I agree with the Planning and Conservation League.
But first, a little background.
San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom is considering asking the Legislature
for an exemption from the California Environmental Quality
Act (CEQA) so his city won’t have to prepare an environmental impact
report to host the America’s Cup yacht race in San Francisco Bay in
2014.
That’s right. An EIR for a yacht race.
Apparently, the city has only six weeks to present a formal
proposal to host the races, which are reported to be worth $1.4 billion
in economic stimulus for the Bay Area, and almost 9,000 jobs.
Undertaking the CEQA process would take months, and that doesn’t
even count possible post-CEQA litigation.
Don’t get me wrong – I hope San Francisco can get the exemption to hold the races, boost tourism, create jobs and prosper.
But honestly – where is the same concern and forbearance for the
dozens of worthy projects that fly under the celebrity radar, that are
not stadiums and yacht races, but are housing and job sites and
shopping centers for working Californians? The CEQA
process is a morass, tying needed economic development in knots of red
tape, litigation and legal extortion. And legislative leadership hasn’t
shown an ounce of concern for these jobs in the rest of California.
That’s where I agree with the Planning and Conservation League,
whose representative said, "(The Legislature) made the decision to
grant an exemption to the City of Industry (for a football stadium) and
got nothing for it other than a bunch of other billionaires
coming to the capital saying they want one, too."
Darn right.
They got nothing for it and learned nothing: that it’s
worth it for the wealthy and connected to deal in one-off CEQA
exemptions, while projects that create permanent, high-skilled jobs and
affordable housing languish in regulatory purgatory.