Opinion
A164394
11-30-2022
SAVE LAFAYETTE, Plaintiff and Appellant, v. CITY OF LAFAYETTE, et al., Defendants and Respondents; O'Brien Land Company, LLC, et al., Real Parties in Interest and Respondents.
Louzeau Drury, Richard Drury, Rebecca Davis, Victoria Yundt, Oakland; Scott Sommer, Los Angeles, for Plaintiff and Appellant. Coblentz, Patch, Duffy & Bass, Jonathan R. Bass, Katharine Van Dusen, and Robert B. Hodilfor, San Francisco, Defendants and Respondents. Miller Starr Regalia, Arthur F. Coon, Bryan W. Wenter, Matthew C. Henderson, Walnut Creek, for Real Party in Interest.
Certified for Partial Publication.
Pursuant to California Rules of Court, rules 8.1105(b) and 8.1110, this opinion is certified for publication with the exception of part II.
Louzeau Drury, Richard Drury, Rebecca Davis, Victoria Yundt, Oakland; Scott Sommer, Los Angeles, for Plaintiff and Appellant.
Coblentz, Patch, Duffy & Bass, Jonathan R. Bass, Katharine Van Dusen, and Robert B. Hodilfor, San Francisco, Defendants and Respondents.
Miller Starr Regalia, Arthur F. Coon, Bryan W. Wenter, Matthew C. Henderson, Walnut Creek, for Real Party in Interest.
TUCHER, P.J. O'Brien Land Company, LLC (the applicant or O'Brien) completed an application for a housing development project in 2011, and the City of Lafayette (the City) certified an environmental impact report (EIR) in 2013. Before the project was approved, the applicant and the City agreed to suspend processing of the original project while the applicant pursued an alternative, smaller proposal. In 2018, when it proved impossible to proceed with the alternative project, O'Brien and the City revived the original proposal, with some modifications. The City finally approved the resumed project in 2020, after preparation of an addendum to the original EIR.
A citizen's group calling itself Save Lafayette petitioned for a writ of mandate, claiming that the project conflicts with the City's general plan as it existed when the project was revived in 2018, that the EIR is inadequate as an informational document, and that a supplemental EIR (SEIR) is required. Save Lafayette appeals the trial court's denial of its petition. In the published portion of this opinion, we conclude that, despite the lengthy delay between certification of the EIR and project approval, the City properly applied the general plan standards in effect when the application was deemed complete. In the unpublished portion, we consider and reject all of Save Lafayette's challenges to the EIR. We therefore affirm the judgment. FACTUAL AND PROCEDURAL BACKGROUND
The petition named the City, the Lafayette City Council, and the Lafayette Planning Commission as respondents, and O'Brien Land Company, LLC and Anna Maria Dettmer as trustee for the AMD Family Trust as real parties in interest. We shall refer to these parties collectively as respondents.
O'Brien submitted an application in March 2011 for approval of the Terraces of Lafayette Project (the apartment project or Terraces of Lafayette), a 315-unit residential development. The City notified O'Brien that its application was deemed complete on July 5, 2011.
As proposed, the apartment project included 14 residential buildings, a clubhouse, a leasing office, parking in carports and garages, and internal roadways. Its location was a 22.27-acre site in Lafayette, bounded by Pleasant Hill Road to the east, State Highway 24 to the south, and Deer Hill Road to the north and west.
At the time the application was deemed complete, the project site was designated Administrative/Professional/Multi-Family Residential on the City's general-plan land-use map and was zoned Administrative/Professional Office in the City's municipal code, a zoning that allowed multi-family developments with a land use permit.
An EIR was prepared for the apartment project, and the City certified the EIR on August 12, 2013. However, the City's Design Review Commission recommended that the Planning Commission deny the application for a land use permit.
The applicant and City staff then began to consider a lower-density alternative to the apartment project, consisting of 44 or 45 single-family detached homes, public parkland, and other amenities (the project alternative). As part of their discussions, the applicant and the City entered into an "Alternative Process Agreement" (the process agreement) on January 22, 2014.
