In a partially published opinion in Save Lafayette v. City of Lafayette (2022) 85 Cal.App.5th 842, the First District Court of Appeal upheld approval of an affordable housing project in the face of the third in a series of lawsuits filed by a citizens group against it. The Court held that the applicant could resume processing of its application after several years pursuing an alternative proposal, subject to the standards applicable when the initial application had been deemed complete. In the unpublished portion of the opinion, which is not discussed further in this summary, the Court rejected arguments that the long-since certified EIR had become “stale,” that it had not adequately examined impacts to special-status species and wildfire hazards, and that a supplemental EIR had been required for those reasons and due to the removal of 10 additional trees.
O’Brien Land Company, LLC (O’Brien) applied to the City of Lafayette (City) in 2011 to build the Terraces of Lafayette – a 315-unit affordable housing development (Project). An EIR was certified in 2013. However, before the Project was approved, the City and O’Brien agreed to suspend processing of the application while the applicant pursued a lower density alternative (the process agreement). The process agreement stipulated that O’Brien could resume the initial Project if the alternative was not approved or was legally delayed by appeal, challenge, or referendum.
The City approved the alternative, including general plan and zoning amendments. However, a citizen’s group calling itself Save Lafayette filed a CEQA lawsuit. The parties settled the suit in January 2016. Save Lafayette then filed a referendum petition, seeking to have the zone...
