Department of Parks and Recreation (1st Dist. 2017) 17 Cal.App.5th 277.  The Court agreed with the trial court’s determination that “the DEIR’s failure to provide the public with an accurate, stable and finite” project description “prejudicially impaired the public’s ability to participate in the CEQA process by setting forth a range of five very different alternatives and by declining to identify a preferred alternative.”

As relevant background, the project involved 777 acres of state-owned land encompassing a 2.2-mile stretch of the Upper Truckee River in the Lake Tahoe Basin.  The land was divided into two units: 608 acres of state park land (Washoe Meadows State Park), and the remainder designated as Lake Valley State Recreation Area to allow continuing operation of an existing golf course (a use not allowed in state parks).  Since at least the 1990s, the golf course layout had altered the river’s course and flow, raising environmental concerns of river bed erosion that threatened habitat and water quality in and around Lake Tahoe through deposition of substantial sediment.Continue Reading Power to the Public: DEIR’s Failure to Identify Proposed Project Among Handful of Vastly Different Analyzed Alternatives Violates CEQA’s Requirement to Contain “Accurate, Stable and Finite” Project Description, Vitiates Intelligent Public Participation, Holds First District

In a published opinion filed September 19, 2017, the First District Court of Appeal reversed the trial court’s denial of a writ petition challenging defendant California Department of Pesticide Regulation’s (“Department”) approval of label amendments for two pesticides containing an active ingredient toxic to honeybees.  The Court held the Department’s environmental review was deficient in failing to adequately address feasible alternatives, lacking adequate baseline information, and lacking an adequate cumulative impacts analysis, and that its public reports were so inadequate and conclusory as to render public comment effectively meaningless and require recirculation.  Pesticide Action Network North America v. California Department of Pesticide Regulation (Valent U.S.A. Corporation, et al., Real Parties In Interest) (1st Dist., Div. 3, 2017) 15 Cal.App.5th 478.
Continue Reading First District Holds CEQA’s Substantive Requirements Apply to Environmental Documentation of State Agency Acting Under Certified State Regulatory Program, Directs Issuance of Writ Setting Aside Inadequately Reviewed Pesticide Label Approvals

In a 46-page opinion filed February 14 and ordered published on March 15, 2017, the Fourth District Court of Appeal rejected numerous CEQA challenges to Riverside County’s approval of an EIR for Specific Plan 380, a 200-acre master-planned, mixed-use community in the County’s French Valley region.  Residents Against Specific Plan 380 v. County of Riverside (Hanna Marital Trust, Real Party in Interest) (4th Dist., Div. 2, 2017) 9 Cal.App.5th 941.  In affirming the trial court’s judgment denying the plaintiff/appellant group’s mandate petition, the Court of Appeal found no merit in any of the group’s arguments that County failed to comply with a number of procedural, informational and substantive CEQA requirements.
Continue Reading Fourth District Affirms Judgment Rejecting Numerous CEQA Challenges to EIR and Approval Process for Large Master-Planned Riverside County Development Project

In a decision filed May 25, and belatedly ordered published June 15, 2016, the Fourth District Court of Appeal affirmed and reversed in part a judgment of the San Bernardino County Superior Court.  It affirmed the judgment to the extent it held the Wal-Mart Tamarisk Marketplace Project (Project) EIR inadequately analyzed the Project’s GHG emissions and that the Project was inconsistent with the City of Victorville’s (City) General Plan; it reversed to the extent the judgment failed to also find that City violated CEQA by not recirculating the EIR and violated the Subdivision Map Act (Map Act) by failing to make all findings required by Government Code § 66474.  (Spring Valley Lake Association v. City of Victorville (Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., Real Party in Interest) (4th Dist., Div. 1) 248 Cal.App.4th 91.)

Continue Reading Fourth District Holds Wal-Mart Victorville Project EIR Violates CEQA; Project Approval Findings Violate Map Act; And Project Is Inconsistent With General Plan