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The California Environmental Quality Act: Why We Care So Much

The Primary Law that Protects People’s Say in how their Local Community Develops

By Michael Endicott, Advocate

The core function of CEQA is to make sure potential significant impacts of any development project are adequately examined before a final local approval is given to proceed so those impacts are eliminated, or feasible mitigation measures to minimize those impacts are adopted. An environmental impact report (EIR) must accurately describe the proposed project, identify and analyze significant environmental impacts expected to result from the project, identify mitigation measures to reduce those impacts to the extent feasible, and evaluate a range of reasonable alternatives to the project. If mitigation measures are incorporated into a project, the agency must adopt a monitoring program to ensure compliance with those measures. Impacts that must be examined include those on land, air, water, minerals, flora, fauna, noise, and objects of historic or aesthetic significance.

CEQA assures the best local development decisions possible by: 1) making sure that all the information on the nature and design of the project is gathered in one place; 2) identifying and examining those impacts in the EIR or a mitigated negative declaration; 3) providing opportunity for the local community, affected by a project, to express concerns and provide potential solutions to eliminate or minimize potential impacts to the decision makers before the final decision is made (Many times the public is the best source of local information.); and, 4) requiring that feasible mitigation measures, or improvements in design, be included in the project’s final permits. CEQA does allow a local government to approve a project without mitigation measures with findings of “overriding concerns and considerations.”

The Problem: CEQA makes sure we, who live in the communities surrounding a project, have a chance to ameliorate the significant impacts of the project on our health, living conditions and the environment for decades to come. General exemptions for a project from CEQA in advance of the otherwise required CEQA review process completely gags our voice on what happens to our community, transferring local land use decisions to Sacramento; and, they give the appearance that Sacramento can be “bought” by developers who can hire lobbyists, hundreds of miles away from the community. Ordinary citizens can’t afford their own lobbyists or to travel to Sacramento (because of expense, work and/or family life). An exemption that blocks citizen access to the courts is the worst kind because it creates a perception of a two tier system of justice in America, one for the wealthy and one for the rest of us. It raises the claim that “wealthy people only have to play by the law as long as it cuts in their favor, but if we try to enforce the law, they can “buy’ their way out” of the laws by which the rest of us must live.

The Message: Ever since the supposedly “one time event” exemption bill for the City of Industry Football Stadium was rushed through in the last hours of session 2009, the number of CEQA exemptions sought have been increasing. Developers for various projects are lurking behind the Capitol curtains looking to gain exemptions for sports sites, industrial facilities and giant infrastructure projects. When you meet with your representatives, ask them to help us keep local land use decisions at the local level, protecting our ability to make sure our communities remain healthy and are sustainable into the future. “Please protect my right to have a say in local land use decisions that keep the air I breathe clean, the water I drink safe and the conditions in which I will live bearable.“ And, thanks for your help from your intrepid lobbyists in Sacramento. We couldn’t do it without your local voices!

Why CEQA is Essential for California Neighborhoods