By David M. Greenwald
Davis may have mastered the art of the circular firing squad, but it is not alone in this regard. The lawsuit was filed by someone familiar to those paying close attention in Davis—Patrick Soluri of Soluri Meserve in Sacramento. The firm represented the failed lawsuits against Lincoln40 and Nishi in Davis in recent years.
The firm is representing a group called Sacramento Investment Without Displacement (SIWD), a group of neighborhood residents.
The issues should also seem somewhat familiar—inadequacy of the EIR, about which in this case the attorneys claim the project disregarded issues that the project will boost population because it only includes a few hundred housing units.
“While the Project could be an opportunity to benefit UC Davis, the City, and immediately surrounding neighborhoods alike, appropriate measures must be taken to ensure that existing residents of these surrounding communities equitably benefit from the planned improvements,” the suit states. “Unless the deficiencies in the UC’s EIR are corrected, the UC’s actions will exacerbate existing housing inequities and drive displacement in some of Sacramento’s most historically underserved communities.”
The suit also alleges that Aggie Square’s EIR fails to address impacts from vehicle miles traveled and greenhouse gas emissions. It demands the EIR and project approvals be set aside and actions 
toward development be suspended until a more thorough EIR and analysis can be made.
In response, Mayor Darrell Steinberg and Councilmembers Jay Schenirer and Eric Guerra Monday fired back at a suit that could derail a massive economic investment in Sacramento that could bring 5000 people in on high paying construction times at a time of economic downturn.
When complete, the center would generate a half-million square feet of public and privately-run labs and some 3500 to 5000 permanent jobs.
In a letter on Monday, the city leaders accused the group of taking a path of “confrontation rather than cooperation.”
They called the lawsuit “both unfortunate and, ultimately, unproductive.
“There is no community benefits agreement without a project,” the statement says. “There is no new inclusive economic development for the neighborhoods without a project. Five thousand union construction jobs and 3,500-5,000 ongoing jobs, many of which will be reserved for local residents, will be lost without a project.”
Kevin Ferreira, Executive Director of the Sacramento-Sierra’s Building and Construction Trades Council, called the lawsuit “the pinnacle of irresponsibility.
“This lawsuit sends a direct message to thousands of would-be workers that it is better for them to receive unemployment checks than to have a job that pays living wages and benefits,” Ferreira said.
In the letter, the city leaders noted that the city and SIWD members had held community talks but the suit now means those talks can no longer proceed.
“Despite the fact that our discussions with SIWD for a CBA has only begun, and despite the fact that the city has already committed to investing tens of millions of dollars of housing resources to construct affordable housing on the Stockton Boulevard corridor, SIWD has chosen to file a CEQA lawsuit against the university, potentially delaying the project indefinitely,” the letter states.
This should all be familiar to Davis residents. Twice Soluri pressed lawsuits against Davis-area projects—Lincoln40 and Nishi. Both times the vast complaints about EIR inadequacies were shot down by Yolo County judges. What they succeeded in doing, however, was to delay the construction of projects and increase the expenses for those projects.
Now they are doing the same in Sacramento for Aggie Square. They won’t kill the project. They probably won’t win. But it will cause delays. Right now people are out of work, the economy is reeling, and this was going to break ground in a month.
In a way this lawsuit can reassure Davis leaders. It is not just Davis that faces these hurdles for major projects. Issues like housing and transportation are vitally important and projects must take these things into account when they plan projects of this sort.
At the same time, while we need to take steps to ensure adequate housing and transportation for projects, we are harming out own prospects. The people who will be harmed by delays in this project are blue collar construction workers—they are the many young workers that Aggie Square would serve.
Companies are finding the cost to do business in California has skyrocketed. That has led to some very notable high tech companies to move out of state. California faces a housing crisis in part because of the sky high cost of construction—which is compounded by suits of this sort, which delay construction and raise the cost of doing business.
This lawsuit may show that this problem is not limited to Davis, but Davis has become subjected to masters of delay, masters of increasing the cost of housing and masters at finding ways to block projects that would bring jobs and vitally needed city revenue to the community. That will harm this community in the long run and lawsuits of these sort will hurt our region now and into the future.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
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How unfortunate!
Looks like the leaders in Sacramento have some similarities with those in Davis.
Here’s some of the details:
New lawsuit could delay UC Davis’ $1.1 billion Aggie Square project in Sacramento (msn.com)
By the way, these concerns predated the lawsuit by many months/years. You can find articles regarding that on the Internet (some of which I previously posted).
So apparently, not everyone is as “on board” as the mayor (and others behind this) as they’d like to believe. But as usual, it’s doubtful that they’ll see it that way (as demonstrated by the tone of this Vanguard article, as well).
Interesting way to say ‘people everywhere disagree about development issues’. These same issues/disagreements are going on all over the state. Why do you assume Davis is so unique? It’s just a microcosm, with a few quirks.
