Civically Speaking: Not too appealing

Challenging projects in the city 

Part of the local democratic process is that ordinary residents have the power to appeal decisions made by governing bodies and commissions.

That right comes with a cost, of course, and challenging a decision in Long Beach can cost hundreds or thousands of dollars, depending on the type of project and the appellant’s relationship to the project. 

But it also opens up the doors for special interest groups to game the system in an attempt to block projects or extract concessions. 

Appeals are rarely successful. I can count on one hand the number of times that I’ve been covering Long Beach that the council has gone against the city staff’s recommendations when it came to an appeal.

And that was last February when it voted to allow a new carwash to be built on Pacific Coast Highway despite residents and city planners saying that it wasn’t a fit for the area. Ironically, the city was in the process of asking the Central Long Beach community what it wanted to see more (and less) of in their neighborhoods as part of a zoning overhaul of the area. 

The car wash, whose client was represented by Long Beach’s former city manager, won.

That’s why I thought it was interesting that the two appeals the council will hear next week are being financed by a single group. Supporters Alliance for Environmental Responsibility (SAFER), a little-known nonprofit that has ties to construction unions, is seeking to block the demolition of the Dolly Varden Hotel and the former Long Beach Cafe on Ocean Boulevard. 

Both buildings are set to be knocked down and turned into housing. The Varden site is slated for a 141-unit development with 16 of those being set aside for lower-income households. The Planning Commission overrode the Cultural Heritage Commission’s attempt to preserve portions of the building in November. 

The Long Beach Cafe, which closed in 2020, is also expected to be knocked down to make way for a 203-unit tower. However, both are being appealed by SAFER. 

SAFER is based out of Covina and regularly appeals projects across the region with some of its more recent attempts to block developments being shot down in cities like Beverly Hills, Pasadena and Los Angeles, to name a few. 

For the Varden appeal, the group made vague assertions that the project would result in unaccounted-for environmental impacts. In its appeal for the Long Beach Cafe project, it pointed to the city’s original Downtown Plan, which was approved in 2012 and allowed for up to 5,000 housing units, and said the 203 new units and their effect on the environment are unaccounted for. 

SAFER used the same allegation when it challenged a proposed 108-unit project at the corner of Seventh Street and Locust Avenue in January 2022. It also claimed there was not enough time to read through the 1,600 pages of documents attached to the project and demanded a new environmental impact report be prepared. 

The council denied that appeal. 

These challenges are made under the California Environmental Quality Act, a 1970 state law that was passed to ensure that new construction in the state wouldn’t adversely affect the environment. 

However, in recent years many have alleged CEQA has been weaponized to block undesirable projects or to force developers to pay off appellants rather than head to court or carry out time-consuming and expensive environmental studies. 

I’m not saying that either of those are the end game of SAFER, but a simple internet search of the group could lead one to believe that its appeals are not actually intended to block projects, considering that they almost always fail. 

Do I think the City Council will deny these appeals like city staff is recommending? 

I do, especially considering that these are housing projects and the city desperately needs to add to its housing stock and these two projects would bring roughly 250 new units to sites that currently house an aging motel and a shuttered cafe.

WHAT YOU SHOULD KNOW THIS WEEK:

By the time you read this, the city may be deep in the throes of an atmospheric river that’s supposed to bring multiple inches of rain starting Sunday. If you drove around at all Thursday morning, you know that large amounts of water can lead to city streets flooding fairly quickly and that water crests over curbs and heads toward homes. For those of you closer to the beach that means it’s sandbag time. Empty sandbags can be picked up at any city fire station and sand to fill those bags can be picked up at fire stations 7,12, 13 and 14 as well as the lifeguard station at 72nd Place and Ocean Boulevard. Here’s a link to the addresses of city fire stations. Try to stay dry this weekend.

PAY ATTENTION TO THIS NEXT WEEK:

Do you remember when LA County Metro wanted to widen the 710 Freeway to make room for truck-only lanes to help relieve port congestion? That idea was scrapped in 2022, mostly because the federal dollars that were going to help build that project were no longer available after the Biden Administration said it wanted to stop the practice of building freeways in disadvantaged communities. Well, this week Metro unveiled its new plans for the 710 corridor and it could mean things like priority bus lanes, improvements to bus stops like shelters, and drinking fountains and other pedestrian upgrades could be on the way. The plan was made public this week and an in-person meeting to review the proposals is scheduled for Feb. 12 at 6 p.m. at the Museum of Latin American Art.