Petitioners in the Saltonstall CEQA challenge to the Sacramento Kings arena project filed a notice of appeal July 31, but the Sacramento Bee reports the Kings began demolition at the downtown site anyway. The Saltonstall petitioners lost an injunction petition last week in superior court. The Bee reports the Kings' counsel argued that the NBA could purchase and move the team if the arena failed to open on time in October 2016. See http://bit.ly/1s7rraV and http://bit.ly/1saO6AV.

With Sacramento's new court document fee rules in place, it will cost you to read the Saltonstall Notice of Appeal and the prior decision, but the names on the appeal are just discernible through the gray slashes digitally imposed on the "preview" display. See the online case index, which itself is free to view, at http://bit.ly/1nnr0Sd.

Meanwhile, Bee columnist Marcos Breton reports the basketball team's management are in talks to buy the city's Republic FC soccer team. See http://bit.ly/1ookAa5.

Legislature back in session, still trying for a water bond bill

The Legislature returned to Sacramento August 4, still not done with the task of replacing the dated water bond proposal that, as of now, is still parked on the statewide November ballot. They also faced results of a major recent public relations campaign to stop or delay fuel tax provisions of the AB 32 greenhouse gas reduction bill before it takes effect. See the Sacramento Bee for a link-rich summary at http://bit.ly/1pVuugs and a larger-scope roundup from KQED's John Myers at http://bit.ly/1uf68lM.

The Sacramento Bee reported separately that plastic bag companies were running television ads in a continuing effort to stop SB 270, the statewide plastic bag restriction bill. See http://www.sacbee.com/2014/08/04/6604874/plastic-industry-hitting-tv-again.html. Local governments were still moving to pass their own bans in anticipation of a grandfathering provision in SB 270. Monterey County granted initial approval for a plastic bag ban in its unincorporated areas, with the final approval vote set for August 26, per the Monterey County Weekly at http://bit.ly/1qLbHus. See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3481 for details on the grandfathering provision and prior legal and legislative history.

In two pieces of completed legislation:

  • Governor Jerry Brown has signed AB 1963, a bill by Assembly Speaker Toni Atkins to ease post-redevelopment logistics. The League of California Cities at http://bit.ly/1kCizIo summarizes the new law at http://bit.ly/1kCizIo, with a link to the text. Its major provision is to give the Department of Finance an extra year, until January 1, 2016, to approve Long Range Property Management Plans for real estate caught up in the redevelopment dissolution process.
  • It was also the League that picked up this Monterey County Weekly item on the signing of SB 2119: http://bit.ly/1owAgYO. Per bill analyses on the SB 2119 official site at http://bit.ly/1y0NRJk, the law adds the possibility of a transactions and use tax to the types of taxes that a board of supervisors can invite residents of a county's unincorporated areas to vote into effect for themselves.

Delta tunnel plan's comment period has closed

The comment deadline closed July 29 for the Bay Delta Conservation Plan (BDCP) -- the twin-tunnels plan to carry water southbound under the delta rather than into it. The comprehensive California water blog Maven's Notebook posted an "Internet Guide to the Bay Delta Conservation Plan" several weeks ago that walks through the available plan documents (See http://bit.ly/1rRmD9w). Maven will be a good source for further developments as smart water writers start to read and post about the comments. Already she has noted a Capital Public Radio item at http://www.capradio.org/29065 on an anti-tunnel protest rally held in Sacramento to mark the close of the comment period. The BDCP project's own Web site is at http://baydeltaconservationplan.com/Home.aspx.

California Economic Summit wants 'peer review' of CEQA guidelines

The California Economic Summit civic organization has asked Governor Jerry Brown to conduct a "peer review" by experts and officials of draft revisions to the CEQA Guidelines before they are circulated to the general public. Revisions to the guidelines are in the works at the Office of Planning and Research. See http://www.caeconomy.org/reporting/entry/summit-calls-for-review-of-ceqa-guidelines.

San Francisco could soon run out of Prop M office space allowance

JK Dineen of the San Francisco Chronicle posted an in-depth news analysis July 29 on downtown planning effects of San Francisco's 1986 Proposition M, which limits new office space construction to 875,000 square feet per year. See http://bit.ly/1kkLKiZ. The SF Business Journal more recently posted a followup story with added details. Both articles report the Planning Commission will start public discussion August 7 on how to proceed if San Francisco construction plans use up the currently available Prop M allowance of office space, which is about 2 million square feet. Dineen puts the amount of proposed office construction at 9.2 million square feet but the Business Journal puts it at more than 11 million. See http://bit.ly/1y0wUyO.