Actually I was defending Davis against regional perceptions.
There’s no need to defend against positive perceptions. 😉
That’s not the perception
I think that says more about you.
I’ve detected a hint of jealousy at times, when some knock Davis. “The People’s Republic of”, “Nuclear-Free Zone”, etc.
Often coming from people who live in less-desirable cities in the valley. (And they know it.)
I wonder how many people you actually talk to in the region. The perception among people who do business in Davis is that it is difficult and more expensive to get things done here and takes a lot longer. That’s one reason the university went to Sacramento rather than Davis for Aggie Square. It’s by no means the only. But now they have to deal with the same problem – indeed the same attorney – in Sacramento, that they might have in Davis. From my perspective, that’s helpful. It puts things into perspective. In a year when we took a huge hit (not that you care), that helps.
Maybe we speak to “different” people, and see things quite differently.
Seems to me that developers are quite willing to try their luck in Davis (often successfully), as long as it’s a housing development.
Witness the conversion of the “Davis Innovation Center” site into the “WDAAC” housing development.
We could go over The Cannery, Nishi, and other sites as well. But, the arguments on here often turn into a “circular firing squad”, getting “no place fast” (as “Moe” might say).
But it is fascinating to see that leaders in other places (also) choose to blame those with concerns, rather than listen to those concerns. Arrogance? Not sure. Perhaps (like you) they simply listen to different people.
“This lawsuit may show that this problem is not limited to Davis,…”
Duh, CEQA lawsuits are a statewide concern. The question is how do you quickly dispense with claims that are frivolous? Many have articulated the problem. No one has yet come up with an easy solution beyond the difficult path of legislative exemptions to particular projects.
Still, while almost every jurisdiction surrounding Davis proceeds through the planning and litigation processes for large economic development projects, Davis continues along its current path of economic stagnation, infrastructure deterioration and structural budget deficits.
So what is the difference between Davis and the rest of the region?
To Paraphrase The Cowardly Lion “What do we got that they don’t got?” Measure D.
Don’t count on Davis resolving any of these problems for ten more years.
.
Ron G, there is a readily available, easy path available to both developers and jurisdictions alike … don’t try and short-cut or game the CEQA process. The fact that the Sacramento Mayor openly says the words “confrontation rather than cooperation” tells me that they knew that these CEQA issues existed, and none-the-less they plowed on without adequately addressing those issues … short-cutting the process.
I don’t know any of the details, but it isn’t hard to see the disconnect in the words “Despite the fact that our discussions with SIWD for a CBA has only begun, and despite the fact that the city has already committed to investing tens of millions of dollars of housing resources to construct affordable housing on the Stockton Boulevard corridor”
The word “promises” jumped out of the screen when I read those words. “Trust us” were two other words that came to mind … confirming (for me) the veracity of the statement two paragraphs earlier, “While the Project could be an opportunity to benefit UC Davis, the City, and immediately surrounding neighborhoods alike, appropriate measures must be taken to ensure that existing residents of these surrounding communities equitably benefit from the planned improvements,”
Arguably, the CEQA process “short-cut” that the developer and UCD and the City took, is highlighted by the two words I bolded “could” (a promises word) and “must” (a commitment word).
I’ll address many of your comments ‘off-line’, Matt…
Some have a kernel of truth, others not so much…
For now, suffice it to say that Davis City professionals almost always rejected “short-cuts” the exceptions were those who were professionals in their own mind), but have often had to deal with folk who object to something, claim it is a CEQA violation, and either don’t understand the CEQA laws, or ‘lie thru their teeth’…
Ten years? Naw, forever. It will take a coalition bringing Measure JeRkeD to court to get it declared unconstitutional. Davis land owners will never stop voting themselves free money.
“we are past the point of absurdity with some of the (CEQA) abuses we are seeing.”
— Gov. Newsom.
Maybe he can try again on CEQA reform. The last major effort in 2014, promoted by then-Sen. leader Steinberg, foundered and fizzled out. The problem is that attorneys and labor unions use CEQA for their own purposes and strongly oppose actual reform of the law, and other politicians like the current system of individual exemptions for large projects because it allows them to do favors and receive money for their campaigns. There are very entrenched interests against actual CEQA reform, even though nearly everyone agrees that it is needed.
Don… reform and clarification… there are parts of CEQA that are ambiguous, and “squishy”…
It was orginally construed to protect the physical/natural environment… most challenges come up from ‘modified’/transmorgified assertions of what it was intended for, and should be… it has gone from being a technical, objective, disclosure process, to a political one… irrespective of physical/natural environment… IMNSHO…
But then I come from the limited perspective (inherently biased?) of reading, learning, the statutes from 1977 to present… a mere 43 years… a “newbie”…
“… there is a readily available, easy path available to both developers and jurisdictions alike … don’t try and short-cut or game the CEQA process.”
There is always an argument that any predictive tool is incomplete.