The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has rejected federal arguments for dropping a desert lizard from consideration for Endangered Species Act protection. In its ruling, the unanimous three-judge panel encourages a broader, more flexible reading of the act than the Clinton administration had offered.

The City of Los Angeles' slum abatement program is categorically exempt from the California Environmental Quality Act, the Second District Court of Appeal has ruled.

A state appellate court has greatly reduced the amount of damages that San Diego County must pay to a landowner in an inverse condemnation case. The court reduced a jury's award of $646,000 by $187,000 and directed the trial court to reconsider other costs included in the award.

A lawsuit challenging a Southern California water agency's purchase of a private water company has been reinstated by the Second District Court of Appeal.

Two Southern California redevelopment agencies have lost separate lawsuits over the allocation of property tax revenue from redevelopment project areas.

The U.S. Supreme Court will decide a case in which Lake Tahoe property owners allege that a temporary building moratorium amounted to an unconstitutional taking.

A Clinton-era Interior Department policy that delayed endangered species petitions filed by the public has been thrown out by the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals. The unanimous three-judge panel agreed with environmentalists who said the policy improperly stalled consideration of plants and animals that could qualify for protected status.

An environmental group that sued the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection over environmental review of a North Coast timber harvest lost its chance to pursue the lawsuit because it did not request a hearing within a prescribed deadline.