Will the California Building Industry Continue to Attack CEQA?

Built more houses?! and who is going to leave in it?!
"environmental and planning laws" please! they just want more money!

Good points. This is another example of big money getting their people in political offices to do their bidding. It is simple common sense to consider long range and the complete impact a development will have on the whole picture, roads, waste, water, environment. There needs to be a completely comprehensive criteria checklist that must be honestly completed before ANY new developing of anything. And if the big money developers want to make more money they can focus on retrofitting all the existing buildings to be LEED certified green standards.

One of the reasons that many of the lawsuits brought by the environmental community or locals opposed to growth is that for the builders, it ends up being cheaper to settle out of court and not get tied up in litigation for years. As far a global warming goes, you cannot force people to live in high-density mixed use developments and not drive. This is a flawed concept that has no basis in reality (don’t bring up Portland – no it has NOT worked). The fact of the matter is that most people would prefer to live in a single family, detached home with at least SOME yard. I certainly don’t intend to raise my children and have my dog crammed into a condo. If you really want to have planning fight global warming, then open up more land to development closer to the major employment centers in the bay area. This of course isn’t going to happen, but if you think that forcing “transit oriented” high-density development in the central valley is the answer to global warming, you are severely mistaken. We should absolutely try to get the jobs near the people (or the people near the jobs), but no one can force Oracle and Microsoft to relocate to Stockton or Manteca. Attempting to force people out of their cars and into condos is a complete myth, and planners need to accept this and explore solutions that have a chance of working in the real world.

To the point that RL was making about the disingenuous (lie) point the author was making about how CEQA cases don’t end up in court and therefore don’t have a financial impact to the cost of a home. The environmental groups extort money through the settlement of cases, before having to go to court, using the threat of going to expensive litigation. Rich endowments are used to fund these groups and the ironic thing is that the endowment expect a healthy return on their tax free money! Then on to sue the next development project (regardless of merit of course).

Costs for new home development, freeways and roadway infrastructure are almost doubled by the impacts of CEQA’s “Red Tape” on each and every project in CA.

To the point of why home builders don’t build 1,500 sqft homes. They DO! People and families for the most part want a larger home. Of course Liberals always want to tell everyone else how to live as they drive/ fly their limousine or private jet from mansion to mansion.

RL: Some well thought out comments and now, a few responses. Another story the builders tell is "well, if the EIR did not go to court, it still cost us an arm and a leg so it wouldn't." Yes, they have to do much better EIRs than they used to -- and that's a GOOD thing. The other piece CEQA has brought to the table is it furthers our founder fathers' concept of democracy. Public participation is paramount in CEQA and thank goodness for that. Since the builders have bought so many politicians, it evens the playing field a bit so that the average citizen can be heard -- no, MUST be heard.

If you re-read my article, it never says anyting about forcing anyone to live anywhere. Do you think the environmental strategists in this state are naive, dumb, or cavalier enough to think we can get that to happen? In my commentary, I complained about lack of CHOICE in new development. Above, CAL comments that builders do build 1500 square foot homes. I simply must be looking in the wrong spots. Except for urban infill projects, the single family detached product that is the vast majority of what's out there are much larger than 1500 sq. ft. Much larger. Check out the ads in the weekend papers for homes in new subdivisions. I did this recnetly and not a single model was under 2,000 square feet.

CAL comments are simply weird and not based on fact. What "rich endowments are used to fund these [environmental] groups"? And these mythical endowments expect a return on their money? What the heck is CAL talking about? I cannot respond to such malarkey other than this sentence. CAL also claims that CEQA causes a doublling of the costs of new development. CAL -- you need to read Greenspan again and review the median home price 1999-2005. Nothing changed in this period with regards to CEQA, planning law, fees, or anything else but -- the lowering of interest rates. So, stop blaming CEQA! If anything, planning law was loosened. The BIA was successful in getting "density bonus" laws to allow them to squeeze more units onto the same amount of land.

Lastly, on global warming. Of course, building more infill and transit oriented development will not solve the problem. But, we have to do that, as it "all hands on deck" to combat climate change. Personally, I think the quickest way to help on global warming is to dramatically raise the CAFE standards ASAP (that't the miles per gallon numbers dictated by the feds to car makers). Clinton dropped the ball on this, and of course Bush barely believes in global warming. But it goes back further than that. The first Arab and OPEC oil embargos hit us in 1973 and 1978. We have had over 30 years to change our ways and instead we are building building cars than ever with ridiculous amounts of horsepower. There are several other things we could do around conservation and energy that are easier than creating and forcing new development patterns, but we need to do it all.

Bill: I truly appreciate your thoughtful response, as well as the clarification on some of your views. I have to say that I agree that CEQA is an important piece of legislation and has forced some good changes that probably would not have come out of the market. The thing that gets to me is that so often, CEQA challenges are used to push not genuine and reasonable environmental concerns, but rather to push pure anti-growth agendas. The folks that use this method are abusing what CEQA was intended to accomplish. Typical complaint “The EIR is inadequate.” Reality: The EIR IS adequate, the person or persons suing simply don’t want the project (or maybe any projects), or are using it as a means of extortion. I’m not suggesting that ALL CEQA lawsuits fit this scenario, but it has unfortunately become an easy vehicle for anti-growth agendas, and is abused far too often. To the title of your article “Will the CBIA Continue to Attack CEQA?” If we could figure out how to stop the abuse of CEQA by anti-growth groups and attorneys who make a ton of money on frivolous lawsuits, I think it would remove much of the heartburn in the building community over CEQA.

