Amy Higuera

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On April 23, 2012, the Planning and Conservation League (PCL) filed a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of Assembly Bill No. 900 (2011-2012 Reg. Sess.) (see Conservation League v. State of California, RG12626904 (Alameda Sup. Ct.) available at http://www.cnsenvironmentallaw.com/2012/04/26/Conservation.pdf.) AB 900 requires CEQA litigation challenging eligible projects to skip over the superior court and…

In an unpublished decision, Outfitter Properties v. State Water Resources Control Board (2012) 2012 Cal.App.Unpub.LEXIS 1986, the Third Appellate District Court (Court) upheld a trial court’s rejection of petitioner’s consolidated petition for writ of mandate, which sought to put a stop to the “Battle Creek Salmon and Steelhead Restoration Project” (Project). Several agencies, including the…

In No Wetlands Landfill Expansion v. County of Marin (2012) 2012 Cal.App.LEXIS 330, the First Appellate District reversed the trial court’s determination that CEQA required the Marin County Board of Supervisors to hear an administrative appeal from the Marin County Environmental Health Services’s (Marin EHS) approval of a solid waste facilities permit for the expansion…

In an unpublished decision, North County Watch v. County of San Luis Obispo (2012) 2012 Cal.App. Unpub. LEXIS 2312, the Second Appellate District upheld the trial court’s determination that a petitioner was barred as a matter of law from prevailing on its CEQA challenges because petitioner failed to request a hearing within 90 days of…

In Earth Island Institute v. Carlton, (2012) 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 44177, petitioner challenged a logging and restoration project under the National Forest Management Act (“NFMA”) and the National Environmental Policy Act (“NEPA”). The district court granted defendants’ motion for summary judgment. Plaintiff makes four central arguments for why Defendants violated NEPA in the…

In Western Watersheds v. United States Forest Service, (2012) 2012 U.S. Dist. LEXIS 45573, petitioners challenged the Forest Service’s alleged practice of reauthorizing livestock grazing on federal land without conducting the proper environmental review under the National Environmental Policy Act (“NEPA”). The court concluded that the actions by the Forest Service in connection with…

In an unpublished decision, Quartz Hill Cares v. City of Lancaster (2012) 2012 Cal.App.Unpub. LEXIS 2026, petitioner sought a writ of administrative mandate to overturn the City of Lancaster’s (City) approval of a 395,000-square-foot commercial project on land previously zoned for residential use under the Planning and Zoning Law and the California Environmental Quality Act…

In Citizens for Open Government v. City of Lodi (2012) ___ Cal.App.4th ___ (Opinion), the Court rejected Citizens for Open Government’s and Lodi First’s (Petitioners) challenges to the reapproval by defendant City of Lodi (City) of a conditional use permit for a proposed shopping center to be anchored by a Wal-Mart Supercenter (Project)…

In Rocky Mountain Farmers Union v. Goldstene (Case no. CV-F-09-2234), the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District granted summary judgment in favor of a group of farming and oil-industry plaintiffs, finding that the Low Carbon Fuel Standard (“LCFS”) regulations promulgated by the California Air Resources Board (“CARB”) to implement provisions of California Assembly Bill…

In Neighbors for Smart Rail v. Exposition Metro Line Construction Authority (2012 Cal.App. LEXIS 434), the Second Appellate District upheld the lead agency’s determination that a future 2030 baseline was proper for determining the significance of traffic and air quality impacts caused by a proposed light rail project in Los Angeles. The EIR at issue…