Tag Archives: environment

Sacramento’s Legislators Are So Wrong on Housing

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Graph from California Legislature’s report “Recent Legislative Actions to Increase Housing Production in California”

As has become usual over the past several years, the California legislature is considering a number of bills that would override local planning control and weaken environmental review for new development projects. Two of the most controversial bills are SB 79 and SB 607. SB 79, from State Senator Scott Wiener, would remove local zoning restrictions for housing projects proposed on sites near transit. SB 607, also from Senator Wiener, along with principal co-author Assembly Member Buffy Wicks, would essentially gut the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), giving local agencies broad latitude in deciding what level of environmental review was needed for a project, if any. (On May 19, both bills were placed in the Senate Appropriations Committee suspense file, which generally means a bill is on hold, but both are scheduled to be heard again by the Committee today, May 23.)

You probably won’t be surprised to hear that, while these bills have a long list of supporters, they’ve also generated major pushback from both individuals and established organizations. SB 79 is opposed by Public Counsel, the Public Interest Law Project, the Western Center on Law & Poverty, and numerous California cities. SB 607 is opposed by a number of environmental groups, including the Center for Biological Diversity, Sierra Club California and Friends of the LA River. (Full disclosure: I work with a group that has sent letters opposing both bills, United Neighborhoods for Los Angeles.)

This has turned into a routine. Every new session, state legislators present a number of bills designed to allow developers to build bigger and faster, with little or no environmental review. The legislators claim it’s the only way to solve the housing crisis. What’s unusual about this year is that Governor Gavin Newsom has upped the ante. As the efforts of citizens and organizations opposed to these bills seem to be having an impact on legislators, Newsom has come forward to say that he’s going to use the budget process to achieve the goal of speeding up new development. Like Wiener, Wicks and many others, Newsom sees the housing affordability crisis purely as a matter of supply and demand. They believe that housing prices will go down if they erase local planning authority and let developers build with little or no environmental review. It’s the classic supply-side economics argument. Unleash the free market, and it will solve your problems.

Unfortunately, the legislature has been unleashing the free market for years now, and it doesn’t seem to working. Take a look at the graph above. This is taken from a report produced by the State Senate and State Assembly Housing Committees. The report is titled….

Recent Legislative Actions to Increase Housing Production in California

With the sub-heading….

California’s Housing Crisis: More Construction Is Needed to Meet the State’s Housing Needs

The paper was produced by the State Senate and Assembly Housing Committees. It argues that California has failed to produce enough housing for decades, and that lawmakers in Sacramento have been reversing this trend with the many bills that have been passed in recent years. They cite reforms to density bonus law, reforms to the Surplus Lands Act, faster approval timelines, and increases in “by-right” approvals. (When a project is approved “by-right”, it means an application is approved automatically, with no public hearings and no environmental review.) The text emphasizes large increases in the percentage of Low-Income and Very Low-Income units completed, and says there’s been a 61.5% overall increase in affordable housing production. That’s great, but the report doesn’t give numbers for rent-stabilized units lost during the same period, or the number of affordable units that converted to market-rate when their covenant expired, which means we don’t know if there’s really been a net gain.

And in spite of the report’s claims about increased housing production, the graph seems to show the opposite. By my count, the report lists 98 bills that were intended to spur housing growth over the last two decades. Things really kicked into high gear in 2017, when Sacramento passed 15 pieces of legislation related to housing. Looking at the lists compiled in the report, it appears that from 2017 through 2024 the Legislature approved a startling 87 bills to jump start housing. Based on the number of bills, if you accept the arguments that Wiener and friends are making, you’d expect housing production to go through the roof. But if we look at the chart above, you can see that the number of units permitted since 2017 is well below the number permitted during the first decade of this century. While it looks like there’s been a slight increase in multi-family units produced over that period, there’s been a huge drop in the number of single-family homes produced. The numbers look even worse if we go back to the 80s. The quantities of both multi-family and single-family homes produced in that decade are far higher than the quantities produced since 2017.

Which brings us to the question, What has this onslaught of legislation actually accomplished? Wiener and his pals have spent years pushing bills to override local zoning restrictions, and they’ve also been busy hacking away at the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA). They argue that loosening local zoning and sidelining CEQA will spur new housing growth. But look at the numbers. Wiener and friends started their assault on local zoning and CEQA back in 2017. While the text of the report seems to be telling us that their campaign has been a resounding success, the graph the authors lead off with tells a different story. Housing production since 2017 is well below what it was in the 2000s, and it’s WAY below what it was in the 1980s. And it’s important to point out that in both of these earlier periods, local zoning was more restrictive than it is now, and CEQA was in full force. No doubt some will argue that the pandemic held down new construction, but California’s own housing dashboard shows that the number of permits issued actually increased during the crisis. (See slide 8 on the housing data dashboard.)


Newsom, Wiener, Wicks and their cohorts keep telling us that local zoning and environmental review are two of the biggest roadblocks to new housing. But given the numbers that we see in the Legislature’s own report, it seems these folks have no idea what they’re talking about. The graph they lead off with tells the story. California was producing more new housing before the Legislature began its attack on local zoning and environmental review.

Harbor Gateway Community Still Fighting Massive Distribution Center

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Would you want these diesel trucks driving through your neighborhood?