The expressed purpose of the process agreement was to establish a process for considering the project alternative; to "suspend" the apartment project in the meantime; and to "preserve" all of the parties’ "rights and defenses ... with regard to the Apartment Project" until the City made a determination on the project alternative. Specifically, the parties agreed that the City would "suspend the processing of the Apartment Project pending [the] City's processing of the Project Alternative," and that if the City Council did not approve the project alternative, or if an appeal, challenge, or referendum was not resolved in a manner acceptable to the applicant, the applicant could terminate the process agreement and the City's processing of the apartment project application would immediately resume, with the parties situated as they were before the application was suspended. The process agreement recited that, "because the Parties have mutually agreed to toll the processing of the Apartment Project, [the] City has not failed to act to approve or disapprove the Apartment Project under the Permit Streamlining Act, and the Apartment Project shall not be deemed approved under the Permit Streamlining Act."
The City certified an SEIR for, and approved, the project alternative (known as the "Homes at Deer Hill") on August 10, 2015. It also adopted a general plan amendment changing the project site's land use designation from Administrative Professional Office (APO), which allows 35 dwelling units per acre, to Low Density Single Family Residential (SFR-LD), which allows only two units per acre. The City then adopted ordinance No. 641, changing the zoning designation of the site from APO to Single Family Residential (R-20).
Save Lafayette filed a petition for writ of administrative mandamus ( Code Civ. Proc., § 1094.5 ) on September 8, 2015, challenging approval of the Homes at Deer Hill based on alleged violations of the California Environmental Quality Act ( Pub. Res. Code, § 21000 et seq. (CEQA)). In January 2016, the parties entered into a settlement agreement and Save Lafayette dismissed the action with prejudice. Acting under permits, the applicants then demolished the buildings and structures on the project site and removed 48 of the 117 trees on the site.
A referendum petition challenging the City Council's approval of the zoning ordinance and requesting that the ordinance be either repealed or submitted to a vote was soon filed. The City Council declined to take either course, so Save Lafayette filed a petition for writ of mandate. The trial court denied the petition but on February 21, 2018, our colleagues in Division Four of this court reversed, concluding the City could not properly keep the referendum off the ballot. ( Save Lafayette v. City of Lafayette (2018) 20 Cal.App.5th 657, 662, 671–672, 229 Cal.Rptr.3d 238.) On June 5, 2018, the zoning ordinance appeared on the ballot and a majority of Lafayette voters rejected it. The next month, the City Council adopted Ordinance No. 668, zoning the site Single-family Residential District-65 (R-65) (i.e., requiring lot sizes more than three times larger than those the voters had rejected).
On June 15, 2018, O'Brien submitted a letter notifying the City that it was terminating the process agreement and withdrawing the project alternative applications, and asking the City to resume processing the apartment project application. As resumed, the project (the resumed project) differed somewhat from the apartment project originally proposed. Pertinent here, the resumed project would preserve 10 fewer trees than the original project (16 rather than 26) and would plant approximately 68 more new trees than the 700 originally planned. The applicant's consultant, FirstCarbon Solutions, prepared an addendum to the original EIR for the resumed project in 2018. ( 14 Cal. Code Regs., § 15164.) The City hired another consultant, Impact Sciences, to review FirstCarbon's addendum. Impact Sciences concluded there had been no substantial changes in the project or its circumstances requiring major revisions to the certified 2013 EIR, so that an addendum rather than an SEIR was appropriate. However, it concluded further analysis was necessary. Impact Sciences then prepared a new addendum (the addendum), which was released in May 2020 and revised in June 2020.
The City certified the addendum as revised, and approved the renewed project on August 24, 2020. In so doing, it concluded the project qualified as a " ‘housing development project’ ‘for very low, low-, or moderate-income households’ " under the Housing Accountability Act. ( Gov. Code, § 65589.5 (HAA) ; see id. , subds. (d) & (h)(3).) As a result, the City found, the HAA preempted conflicting requirements of the Lafayette Municipal Code, and the project was exempt from certain findings the City normally required in order to obtain the necessary permits.
