City Visions takes up the movement to reform the California Environmental Quality Act -- hailed by some as our state's pre-eminent environmental law, but condemned by others as a vehicle for obstructionism. How has the 43-year old law helped -- or hindered -- the construction of environmentally sound projects in the Bay Area? What, if anything, needs to be changed?
Guests:
-Matt Regan, Vice President of Public Policy and Government Relations, Bay Area Council. The Bay Area Council is a business-sponsored, public policy advocacy organization for the nine-county Bay Area.
-Tom Adams, founding partner, now retired, of Adams Broadwell Joseph & Cardozo, a San Francisco-based environmental law firm, where he specialized in CEQA and land use litigation. He is also a former board president of the California League of Conservation Voters.
-Jennifer Hernandez, a partner with the global law firm Holland & Knight, where she chairs the National Environmental Team and leads the West Coast Land Use and Environment Practice Group. Her work focuses on brownfields redevelopment, wetlands and endangered species, and master planned community projects.
-Richard Frank, Professor of Environmental Practice and Director of the California Environmental Law and Policy Center at the UC Davis School of Law.