How would you like to have hundreds of diesel trucks driving up and down your street, spewing diesel exhaust, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week? Residents living on Redondo Beach Boulevard in the Harbor Gateway area have been trying for years to stop a massive distribution center from being built right across the street from their homes, but it seems that no one at LA City Hall is listening.

Back in 2018 I posted about the LA City Planning Commission’s approval of this toxic project directly across the street from residents’ homes in the Harbor Gateway community. Developer Prologis had filed an application to build a 300,000+ sq.ft. warehouse which would generate hundreds of diesel truck trips every day, and would operate all night long. The LA Department of City Planning had allowed Prologis to slide by with low-level environmental review that didn’t begin to address the impacts. Thankfully the State’s then-Attorney General, Xavier Becerra, stepped in to let the City know that they weren’t doing enough to protect the residents’ health. The people who had been fighting the project were overjoyed, but it turns out the reprieve was only temporary.

Apartments right across the street from the proposed distribution center.

The Prologis distribution center is back, and will be heard again by the City Planning Commission on Thursday, May 8. Given the CPC’s record of approving pretty much everything that comes before them, it’s likely the project will again be given the green light. The folks at LA City Hall do not seem to care that the residents are already subject to vehicle exhaust from the nearby 110 Freeway. Nor do they seem to care that the area ranks in the top 5% for pollution burden and vulnerability according to the California Environmental Protection Agency’s screening tool. And apparently it makes no difference that, in addition to the residential buildings, the project site is surrounded by a public park, an LAUSD school, nursing homes, and two churches. This project will bring the trucks already travelling the freeway right into the neighborhood, and air pollution has been shown to have serious health impacts on children, adults and seniors.


Area residents will be showing up at the CPC meeting to voice their opposition. If you can make it down to City Hall, they’d appreciate your support. The meeting starts at 8:30 am, but it’s hard to say exactly what time the item will be taken up by the Commissioners.

If you can’t make it down, you can also submit comments to the following e-mail address.

cpc@lacity.org

Be sure to identify the project in the subject line.

Prologis Vermont Redondo Project, CPC-2017-1014-CU-ZAA-SPR

Thoughts on LA, Fires and the Future

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Map of current fires in LA area from Cal Fire, as of January 12, 2025

If you’re looking for updates on the fires in LA, this post won’t offer anything you haven’t heard already. The LA Times, Daily News, and local news stations have been doing an excellent job reporting on the situation. I’m writing this post because I want to talk about what comes next. While the fires are still burning, and may continue to burn through next week, we do need to start talking about the future of LA. And I think the best way to start talking about the future is to begin with the past….

The City of LA was built on real estate speculation. To some degree, this is true of most cities, but it’s especially true of Los Angeles. Writers have commented on the fact that this area lacks a number of the things that are generally the basis for large scale development, most fundamentally a reliable source of water. Nor did the City of LA initially have a port, and only gained one by annexing San Pedro in 1909. That area is only tenuously connected to the rest of the city by a narrow, 20-mile corridor that’s basically just a rail line.

LA did have oil. Drilling began in the 19th century, and in the early 20th century large sections of the city, including Downtown, were covered with oil wells. But real estate investors saw huge amounts of money to be made by residential and commercial development, and gradually most oil wells were either shut down or hidden. (The majority of wells that are still visible are located in the southern part of LA, and the low-income communities that are impacted don’t have the political clout to shut them down.) The real estate investors promoted Los Angeles aggressively, putting ads in newspapers nationwide, essentially selling the climate. LA had lots of sun and little rain. People came, but the investors knew that to sustain new development they’d need to bring more water to the area. The LA Aqueduct was completed in 1913, after business interests used dishonest means to buy up the rights to the Owens Valley’s water resources. As the city continued to grow, LA snagged more water from the Colorado River with the construction of Hoover Dam during the Depression. Then came the construction of the California State Water Project, which extended from the 50s through the 70s. The bottom line is, the City of LA is only able to support a population of almost four million people because it imports about 90% of its water from areas that are hundreds of miles away.

I’m talking about the way LA was built because I think it’s important to understand the city’s history in talking about the fires that have devastated LA’s communities. Real estate investors built LA because there were fortunes to be made. In the first past of the 20th century, the only efforts at planning were driven by investors looking for profit. In the second half of the 20th century, there was more of an effort to plan for growth, but efforts at responsible planning were often overridden by the same investors looking for more profits. In the 21st century, there’s a lot of talk about planning at City Hall, but really most of it boils down to upzoning large swaths of the city to promote more growth. Planning in the City of LA is still largely driven by investors and their lobbyists. If you don’t believe me, please read up on the recent convictions of former Councilmember Jose Huizar, former Deputy Mayor Ray Chan and others who were caught up in a massive scandal involving bribery, fraud and racketeering. And if you think those convicted were the only ones involved, it’s important to remember that projects backed by Huizar were almost without exception unanimously approved by the LA City Council.

