From Permits to Penalties: A Deep Dive Into Coastal Development Law
Navigating Environmental Restrictions on Alternative Project Delivery for Complex Infrastructure Projects
On-Demand Webinar | Charting a Course for Offshore Wind Energy in California
[WEBINAR] Update on the California Environmental Quality Act: What’s New for 2018
[WEBINAR] Building a Solar Energy Project in 2018
How Trump's Infrastructure Plan Impacts the Energy Industry
BB&K's Charity Schiller Discusses CEQA Baseline
Senate Bill (SB) 131 includes important California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) exemptions for qualified advanced manufacturing projects, health centers and rural clinics, childcare centers, food banks, farmworker...more
Acquiring property for public projects typically does not occur until after the project has received environmental approval. In California, complying with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) can sometimes take...more
On March 14, 2025, the California Court of Appeal for the First District issued the first published opinion interpreting Assembly Bill 52 (AB 52), the law governing tribal consultation procedures under the California...more
California Gov. Gavin Newsom on Jan. 12 issued an executive order in response to the devastating wildfires, suspending environmental reviews required under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) and permitting...more
In the wake of the tragic disaster still unfolding in multiple communities of Southern California, Governor Newsom has issued an executive order (Executive Order N-4-25) intended to “expedite recovery” from the disaster by...more
In response to the devastating wildfires in Los Angeles and Ventura Counties, Governor Gavin Newsom issued Executive Order N-4-25 on January 12, 2025 to expedite the recovery process in affected communities. The following...more
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...more
In People ex rel. Bonta v. County of Lake (2024) 105 Cal.App.5th 1222, the First District Court of Appeal held that the Final EIR (“FEIR”) and associated errata for a proposed mixed-use development project, located in a rural...more
In a partially published opinion filed October 31, 2024, the Second District Court of Appeal (Div. 1) held, in light of AB 1307 and the Supreme Court’s decision in Make UC a Good Neighbor v. Regents of University of...more
In a published opinion filed October 21, 2024, the Second District Court of Appeal (Div. 7) reversed a judgment entered after the trial court granted without leave a real party developer’s motion for judgment on the...more
The California Legislature has continued to refine the Density Bonus Law over the years, making important updates to housing laws that impact developers across the state. Recent legislative changes include key updates on...more
Litigation abuse is all too familiar to those engaged in the herculean task of getting new development approved in California. See, for instance, Jennifer Hernandez’s 2022 report for the Center for Jobs & the Economy, titled...more
In Relevant Grp., LLC v. Nourmand (9th Cir. Sep. 5, 2024, No. 23-55574) 2024 U.S. App. LEXIS 22559, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals narrowed the applicability of Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (“RICO”)...more
On June 27, 2024, the California First District Court of Appeal affirmed the denial of a writ petition challenging the City of Lafayette’s determination that a 12-unit residential condominium building qualified for the Class...more
City of Los Angeles - Increase to Planning Applications and Affordable Housing Linkage Fees - On July 1, 2024, the fee for planning and land use applications increased by 3.5% based on the Consumer Price Index for All Urban...more
Project opponents were unable to state a claim against the Regents of the University of California based on allegations that a new hospital at the University of California, San Francisco campus would violate local land use...more
The Los Angeles Superior Court issued a highly anticipated ruling on March 4, 2024, addressing a Builder’s Remedy project denial by the City of La Cañada Flintridge. The decision confirms (i) that a local jurisdiction cannot...more
Senate Bill (SB) 1227, introduced by Senator Scott Wiener on February 15, 2024, would help speed the recovery of downtown San Francisco by creating a new CEQA exemption for qualifying commercial, institutional, student...more
In a published opinion filed on January 17, 2024, the Second District Court of Appeal (Div. 5) reversed a trial court judgment overturning a mitigated negative declaration (MND) and requiring an EIR for a 42-single family...more
2023 served up roughly the same number of published appellate CEQA cases as 2022 with a defense win percentage of over 80 percent, which has been the case in many, if not all, of the past ten years. A prominent theme of...more
In Guerrero et al v. City of Los Angeles (January 17, 2024, No. B326033 c/w B327032) ___Cal.App.5th___, the Second District Court of Appeal held that the project opponents did not timely file their CEQA lawsuit. The...more
In Tsakopoulos Investments v. County of Sacramento (2023) 95 Cal. App. 5th 280, the Third District Court of Appeal (“Court”) upheld the County of Sacramento’s (“County”) certification of the Mather South Community Master Plan...more
In an opinion filed September 13, and modified and certified for publication on October 6, 2023, the Fourth District Court of Appeal (Div. 3) affirmed the trial court’s judgment denying a CEQA writ petition challenging the...more
In a partially published opinion filed September 20, 2023, the First District Court of Appeal (Div. 3) affirmed the Alameda County Superior Court’s judgments denying writ petitions in three partially consolidated CEQA actions...more
The 2023 California Legislative Session, which closed on September 14, was dominated yet again by efforts to address the state’s continued housing crisis. For the last several years, we have written about many bills enacted...more