Welcome to "CEQA News You Can Use," a quarterly production of Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck's Natural Resources lawyers. This publication provides quick, useful bites of CEQA news, which we hope can be a resource to your real-time business decisions. That said, it is not and cannot be construed to be legal advice. Enjoy!
When is the real party in interest indispensable? Well, it depends ...
When is a real party in interest so indispensable that a CEQA case cannot proceed without it? In Save Berkeley's Neighborhoods v. The Regents of the University of California (2021) 70 Cal.App.5th 705 (rehearing denied), the First District Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court's order allowing a CEQA action challenging a project on the U.C. Berkeley campus to proceed even though the project developers could not be joined because the statute of limitations to sue them under CEQA had run. The court held that while real parties in interest are necessary parties under Public Resources Code ' 21167.6.5(a), whether they are indispensable parties under Code of Civil Procedure ' 389(b) depends on an equitable balancing test. The court clarified that Public Resources Code sections 21108 and 21167.6.5 do not create a presumption that real parties are indispensable. The court found the developers not indispensable because there was strong unity of interest between the regents and the developers, and the petitioner would not have an adequate remedy as the limitations period had run. The court's analysis was based, in part, on the "foremost principle" that CEQA is "to be interpreted in such manner as to afford the fullest possible protection to the environment within the reasonable scope of the statutory language."
CEQA's "infill" exemption can apply to parcels over five acres as long as the development site is no more than five
In Protect Tustin Ranch v. City of Tustin (2021) 70 Cal.App.5th 951 (petition for Supreme Court review pending), the Fourth District Court of Appeal upheld the city's use of the "infill" categorical exemption (CEQA Guidelines section 15332) for the addition of a Costco gas station to an existing shopping center on a parcel larger than five acres where the development "site" is less than five acres. Despite conflicting statements in the record, the court found reports describing the proposed development as just over two acres to constitute substantial evidence that the "project site" was less than five acres. The court also rejected Protect Tustin...
