Blogs

The California Supreme Court announced today that it will hear oral arguments in San Francisco on California Redevelopment Association v. Matosantos on November 10. The lawsuit challenges the constitutionality of the state's plan to eliminate redevelopment agencies unless they agree to pay $1.7 billion for FY 2011-12 and $400 million in subsequent budget years. 

The first article I ever wrote for CP&DR concerned the generationally decrepit state of Los Angeles' Westwood Village (see CP&DR Vol. 23, No. 6 June 2008). In the three years that have passed since then--despite my blistering expose (of one of the city's most open secrets)--it's only gotten worse. Storefronts are vacant. Bars are sad. Only the Trader Joe's seems to be making any money, and that's because, well, it's Trader Joe's.

Against the protests of many environmental and community groups -- but with the support of developers and builders -- Gov. Jerry Brown signed Senate Bill 226 (Simitian) yesterday, ushering in what some consider a new era of reform to the California Environmental Quality Act.  

SB 226 includes the following alternations to CEQA: 

Governor Jerry Brown has indicated that he has little patience for new laws that he considers pointless or redundant. He recently noted, in fact, that many of the laws passed during the recent legsilative session, which ended Aug. 31, try to address problems that haven't gone away on countless previous attempts to legislate them away. So why bother passing new laws?

Therefore, of the 600-plus bills waiting on the governor's desk--including many involving land use--many are likely to get vetoed. Here is a rough list of bills that the governor is considering: 

If you want to know where Jerry Brown is going on redevelopment, just take a look at AB 664 – a bill he signed in late September designed to help San Francisco finance facilities for the 2014 America's Cup race.

P.J. O'Rourke once referred to the United States government as a "vast, rampant cuttlefish," writhing and squirting ink all over the place to no useful effect. I think D.C.'s tubluence has far exceeded even that metaphor, but taking its place lately are California's municipal general plans.

Frighteningly enough, this is the 27th year I've attended the California Chapter, American Planning Association, conference and at least the third time here at the Fess Parker in Santa Barbara. Memories both good and weird haunt me here; I remember, for example, standing in the corridor outside the Santa Barbara ballroom in 1995 watching TV as the O.J. Simpson verdict came in.

It's a wonder that this afternoon's CalAPA sessions didn't also include presentations on mom and apple pie. Some oft-forgotten vestiges of Americana were on full display in the two sessions that I visited, one on promoting main street-style retail and the other on urban agriculture. 

As the implementation of SB 375 approaches and the Pacific Ocean rises ever higher, one of the greatest technical challenges facing planners is that of defining and measuring "sustainability." Judging by this morning's session "Translating Sustainability into Practice: Tools for Measuring Community Sustainability" at the California American Planning Association conference, that task is going to be about as easy as creating cold fusion. 

Normandy Beach, NJ -- We have a situation at the Jersey Shore. I don't mean Jersey Shore and I don't mean The Situation. 

I'm referring to the actual Jersey Shore. Here, along the state's 110-mile coastline a sense of imprisonment overpowers the hedonism. It's the same in many other East Coast states. 

California's redevelopment agencies have won a minor, but far from permanent victory, in their effort to shield a total of $1.7 billion in tax increment funds from the state. 

Attorney General Kamala Harris took the unusual measure of pre-emptively voicing her official opposition to the lawsuit that was filed two weeks ago to overturn the budget bills that force redevelopment agencies to either disband or pay a total of $1.7 billion in "remittances" to the state. The suit was filed by the California Redevelopment Association and the League of California Cities in the state Supreme Court; the petition calls on the court to declare the actions unconstitutional in light of Prop. 22.

To its minimal credit, Borders Books & Music always had a a few shelves where the works of Jacobs, Mumford, Kunstler, Whyte, Florida, and others resided.

OK, nothing surrounding redevelopment is much "fun" these days. But let's try to lighten the mood.