Image from Cal Fire Update, January 11, 2025

The point here is that development in LA is not driven by responsible planning. Development in LA is driven by money. If you want to know why projects were approved and are still being approved in fire-prone areas, follow the money. While there have been individuals who chose to build their own homes in areas where fire risk is high, most of the residential development in these areas is the result of the creation of suburban subdivisions. Even when citizens expressed concern about fire risks in these areas, they were almost always ignored by the politicians, who had often received campaign contributions from the developers. The Porter Ranch area has been repeatedly threatened by fires, but that didn’t stop the City of LA from approving The Vineyards at Porter Ranch, a recent multi-phase mixed-use project that includes apartments, a hotel and a large retail component. The project location has been designated by the LA Fire Department as a Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zone (VHFHSZ). Another example is LA City Planning Director Vince Bertoni’s approval of the initiation of a General Plan Amendment (GPA) to make way for the Bulgari Hotel, a massive luxury hotel project that was to be located in another VHFHSZ in the Santa Monica Mountains. The request for the GPA was submitted by developer representative Stacey Brenner, whose husband served as a deputy to former Councilmember Paul Koretz. The project was in Koretz’ district. The Bulgari Hotel was only stopped because area residents put intense pressure on Koretz’ successor, Councilmember Katy Yaroslavsky, who promised to stop the project during her campaign for the office.

Many of the areas that have been burned in the current spate of fires have burned repeatedly before. In the last few decades there have been multiple fires in Brentwood, Bel Air and the Hollywood Hills. Other communities like Baldwin Hills, Sunland-Tujunga and Chatsworth have all been hit by devastating fires. But, with rare exceptions, the City of LA continues to approve new development in fire prone areas.

As fires continue to rage across Los Angeles County, talk of rebuilding has already begun. I wish our elected officials would take some time to think about this. We need to have a tough conversation about rebuilding. I understand that thousands of people have lost their homes, and their dearest wish would be to rebuild and return to their communities. If individuals have the resources to do this, and if they understand the risks, they should be able to make that choice. But with the death toll from the current fires at 16, and damages worth billions of dollars, our elected officials should think long and hard about pushing for large scale development in fire prone areas. In most of these areas, the question is not whether they’ll burn again but when they’ll burn again. The LA area has always been prone to fires. As climate change continues to make the region drier and warmer, the risks will only increase. And while our firefighters can work miracles when conditions are favorable, we’re now seeing a brutal demonstration of how hard it is to control wind-driven fires.

It remains to be seen how strong the push for rebuilding will be once the fires stop. No doubt the real estate investors are already weighing their options. Some may want to bet on rebuilding. Others may think the risk is too great and decide to put their money elsewhere. But California Governor Gavin Newsom has already announced the suspension of laws that would require environmental review for rebuilding in fire prone areas. This is just crazy. After this disaster we should be insisting on stronger environmental review. The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) requires an assessment of whether new development will result in wildfire risks. It also requires cities to ask whether fire departments can provide adequate protection and whether the site can be safely evacuated in an emergency. Instead of brushing these issues aside, we should be insisting on careful scrutiny.

CEQA also requires review of a project’s greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs), because of the growing threat of climate change. Most Environmental Impact Reports I’ve read make no meaningful effort to accurately assess a project’s GHG impacts. Instead, the preparers rely on the State’s CalEEMod platform, which allows them to input whatever numbers they want, thereby pretty much guaranteeing that no project will ever appear to cause significant GHG impacts. In reviewing the EIRs, LA City Planning generally accepts whatever the developers claim without question. While the City of LA and the State of California claim to be fighting climate change, in reality both of them usually support new development regardless of what the GHG impacts are.

Again, I totally understand that many of those who lost homes in the fire are anxious to rebuild. If I were in their situation, I’d probably feel the same way. But LA has been repeatedly hit by deadly and devastating fires. As much as we may want to hear inspiring words about rebuilding, we need to ask: Do we want to be reliving this tragedy over and over again?

Let’s think carefully before we start to build again. And let’s demand that our elected officials do the same.

Image from Cal Fire Update, January 11, 2025

Why Would You Build a 56,000 Sq. Ft. Distribution Center within 300 Feet of an Elementary School?

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3505 Pasadena Ave.

Residents of Lincoln Heights are up in arms over the plan to build a 56,700 square foot e-commerce distribution center at the intersection of Pasadena Ave. and Avenue 35.  Not only is the project in close proximity to houses and apartments, it’s less than 300 feet away from Hillside Elementary.  The community is understandably upset about the potential for a huge increase in truck traffic and diesel emissions.

Hillside Elementary School

At this point, though, the community is uncertain how to stop it.  Xebec, the real estate firm behind the distribution center, believes that the project complies with existing zoning and doesn’t need discretionary approvals from LA City Planning.  They’ve already applied for permits from LA Building & Safety.  Councilmember Eunisses Hernandez, who represents Lincoln Heights, has come out against the project, and she’s proposed changes to the plan that governs the area.  Unfortunately, those changes won’t be approved until December, and Xebec wants to have the permits finalized before then. 

I don’t blame the residents for being angry.  It’s not hard to understand why building an e-commerce distribution center near an elementary school is a problem.  There are decades of research showing that diesel exhaust can have long-term impacts on children’s health.  Children living in areas where they’re exposed to diesel exhaust are at higher risk of respiratory problems, including reduced lung capacity.  Seniors also face higher health risks, and actually, so does everyone living in an area where they’re regularly exposed to diesel emissions.

New residential building under construction right next door to 3505 Pasadena

I have to admit, I have trouble understanding the zoning for 3505 Pasadena.  According to ZIMAS, the General Plan Land Use designation for this parcel is Hybrid Industrial.  The Hybrid Industrial designation was created by LA City Planning to allow residential uses in industrial zones.  As a matter of fact, right next door to 3505 Pasadena there’s a massive new residential complex under construction that contains over 460 units.  If the Hybrid Industrial designation was created to spur new housing developments in industrial areas where appropriate, the Xebec project seems to violate the whole intention of this initiative.  And when those new units go on the market, how many prospective tenants are going to sign a lease when they realize they’ll be living next door to an e-commerce distribution center?