Coastal Commission to take up the Sand City matter again, briefly

There's one more approval stage ahead for the slightly queasy deal signed at the April Coastal Commission meeting to allow the 368-unit Sand City resort project to go forward in Monterey County. The Commission's August agenda will include a proposed approval for revised detailed findings based on its prior actions in April. Approval of the "eco-resort" for an ecologically fragile dune area upset some environmental advocates in April, especially regarding potential harm to snowy plover on the site. (See http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-3474.) The Monterey Herald has a summary of issues at http://bit.ly/1uIR1oL. Sand City has the very last item on the Commission's four-day San Diego agenda. For the proposed revised findings see the large (512 pp.) agenda item file at http://documents.coastal.ca.gov/reports/2014/8/F16a-8-2014.pdf. The Sand City project was a subject of conflict and litigation for years. For some of the prior history see CP&DR's prior coverage from 2008 at see http://www.cp-dr.com/articles/node-1963.

Tule Lake preservation group sues over airport fence on camp site

The Tule Lake Committee has filed a CEQA court petition to block construction of a fence at Tulelake Airport in Modoc County. The airport, which is used mainly by a crop-dusting company, Macy's Flying Service, occupies part of the footprint of the wartime Tule Lake Relocation Center, later designated the Segregation Center, where more than 18,000 Japanese Americans were incarcerated from 1942 to 1946. The fence has been endorsed by the FAA as needed to secure the runway.

Lee Juillerat of the Klamath Falls Herald and News, who has written on camp site preservation issues for years, has a detailed perspective on the matter at http://bit.ly/1poV83T.

In a Change.org petition and a public campaign, the petitioners have argued that the fence would interfere with visitors' ability to view the historic site as a whole and would especially block access to families looking for the locations of relatives' barracks. The Tule Lake camp site, now the town of Newell, CA, is near the Modoc-Siskiyou county line about 30 miles south of Klamath Falls, Oregon.

For the petition and related campaign materials see https://www.facebook.com/StopTheFence. The suit names Modoc County, where the airport is located, and officials of the nearby Siskiyou County town of Tulelake, with Macy's Flying Service as real party in interest.

Khosla posts his side of the Martins Beach story

Vinod Khosla, owner of the disputed Martins Beach on the San Mateo County coastside, used op-ed space in the SF Chronicle on August 4 at http://bit.ly/1kC5bUH to post comments arguing the beach "has never been open to public access" in the sense that "prior owners ran a commercial operation" that charged for access. The op-ed repeated Khosla's prior objections to requirements imposed by county and Coastal Commission officials, and it claimed "Coastal Commission staff indicated 'they will need a permit for something sometime, and then we will have them' and 'we will tie you up in red tape.'" It said the prior owners of the property had tried to interest nonprofit and public agencies in purchasing the land for a park but did not find takers.

As of July 24, the Commission raised the stakes in the beach battle by posting an invitation on its official http://www.coastal.ca.gov/ site for members of the public to document their past use of Martins Beach in a "prescriptive rights survey". See http://bit.ly/1lBnMe6 for more comment and details.

In other news:

  • The Department of Finance has approved release of an additional $4.9 million to continue with San Diego's Horton Plaza project to turn a former department store building into an open downtown public space. The U-T has details at http://bit.ly/1lZ4X4D. KPBS has more background at http://bit.ly/1rRuRys. The approval letter is posted at http://bit.ly/1lZ528x.
  • Nate Donato-Weinstein of SFBJ reports Google has bought more of Mountain View: $98.1 for nine buildings from Boston Properties: http://bit.ly/1xBXxtB.
  • A burst pipe at UCLA led to a flood that wasted 20 million gallons of drinking water. The LA Times at http://lat.ms/1kkaJCD responded with a report on concerns about the age and condition of the city's infrastructure.
  • The SF Chron's Will Kane writes that Oakland will have to raise "at least $1.75 billion" to keep both the A's and the Raiders in town: http://bit.ly/1owlOAg
  • Both San Francisco and Los Angeles sent representatives to Colorado Springs in July to discuss possibly hosting the 2024 Olympics. The Chron wrote up SF's delegation at http://bit.ly/1spsD7j and the LA Times reported on Mayor Eric Garcetti's trip at http://lat.ms/1oa5Egi. The LA Times says the U.S. Olympic Committee will pick a U.S. host city in 2017. It remains to be seen if San Francisco is sore enough from its losses hosting the America's Cup to hesitate about investing in another one-time international sports event.