People of the State of California v. County of Lake
(2024) (Case No. A165677)

The People of the State of California v. County of Lake decision from the California Court of Appeal’s First Appellate District is the most recent reminder to lead agencies of CEQA’s key function to inform the public of a project’s environmental impacts and of the harsh consequence that follows if informing the public is not at the forefront during preparation of the project’s environmental analyses.

In this case, the Center for Biological Diversity and California Native Plant Society (petitioners) challenged the County of Lake’s approval of the Guenoc Valley Mixed-Use Planned Development Project (a luxury resort consisting of residential estate villas, hotel units, and related infrastructure, on 16,000 acres) and certification of the project’s environmental impact report (EIR).  The trial court agreed with petitioners’ claim that the EIR did not adequately inform the public of the project’s potential to exacerbate wildfire ignitions and rejected petitioners’ other claims.  On appeal, the court affirmed.

The majority of the published portion of the opinion is devoted to the court’s analysis of the County’s evaluation of the project’s wildfire ignition risk.  First, the court found that mention of the topic was included in the post-EIR analysis – in an errata to the final EIR, which was determined to be “too late” because “[m]aterial not contained in the EIR cannot be expected to be considered; and therefore, cannot be relied upon to support an adequate EIR.”

Second, the errata’s discussion of the impact cited a scientific study unrelated to the project and included a summary statement that “increased fire education, a decline in smoking, and modern vehicles . . . have reduced the impacts of anthropogenic causes of wildfire ignitions.”  The court held such discussion inadequate under CEQA because it failed to reasonably describe the “additional wildfire risk factors as compared to existing conditions” that the project would “introduce” to the area.

In the court’s view, the County provided no way to connect the dots between the “additional wildfire risk factors,” which the errata conceded exist, and the project’s Wildfire Plan prevention strategies (such as fire breaks and undergrounding power lines), which the errata did not update.  More specifically, the court found fault in the County’s failure to explain “the extent to which bringing in over 4,000 new residents … increases the risk of human-caused wildfire over the existing baseline risk,” and then posed a series of ignition-based questions for the County’s potential consideration.[1]  Because the County did not appear to “use its best efforts to find out and disclose all that it reasonably can” about the project’s impact on these ignition risk factors, as a remedy, the court directed the County to revise the EIR.

In good news for the County, the court rejected petitioners’ other challenges, one of which questioned the EIR’s inclusion of a carbon credit program to mitigate the project’s greenhouse gas impact.  While not relying on the carbon offset program to eliminate the project’s impacts, the County included a condition requiring the project applicant to purchase such credits to offset the difference between the mitigated project emissions and the relevant significance thresholds.  The court did not agree with petitioners that, by virtue of being in the EIR, the carbon credit program must meet CEQA’s standards for feasible mitigation measures because petitioners failed to cite authority for their contention that CEQA bars considering potentially beneficial measures that agencies deem too uncertain to be feasible.

Another rejected claim was the County’s alleged non-disclosure of the project’s potential use of an off-site well and the County’s failure to quantify the amount of groundwater the project would draw.  The court noted petitioners failed to acknowledge the EIR’s discussion of the off-site well production capacity and the groundwater basin concluded with the caveat “if required,” which the record revealed was exceedingly unlikely. As a result, it was appropriate for the County to terminate discussion of that impact since it was too speculative for evaluation.

Although unpublished, the court discussed petitioners’ remaining claims and held that (1) the EIR’s wildfire plan and biological resources analysis were not irreconcilably inconsistent; (2) the mitigation measure implementing a transportation management demand plan was not impermissibly deferred; and (3) the agency’s rejection of Alternative C was supported by required CEQA findings.

At the end of the day, while petitioners prevailed on only one of the six claims, the court vacated the project approval and EIR certification, and ordered the County to re-do the EIR’s wildfire ignition risk impact assessment, which is arguably a harsh but an all-too-common consequence for failing to adequately inform the public on a single project impact area under CEQA. As such, while the State CEQA Guidelines assure practitioners that “technical perfection” is not required in an EIR, this decision is yet another cautionary tale of the fine line for lead agencies to navigate between technical analysis and informational disclosure when evaluating project impacts under CEQA.

[This alert does not constitute legal advice and no attorney-client relationship is created by viewing or responding to this alert. Legal counsel should be sought for answers to specific legal questions.]

[1] The questions presented by the court pursue statistical data that – to date – has not been industry standard in the wildfire analysis arena.  E.g., the court inquired about the number of wildfire ignitions “per 1,000,000 miles driven by vehicles” with and without catalytic converters.  Yet, the court acknowledged that “[o]f course, we do not require” that the specific questions posed be answered.