General Plan Land Use designation for 3505 Pasadena is Hybrid Industrial

But whatever the zoning is, this project should be stopped.  Just ask yourself if you’d like to have diesel trucks going in and out of a distribution center right across from your home.  Or better yet, ask yourself if you think elementary school kids should be breathing the toxic diesel exhaust from these trucks.

The LA City Council rep for the area is already looking for a way to stop this, but it might help to send a note to some people at the State level.  If you feel like speaking up, here are the e-mail addresses for the two people who represent Lincoln Heights in Sacramento, State Senator Maria Elena Durazo and Assemblymember Miguel Santiago.  I’m also including a staff member at the California Environmental Protection Agency’s Environmental Justice Program.

senator.durazo@sen.ca.gov

assemblymember.santiago@assembly.ca.gov

leticia.syslo@calepa.ca.gov

Here’s a suggested subject line.

Kids Shouldn’t Be Breathing Diesel Exhaust: Stop the Distribution Center at 3505 Pasadena

If you see problems with this project, let the folks in Sacramento know.  The people of Lincoln Heights would appreciate it. 

Should We Really Remove Limits on Events with Alcohol at Our Parks?

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How much alcohol at LA City parks is too much alcohol?  It appears that the City of LA doesn’t believe there’s any such thing as too much alcohol at city parks.  At the April 20 meeting of the Board of Recreation and Park Commissioners, one of the agenda items was a proposal to revise the Recreation & Parks Alcoholic Beverage Policy. 

The current policy says only beer and wine can be served at public events in LA City parks, and it limits the number of events where alcohol is served to no more than one event per park per year.  The proposed revisions would allow the sale of a full line of alcoholic beverages and remove any limits on the number of events where alcohol is served.

Does that really seem like a good idea?  Opening up our parks to an unlimited number of events that offer booze to attendees?  There are so many problems with this it’s hard to know where to begin.

First, while the revised policy requires that event organizers hire security, the security is only going to be dealing with issues at the site of the event.  What happens when people who’ve had too much to drink leave the area and start wandering around the park?  Or get into their cars and start driving home?  Just last year a cyclist riding through Griffith Park was hit and killed by a motorist.  Police said the driver appeared to have been drinking.

Second, allowing more events that serve alcohol will likely bring a lot more people to LA’s parks, but the Department of Recreation & Parks hasn’t been able to properly maintain these important resources for years.  Sadly, Rec & Parks has been the victim of severe budget cuts, and has been struggling without proper staffing.  Increasing the number of visitors without increasing the budget for Rec & Parks just means the Department will be more burdened than ever.

And then there are the environmental issues.  If increasing the number of events that offer alcohol would increase the number of visitors to LA’s parks, it seems likely that there would be significant impacts to the environment.  This is especially true if the policy change means more live music festivals, which is almost certainly the case.  There’s no sign that Rec & Parks has done any kind of environmental review, and there’s no way they could claim that this policy change wouldn’t have any impacts.

One impact would be traffic.  I know our leaders like to pretend that nobody drives any more and everybody takes transit, but if you believe that’s true, you should check out the full parking lot and the cars lining the street on the periphery of the LA State Historic Park.  You can see the same at many of LA’s other parks.  Unfortunately, the vast majority of Angelenos still drive cars to get where they want to go.

Another impact is solid waste, and again, more music festivals would be a particular problem.  The City will tell you that all the empty aluminum and plastic containers discarded at these events can be recycled, so there’s no impact to the environment.  Sure, they can be recycled, but they’re often not, and the City has been struggling for years to comply with a State mandate that it divert 50% of its solid waste to recycling.  More music festivals would also likely have significant impacts on habitat and wildlife, and these impacts should also be assessed.  

One of the motivations for this policy change may be to generate more revenue for Rec & Parks, and the Department certainly needs more funding.  But the change will probably result in higher costs, too, and there’s no sign that this has been analyzed.  Before even considering increasing the number of events that offer alcohol, the Department should do a study to analyze whether increased revenue would offset the increased costs. 

There may be good arguments for increasing the number of events that offer alcohol at LA’s parks, but lifting the current caps to allow an unlimited number, especially if serving a full line of alcohol is allowed, does not make sense.  It might make sense to allow a small increase in the number of events with alcohol.  Or it might make sense to designate certain parks that could host these events.  Rec & Parks should study a few different options, and weigh the benefits against the costs.  They also need to do environmental review. 

If you’d like to offer input on the proposed revisions to Rec & Parks’ Alcoholic Beverage Policy, you can send an e-mail to the Board of Commissioners:

RAP.COMMISSIONERS@LACITY.ORG

You might also copy General Manager Jimmy Kim and his Administrative Assistant, Desiree Ramirez:

Jimmy.Kim@lacity.org

Desiree.Ramirez@lacity.org

It also couldn’t hurt to contact your LA City Councilmember to let them know how you feel.

There may be ways to update the current policy that would provide benefits, but just opening the door to an unlimited number of events with alcohol is not a good idea.

Why Should LA Worry about Pakistan?