On the cost of an EIR – land use and environmental planning does cost a lot of money, depending on the project size it could well be many millions of dollars JUST for studies. If the project is big enough, this cost spread over total number of units really isn’t that big in the grand scheme. On a small project however it could either make or break it.

On your comment about furthering democracy – I agree and disagree. An open process IS a good thing. In my experience however, the vast majority of citizens don’t care enough to attend a public hearing. The only major turnouts I’ve seen at public hearings on growth are when a well organized NIMBY group doesn’t want a project that disrupts their “lifestyle” – pure self interest at the expense of other nearby landowners and would-be new residents. While interested citizens absolutely should have the opportunity to be heard and provide input, in practice it is often very limited (at least in my experience).

On home size: I have seen more new homes in the smaller range, albeit recently. I think a major contributor is the cost of buying a new home. I, like you, hope to see more builders offering smaller homes which will not only help lower the price, but will also take less energy to heat and cool – part of the battle on global warming.

Clarification on your comment that “The BIA was successful in getting ‘density bonus’ laws to allow them to squeeze more units onto the same amount of land”: Isn’t this a good thing from a “smart growth” perspective? More units on less land = preservation of farm land & open space and more efficient provision of infrastructure? The tone of the comment sounds negative, but I would think that this is something you would support?

Ah, I thought you would bring up the NIMBY aspect. Believe me, the environmental community is well aware that some neighbors or neighborhood groups will use CEQA in a less than honest way. But, this is not an everyday occurence and we certainly don't want to throw out the baby with the bathwater. We have had discussions about how to limit these kind of lawsuits and usuallly we end up with ways to streamline the CEQA process. See SB 375 (Steinberg) for some ideas that we got behind; essentially, do master EIRs that developers can depend on for 5 years, including traffic mitigation that cannot be revisited.

The move to smaller homes is happening at glacial speed (sorry for the bad and now inaccurate pun -- the glaciers and ice caps are melting at alarming rates). I think the large home syndrome was at least partly created -- buyers become convinced they need 3,000 square feet to live, just like they come to believe they need an Escalade or Sequoia to drive around in. Frankly, I think both are gross American excesses that are helping to drive global warming. Yes, China has now passed us in gross emissions, but we are still way, way ahead in per capital emission of greenhouse gases. It's time we became world leaders on reducing natural resource consumption, something that clearly won't occur under Bush and I am wondering about the Democratic candidates. Will it be business as usual? We simply cannot afford that anymore.

The density bonus issue: This one is a tough one for smart growthers, as sure, we want more infill and higher densities. The concern is that the Legislature loaded them up several times, tipping the scales to the side of the developers at the expense of the ability of local gov't to control impacts and of quality of life for some neighborhoods. The Legislature did this while the BIA was crying "housing crisis." Hopefully, with a real slump in the industry, we can make some progress in the Capitol because some of the tactics of the BIA won't hold as much water. Last point -- yes, I understand that building housing is a real economic engine for a region and I am not cheering the slump. I just wish we would grow in a much more efficient manner.

Bill:

You can be most assured that CEQA is used in frivolous efforts to impede or halt homebuilding projects, particularly in Northern California. In fact, the Sierra Club, as you may be aware, has initiated some of these very actions. Although CEQA does provide a useful format for evaluating, determining and mitigating the impacts of development projects, its misuse adds to the cost of development, delays development and rarely adds any value to the outcome.

The negative impacts of frivolous CEQA litigation certainly has a negative impact on California homebuyers, as delays in project approvals (which can take many years and cost millions) effectively reduce the supply of housing, artificially inflating its cost.

While I would certainly agree that historically low interest rates added fuel to the fire of rising home prices in California during the recent boom, the artificial restrictions on supply caused by "local government's authority over housing approvals", self-serving NIMBY CEQA lawsuits and efforts by the Sierra Club and other so called "public interest" private goups to force their values on an uninformed populace had already caused and fanned the flames of home price escalation well beyond any rational economic basis.

Although California homebuilders increased production to meet market demand from 1999-2005, this increase did not approach the production of housing which occured in the previous expansion in the mid-1980's. During this recent boom, the average size of new homes grew for many reasons, not the least of which was the economics of building on more expensive land (due to the aforementioned supply constraints) and the results of rampant and often unwarranted construction defect litigation, unique to California, which eliminated the ability of builders to build less costly and smaller townhomes and condominiums.

Despite the current market conditions, Californians are still under-housed relative to the average U.S. citizen. More signficantly, polling of Californians consistently shows that a strong majority desire a single family detached home. Despite this, actions of NIMBY's, the Sierra Club and other CEQA abusers continue to force home buyers to travel further and further from employment centers, exacerbating traffic, global warming and related impacts. If it were not for the efforts of CBIA and its allies in Sacramento, there is little doubt that home builders would continually find it more difficult to meet the needs of California families.

Post a comment