Stockton Citizens for Sensible Planning v. City of Stockton _____ Cal. ___ (April 1, 2010, No. S159690)

On April 1, 2010, the California Supreme Court unanimously ruled that flaws in the decision making process underlying a facially valid and properly filed Notice of Exemption (“NOE”) do not prevent the NOE from triggering a 35-day statute of limitations period for challenging the agency’s determination under the California Environmental Quality Act (“CEQA”). The decision ended a lawsuit challenging the approval of a Wal-Mart Supercenter in Stockton, California (the “City”). In overturning the lower courts, the Supreme Court held that when an NOE minimally complies with CEQA, it is sufficient to trigger the 35-day statute of limitations under CEQA. and a plaintiff can not argue the merits of the underlying approval as a means of circumventing the statute of limitations.
In 1989, the City had approved a plan for the development of the 1,239 acre A.G. Spanos Park tract in northwest Stockton, whereby the entire tract would be developed with a mix of residential, commercial, open-space and recreational uses. The A.G. Spanos Park tract is bisected by Interstate 5, forming the 586-acre Spanos Park East and the 653-acre Spanos Park West. Spanos Park West was intended to contain to broad components: a commercial component and a medium to high density residential component that would contain 2,983 of the 7,460 residential units planned for the entire tract.

This content has been archived. It is available through our partners, LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law.

To view this content, please continue to their sites.

Not a Lexis Subscriber?
Subscribe Now

Not a Bloomberg Law Subscriber?
Subscribe Now

Why am I seeing this?

LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law are third party online distributors of the broad collection of current and archived versions of ALM's legal news publications. LexisNexis® and Bloomberg Law customers are able to access and use ALM's content, including content from the National Law Journal, The American Lawyer, Legaltech News, The New York Law Journal, and Corporate Counsel, as well as other sources of legal information.

For questions call 1-877-256-2472 or contact us at [email protected]