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By Carport – Own work, usingFile:Pakistan location map.svg by NordNordWest.STRM-30 data for the relief, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=23198633

If you’ve been watching the news at all, you’ve heard about the unprecedented flooding in Pakistan.  Millions have been displaced.  Over 1,300 people have died.  It’s hard to estimate the impact on the economy at this point, but it’s likely that much of the population will be facing extreme hardships for a long time to come.   

Many of the news sources reporting on this catastrophe have quoted scientists who believe that this extreme weather event is linked to climate change.  The horrible irony is that Pakistan produces only a tiny fraction of the greenhouse gas emissions that are driving climate change, and yet it’s suffering some of the worst impacts. 

Who are the biggest culprits when it comes to greenhouse gas emissions?  China and the US are the top two nations pouring CO2 into the atmosphere, but even though the US is second in overall emissions, its per capita emissions are about twice that of China.  Within the US, California has over 14 million registered vehicles, far more than any other state, and the vast majority of them run on fossil fuels.  Of that 14 million, over 7 million are registered in LA County.

So we definitely need to take some of the responsibility for the climate crisis.  But we shouldn’t waste time feeling guilty.  We should get to work on changing the situation.  There are a number of things we can do.  We can start by driving less.  This could mean taking transit to work one day a week, or carpooling with a friend, or if your job allows it, working from home when it’s convenient.  We can also try to minimize the amount of plastic we use.  This may sound easier than it really is.  Many of the products we use in daily life are made of plastic, and so much of what we buy comes wrapped in plastic.  But if you start thinking about it, you can probably find at least a few items that you can do without.  And if you shop on-line, it’s important to consider the way things are packaged.

But we also need to support legislation that will reduce greenhouse gas emissions.  This is the hard part, because there are powerful interests targeting bills intended to curtail the use of fossil fuels.  This year the Western States Petroleum Association and the California Independent Petroleum Association used their clout to either stop or weaken a series of bills that were written to address climate change.  Capital and Main lays out the gory details in this article. 

California Oil Industry Continues to Thwart Climate-Related Bills

We shouldn’t be discouraged.  We have clout, too.  According to a poll by the Public Policy Institute of California, 80% of the state’s residents say that climate change is a serious threat to our economy and quality of life.  That means an overwhelming majority of California voters understand the gravity of the situation.  We need to let our representatives in Sacramento know that they should be listening to us, not the fossil fuel lobby.  If you don’t know who your representatives are, use this link to find out. 

Find Your California Representative

We need to think about how climate change is affecting our lives in LA.  We need to think about how climate change is affecting the people of Pakistan. 

We’re all in this together. 

The River After the Rain

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We had a lot of rain in February. Not long after the storms passed I took some photos of the LA River along the Glendale Narrows. While it was nothing like the raging torrent it had been a few days before, the runoff from the rains was still flowing freely. It was a great day to take a walk along the river.

The river flowing beneath the Glendale Freeway.
A view of the river looking toward the Fletcher Bridge.
The Fletcher Bridge.
A stairway leading from the Fletcher Bridge down to the river.
Underneath the Fletcher Bridge.
Water rushing along the river bed.
A tangle of dead wood.
At this point the river runs right along the Golden State Freeway.
A view of the San Gabriel Mountains in the distance.
A shot of the river looking toward Griffith Park.
Power lines stretching across the river.
The rains swept a lot of trash into the river bed.
Stones and reeds on the river bed.
The river emerges from under the Hyperion Bridge.
On the left the Hyperion Bridge. On the right the pylons that used to support the Red Car.
Under the Hyperion Bridge.
Here the water was smooth and calm.
A view of the river from Sunnynook Bridge.

Harbor Gateway Community Fights Toxic Project

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HG Sm 01 Open

Site at Vermont and Redondo where Prologis wants to build a massive distribution center.

Back in February I was at a City Planning Commission (CPC) hearing.  I’d come to talk about one of the items on the agenda, but while I was waiting for that to come up, I noticed a group of people sitting together holding signs that said “NO on 7”.  These people wanted to voice their opposition to a new distribution center that had been proposed for their community.  Logistics REIT giant Prologis was seeking permission to build a 341,000 sq. ft. warehouse with 36 truck loading positions and parking for up to 71 trailers that would operate 24/7.  Amazingly, the site they had in mind was right across the street from a residential neighborhood in the Harbor Gateway area.

HG Sm 10 Hearing

The community shows their opposition at the City Planning Commission hearing.

A long list of speakers got up to talk.  First there were the applicants and their reps, all of whom boasted about what a great project this was.  There were also a number of union members who came forward to tell the Commissioners that the distribution center would create lots of jobs.  And staff from Councilmember Joe Buscaino’s office showed up to speak in support of the project.

But the people who actually live in the community were dead set against it, talking about impacts from diesel truck exhaust, and noise from a distribution center that was going to operate 24/7.  They explained to the Commissioners that the site was just across the street from apartments and houses.  They pointed out that a healthcare facility, a convalescent home and a public park were all within a few hundred feet of the proposed distribution center.  The CPC listened to all this, and then voted to approve the project.  While Commissioners Vahid Khorsand and Veronica Padilla-Campos voted against, everyone else gave the distribution center a thumps up, and it passed easily.  The final tally was 6-2.

HG Sm 20 Apts

Residential neighborhood directly across the street from the project site.

