Summary: Thursday, January 22, 2015 Good morning! This is Day Two of some remarks about litigation and land use. As I said yesterday, public participation, not litigation, is the best way to get the land use decisions you want. Promoting public participation, of course, is the “unhidden agenda” of the Land Use Report. Land use decisions have a big impact on our future, and becoming personally involved is your best way to have an impact on land use policy and project decisions. That said, let’s not discount the importance of land use litigation. Litigation can play an incredibly important role in making sure that governmental land use decisions represent the public interest. I decided to talk about litigation and land use when I found out that two different lawsuits have been filed, challenging the recent approval of the Ferrini Ranch development by the Monterey County Board of Supervisors. Both LandWatch Monterey County and the Highway 68 Coalition have filed lawsuits against this development approval, but those who have been following the debate will remember that both groups have gone to court not as their first response to what they think is a bad project approval, but as a last resort. That’s the right way to do it, and in fact, the courts actually require project opponents to have “exhausted their administrative remedies” before they come to court. Tomorrow, I’ll comment on the claims made in the lawsuits. More Information: Land Use Links Gary Patton’s Two Worlds Blog Gary Patton’s Blog on “Deference” Planning Department Information on Ferrini Ranch LandWatch Website LandWatch Litigation on Ferrini Ranch LandWatch Web Page on Ferrini Ranch News Article on Ferrini Ranch Monterey Bay Partisan on Ferrini Ranch Lawsuits
