In City of Vallejo v. City of American Canyon (Case No. C102070), the Third District Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court’s judgment rejecting a neighbor city’s CEQA challenge to the Environmental Impact Report (“EIR”) for the 2.4 million-square-foot Giovannioni Logistics Center project in American Canyon. The court held that the EIR and associated Water
In Krovoza v. City of Davis (2025) 117 Cal.App.5th 623, the Third District Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court’s denial of a writ petition challenging the City of Davis’s use of categorical exemptions under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) for the relocation of playground equipment within a city park. The court held that
Much is discussed every year in the Legislature about how the California Environmental Quality Act (“CEQA”) needs reform. But the calls for change nearly always fail, aside from a few tinkering changes. This year is different. Via some deft political maneuvering to bypass the typical roadblocks to reform, major changes to CEQA have been enacted
In Citizens for a Better Eureka v. City of Eureka (2025) __ Cal. App. 5th __, the First District Court of Appeal affirmed a judgment dismissing a CEQA action that challenged an approval for the redevelopment of a City of Eureka (City) parking lot into affordable housing (Project). The Court affirmed the dismissal because Petitioner
This year, over fifty bills were introduced in the Legislature that directly addressed a CEQA issue. Many died in committee, or failed to make it out of their respective houses. The vast majority of those that advanced sought project-specific exemptions. For instance, there were multiple bills to exempt wildfire fuel reduction projects from CEQA review.
On May 29, 2025, in Seven County Infrastructure Coalition v. Eagle County, Colorado (2025) 605 U.S. ____, the Supreme Court gave instruction that the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) “is a procedural cross-check, not a substantive roadblock,” and that NEPA’s goal “is to inform agency decisionmaking, not to paralyze it.”
Specifically, the Court overturned the
In Cleveland National Forest Foundation v. County of San Diego (2025) 109 Cal. App.5th 1257, the Fourth District Court of Appeal invalidated two thresholds of significance adopted by the County of San Diego (“County”) that in certain circumstances would have avoided the need for a project proponent to perform an analysis of vehicle miles travelled.
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 “eliminating barriers that unduly delay the rapid rebuilding of homes and other facilities destroyed or damages by the extreme windstorm conditions and
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 part of Lake County, failed to adequately assess the increased risk of human-caused wildfires the project created.
In Yolo Land and Water Defense v. the County of Yolo (2024 105 Cal.App.5th 710, the Third District Court of Appeal upheld the County’s EIR for a sand and gravel mine, known as the Teichert Shifler Mining and Reclamation Project. Downey Brand attorneys Andrew Skanchy and Sam Bacal-Graves successfully represented the County in this litigation