Even though I’d never heard of the project before that morning, it was pretty easy to see that the approval process was a joke.  The applicant wants to build a 300,000+ sq.ft. warehouse right across the street from a residential neighborhood.  The warehouse will generate hundreds of diesel truck trips every day, and will operate all night long.  This is a project that will have major impacts on the surrounding community, but instead of doing a full Environmental Impact Report (EIR), the Department of City Planning (DCP) allowed the applicant to slide it through with a much less rigorous Mitigated Negative Declaration (MND).  In other words, the DCP is saying that even though there could be negative impacts, don’t worry about it, because we can mitigate them to the point where they won’t be a problem.

HG Sm 30 Kei Ai

Kei-Ai Healthcare Center sits just across the street from the project site.

It’s a familiar game.  The City of LA plays it all the time.  The DCP lets the applicant run the environmental review process without providing any meaningful oversight.  DCP staff will offer some suggestions, the CPC will set some conditions, but the project that gets approved generally gives the developers pretty much everything they were asking for.  These days most of the Commissioners on the CPC seem to believe their job is to approve projects.  No matter what’s being proposed, the routine is pretty much the same.  They listen to testimony, ask DCP staff a few questions, spend a little time haggling over conditions, and then give it a green light.  Occasionally, as with this distribution center, one or two of the Commissioners will dissent, but almost without exception the majority gives the proposed project a thumbs-up and the developers and their reps walk out smiling.

HG Sm 40 Gard Conv

Gardena Convalescent Center is just over a block away from the project site.

But the people who live in the neighborhood aren’t smiling.  And they’re not taking this lying down.  I contacted one of the residents, Rosalie Preston, to ask if the community was planning to fight the project.  She sent me a copy of the appeal they’d submitted.  Preston points out that the community is already considered disadvantaged by the California Environmental Protection Agency (CalEPA) because of its proximity to the 110.  The freeway carries hundreds of diesel trucks through the area every day, causing CalEPA to rank it in the highest percentile for pollution burden.

I really hope the appeal will be granted, because the community has already spent way too much time opposing this awful project.  But if the appeal is denied and this goes to court, I’ll be laughing my head off on the day the judge hands the City of LA another embarrassing defeat.  The City has lost a number of high-profile cases related to development and planning.  This will just be one more demonstration of how badly broken the approval process is.

But let’s take look at the appeal, and see why the community has a problem with the CPC’s decision to approve the project….

An EIR, Not an MND

There’s really no question about this.  According to State law, an EIR is required if “substantial evidence in the record supports a fair argument that the project may result in significant adverse impacts.”  The Prologis Distribution Center will bring hundreds of diesel trucks in and out of this residential community, all through the day and all through the night.  Prologis argues that they can mitigate air quality and noise impacts to the point where they’re not significant.  It’s not surprising to hear developers make idiotic claims like this, but it’s depressing that the City is happy to take their word for it.  The fact that the DCP allowed Prologis to get away with an MND shows just how little they care about how new development impacts LA’s communities.

Toxic Emissions

Diesel trucks emit a range of harmful substances, and the claim that hundreds of trucks will travel through this community every day without having significant impacts on the health of the residents is absurd.  Among the components of diesel exhaust are particulate emissions.  The California Air Resources Board (ARB) regulates two classes of particulate emissions.

PM2.5: Up to 2.5 microns in size.

PM10: Up to 10 microns in size.

The ARB web site offers this information….

“The ARB is concerned about Californians’ exposures to PM2.5- and PM10-sized particles because of the potential harmful health effects that can result.  PM 2.5 and PM10 particles easily penetrate into the airways and lungs where they may produce harmful health effects such as the worsening of heart and lung diseases. The risk of these health effects is greatest in the elderly and the very young. Exposure to elevated concentrations of PM is also associated with increased hospital and doctor visits and increased numbers of premature deaths.”

The consultants who wrote the MND claim that the PM levels residents will be exposed to fall within the limits set by ARB, but the appeal calls this into question.  To predict the emissions that will be generated by a proposed project, environmental consultants use a program developed by the State known as CalEEMod.  The appellants looked at the numbers used by the authors of the MND for these estimates, and then compared them to the numbers actually given in the MND.  “When we reviewed the Project’s CalEEMod output files, we found that several of the values inputted into the model were not consistent with information disclosed in the IS/MND.”  The appellants believe that the numbers used by Prologis’ consultants represent only about half of the truck trips the project would generate.  This means the actual levels of PM pollution would be double, and the health impacts to the community much more severe than Prologis has stated.

Site Clean-Up

It’s known that former industrial uses on the site left toxic chemicals in the soil, including tetrachloroethylene (a likely carcinogen), trichloroethene (a known carcinogen), total petroleum hydrocarbons and heavy metals.  A Phase I Environmental Site Assessment was done in 2016.  It concluded that the site was rife with contaminants and recommended additional investigation.  Anybody with common sense should understand that there’s no way to talk about mitigating the impacts until all the information is available.

The appeal covers a lot of other issues, but it all boils down to the fact that Prologis isn’t being honest about the impacts that will be caused by the project.  And as usual, the Department of City Planning and the City Planning Commission are letting the developer get away with it.  There’s certainly an argument to be made regarding the jobs the project will create, and the increase in economic activity throughout the area.  But even if the CPC believes the economic benefits outweigh the health concerns, they’re still required by law to fully assess the impacts and to make every reasonable effort to protect the health of the community.  They haven’t done that.  By allowing Prologis to use an MND instead of an EIR, they’ve let the developer off the hook and let the community down.

But that’s nothing new.  Anybody who’s been following development in LA over the years knows about the cozy relationship that business interests have with City Hall, and by extension, with the DCP.  Developers and real estate investors know it’s just a matter of working the machine, and if they play the game right, pretty much anything they ask for will be approved.

City Hall is supposed to protect us.  Instead they’re selling us out.  The people opposing this project are just the latest victims of the City’s disrespect for State-mandated environmental review.  By allowing Prologis to slide through this process without properly assessing the project’s impacts, the DCP is putting residents’ health at risk.

That’s not acceptable.  Unfortunately, once again the CPC has ignored the law, and once again residents have been forced to pursue an appeal and possibly a law suit just to protect their community.  Once again the City of LA has put the interests of developers over the rights of citizens.

 

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Rosecrans Recreation Center, directly north of the project site.   Photo by Carmelita Ibarra from Google Images.

Glendale Puts Hold on Grayson Repowering

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On Tuesday night protesters gathered in front of Glendale City Hall to oppose spending $500 million on rebuilding the Grayson Power Plant. Glendale Water and Power (GWP) has put forward a plan to replace obsolete generating units with newer ones, increasing the plant’s output significantly. The process is called repowering, and the GWP says it’s necessary to provide a reliable supply of electricity for the city.

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Speakers talked about the problems with the current plan for Grayson.

But there are many who feel that upping Grayson’s output is a bad idea, since it means a big increase in the plant’s fossil fuel consumption. Debate over Glendale’s plan has been intense, with environmentalists claiming that the GWP has failed to explore clean energy alternatives. They point out that repowering Grayson would mean significant increases in CO2, ozone and particulate emissions.

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The media showed up to cover the protest.

The Grayson plan was on the City Council’s agenda that night, and council members would be deciding whether or not to approve the project’s Environmental Impact Report (EIR). The rally broke up as the meeting was starting. I went home and watched the proceedings on my laptop. It was long night. I wanted to hang on until the Council voted, but at 10:00 pm they were still taking public comment, and I finally gave up.

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Volunteers manning the table.

The tone of the meeting was civil, but tense. Evan Gillespie spoke on behalf of the Sierra Club, and he questioned some of the claims made by GWP. The utility had initially said that Grayson needed to produce 250 megawatts or there was a danger of power shortages, but then later said they might be able to do with less. He also was skeptical of the claim that the cost of the current plan wouldn’t mean raising rates down he road.

Angela Johnson Meszaros, a staff attorney with Earth Justice, stated that the EIR had serious problems. The EIR says that the project’s emissions woudn’t be significant because of offsets provided by the South Coast Air Quality Management District (SCAQMD). How does this work? Polluters can bank credits for emissions they don’t produce, which in turn can be traded to polluters who produce more than they should. But wouldn’t Grayson still be pumping a lot of dirt into the sky over Glendale? You bet, and Johnson Meszaros pointed this out. The idea that emissions offsets will somehow even things out across the LA area sounds good in theory, but if you live anywhere near the power plant you’ll still be breathing a lot of dirty air. She also said that the biggest problem with the EIR was that it didn’t present enough viable alternatives, especially with respect to clean energy.

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Sometimes you just can’t find a sturdy surface to write on.

Like I said, I bailed before the end of the meeting, but this morning I sent a message to the folks at Stop Grayson Expansion. They responded with the news that the Council voted 4 to 1 to put a hold on things for 90 days and issue a Request for Information (RFI). This means they’re going to look for alternative solutions for Glendale’s energy needs, including clean energy options. Stop Grayson had been hoping for an independent study of possible alternatives, but they believe that if the RFI is prepared carefully it could be a step in the right direction.

Bottom line, we need to get away from fossil fuels. This isn’t going to happen right away, but it’s never going to happen if we don’t push aggressively for alternatives. Thanks to all those who showed up at the rally on Tuesday, and thanks to all the groups who worked so hard to change the discussion about Grayson. This isn’t over yet, but things are looking a whole lot better.

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We Need Trees, Not Fees

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The City has a problem. The Urban Forestry Division (UFD) has scores of trees sitting in boxes in storage that it can’t plant. Why is this? In large part it’s because when developers remove trees to build projects, they agree to replace them by purchasing new ones for the City to plant elsewhere. Unfortunately, due to budget cuts, the UFD has no staff to do the planting. And worse, when trees are stuck in boxes for long periods of time, their health declines, sometimes to the point where they’re not viable any more.

Actually, the City has an even bigger problem than this. We’re losing a huge chunk of our urban forest. Years of dry weather has already impacted the health of thousands of trees in the LA area, but now there’s a worse threat. A beetle called the shot hole borer has come to the region. It nests in trees and in the process often kills them. The die-off has already begun, and if it continues at its current pace we can expect to lose millions of trees throughout Southern California over the next several years. This isn’t just a matter of erasing pretty landscapes. As a result of this massive reduction of our urban forest, there will be impacts to our water resources, our air will be dirtier, and our cities will grow hotter than they are already.

So you’d think we’d be doing everything we can to protect the trees we’ve got. Unfortunately, that’s not the case. Aside from the natural threats to our trees, development is taking a toll on the urban forest. City Hall is pushing hard to boost construction of housing and hotels, as well as office and commercial space. Which brings us back to the first point. Developers generally want to squeeze as much square footage as they can out of a project. Often they ask the City to reduce required setbacks, or even let them build right out to the property line. In many cases they also ask the City to reduce the requirements for open space. The Department of City Planning (DCP) is usually pretty generous in granting developers’ wishes, especially if it’s a housing project that includes some affordable units.

To give you an idea of how bad things have gotten, let’s talk about the City’s Protected Tree Ordinance (PTO). Some species are considered so important that we should afford them special protection. A while back the City Council approved the PTO in order to prevent their removal except under extraordinary circumstances. So how’s that working out? Not so good. In November of last year Councilmembers Paul Koretz and Mike Bonin introduced a motion to strengthen the ordinance. Here’s a quote.

”Unfortunately, trees are not being adequately protected and departments are not working well together to protect them. Trees are being cut before development permits are applied for, trees are not being protected during construction activities, and building permits are routinely issued without the Department of Building and Safety being aware of the presence of protected trees on the affected properties, all resulting in an accumulating net loss of trees, tree canopy and the accompanying ecosystem services across the City.”

This is serious. We need trees. Our water resources are increasingly stressed. LA’s air quality ranks among the worst in the nation. And temperatures in the city continue to rise. A robust urban forest would help us deal with all of those problems, but instead of enhancing our tree canopy we’re cutting it down.

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The reason I’m bringing all this up is that there’s a proposal before the City right now to allow developers to fulfill the requirement for replacing trees simply by paying a fee. For new projects that remove trees, the City would calculate the required number of replacements (usually at a ratio between 2 to 1 and 4 to 1), and then bill the developer for in-lieu fees of $2,612 per tree. This amount would cover the cost of procurement, planting and providing water for three years.

At first glance, this might look like a good deal. The UFD doesn’t have staff to plant the replacement trees it’s been receiving, and storing them for long periods of time impacts the trees’ health. There apparently has been talk of restoring some of the UDF’s funding in the City’s next budget, which could lead to the hiring of personnel to plant trees. But that’s definitely a roll of the dice, since LA is struggling with a structural deficit, and for years now its budgets have been held together with scotch tape and bubble gum. Many City departments suffered staff cuts during the recession, and they’re all lobbying to restore those positions. So without any certainty over staffing for the UFD, the in-lieu fee probably seems pretty attractive, since the cost of planting and watering is built in. The City is outsourcing a lot of work already, and it could just hire a contractor to do the job.

But really, there are a number of problems with just charging an in lieu-fee….

First, it makes it even easier for the DCP to allow developers to do away with trees. If, in theory, all the trees that are removed will be replaced at a 2 to 1 ratio or better, and if the money collected includes planting and watering, then why would they hesitate to reduce setbacks and open space? Let the developers do whatever they want! Problem solved. But in reality, we have no guarantee that this system will work as promised. Think about it. Supposedly the current system of requiring developers to replace trees was going to solve the problem. And what actually happened? We have a lot of trees sitting in City-owned storage areas. Some have been sitting in boxes so long that they’re no longer viable. And at the same time developers have been cutting down trees and putting hardscape in their place.

But the City would certainly spend the money they collect. Right? Not necessarily. You may recall that back in 2015 City Controller Ron Galperin did an audit of fees collected from developers. He found $54 million that had been sitting in City-controlled accounts for at least three years. This money had been collected, but it hadn’t been spent. Unfortunately, City Hall isn’t always great about following through.

Second, while charging the in-lieu fees may lead to a better replacement rate in the future, there’s no guarantee that the City will do anything about the trees the UFD currently has in stock. If the budget for the next fiscal year doesn’t include funds for additional staff, these trees could easily sit in storage until they die. It’s been suggested that non-profits could step in to do the planting. If that’s a possibility, why hasn’t it already happened?

Third, and most important, this is not a solution, it’s a quick fix. In order to find a solution, you have to first identify the problem, and the City hasn’t done that. It’s proposing in-lieu fees as a way of replacing trees that are cut down for development, but that’s really just one aspect of the situation.

The real problem is that we’re facing a potentially devastating loss of our urban forest.

If we fail to maintain our urban forest, our air quality will suffer, our water quality will be diminished, and LA will continue to grow hotter than it already is.

LA needs a comprehensive, holistic approach to managing our urban forest. We must do a complete inventory of the city’s tree canopy, and also an inventory of space available for planting trees. We then need to use this data to develop a unified policy based on actual science that will address all aspects of the problem. Rather than coming up with quick fixes to deal with tree loss caused by new development or sidewalk repair or insect infestation, we need an integrated approach that brings all these things together.

In other words, we need to gather the data, look at the science, and then develop an actual plan.

If we don’t do this, our urban forest will continue to decline, and we will suffer the consequences.

If you want to take a look at the proposed ordinance, here’s the link.

Tree Replacement In-Lieu Fee

If you want to contact your City Council rep about this issue, be sure to include this council file number in the subject line.

CF-16-0461

And to make sure your comments are included in the file, don’t forget to copy the City Clerk.

cityclerk@lacity.org

Finally, if you want to voice your comments in person, this issue will be considered by the Community Forest Advisory Committee (CFAC) later this week.

CFAC Meeting
Thursday, March 1, 1:00 pm
City Hall, 200 N. Spring St, Room 361
[USE MAIN ST. ENTRANCE.]

For more information, follow the link below.

CFAC Meetings

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