Save Lafayette filed its petition for writ of mandate on September 23, 2020, alleging that, in violation of CEQA, the 2013 EIR did not adequately analyze a number of environmental impacts—including the presence of special-status species, the risk of wildfire, and the destruction of mature trees—and that an SEIR was necessary. It also alleged the project was inconsistent with applicable general plan and zoning requirements.
The trial court denied the petition. As to Save Lafayette's contentions under CEQA, the court ruled in its favor on two preliminary matters—concluding Save Lafayette was entitled to challenge the 2013 certification of the EIR, and that the dismissal of the 2015 lawsuit did not act as res judicata to bar Save Lafayette from challenging the 2013 EIR. But the court ruled against Save Lafayette on the merits, rejecting all of its challenges to the adequacy of the EIR. The court also found that, despite the delay while the parties pursued the smaller Homes at Deer Hill project, respondents were entitled under the HAA to the benefit of the zoning in place when the application for the apartment project was deemed complete in 2011.
The trial court entered judgment in respondents’ favor on January 4, 2022. This timely appeal ensued.
DISCUSSION
Before considering the CEQA challenge, we turn our attention to the argument that the City of Lafayette should not have approved the resumed project because the site is now zoned for single-family homes on large lots. I. General Plan and Zoning Consistency
Save Lafayette contends the project as approved is inconsistent with the site's current general-plan land-use designation and with its zoning. Save Lafayette argues the project is governed by the standards in effect in 2018, when the applicant terminated the process agreement and asked the City to resume processing its application, not by the standards that existed in 2011, when its application was deemed complete. This argument requires us to consider the interplay among the laws governing general plans and zoning, the HAA, and the Permit Streamlining Act. ( Gov. Code, § 65920 et seq. (PSA).)
A. Legal Background
Each city and county in California must have a general plan for its physical development ( Gov. Code, § 65300 ) and local land use decisions, including zoning ordinances, must be consistent with it. (Id. , § 65860, subd. (a); Fonseca v. City of Gilroy (2007) 148 Cal.App.4th 1174, 1182, 56 Cal.Rptr.3d 374.) In turn, land use permits must be consistent with a site's zoning. ( Land Waste Management v. Contra Costa County Bd. of Supervisors (1990) 222 Cal.App.3d 950, 959, 271 Cal.Rptr. 909.)
In the HAA, our Legislature has established limited exceptions to these general rules. The HAA was enacted in 1982 in an effort to address the state's shortfall in building housing approximating regional needs, and the Legislature has amended the law repeatedly in an increasing effort to compel cities and counties to approve more housing. ( California Renters Legal Advocacy & Education Fund v. City of San Mateo (2021) 68 Cal.App.5th 820, 834–835, 283 Cal.Rptr.3d 877 ( California Renters ).)
The HAA provides that when a proposed housing development complies with objective general-plan, zoning, and subdivision standards and criteria in effect at the time the application is deemed complete , the local agency may disapprove the project or require lower density only if it finds the development would have specific adverse effects on public health or safety that cannot feasibly be mitigated. ( California Renters , supra , 68 Cal.App.5th at p. 835, 283 Cal.Rptr.3d 877 ; Honchariw v. County of Stanislaus (2011) 200 Cal.App.4th 1066, 1074–1075, 132 Cal.Rptr.3d 874 ; Gov. Code, § 65589.5, subd. (j)(1).) Of particular relevance here, a local agency may not disapprove (or approve in a manner that renders infeasible) a housing development project for very low-, low-, or moderate-income households unless it finds, inter alia , that the project is inconsistent with the zoning ordinance and the general-plan land-use designation existing when the application was deemed complete. ( Gov. Code, § 65589.5, subd. (d)(5).) Thus, even if a project is inconsistent with the current general plan or zoning standards, under the HAA it may need to be approved if it was consistent with standards existing when the application was deemed complete.
Subdivision (d)(5) of section 65589.5 currently provides, as one of the permissible grounds for disapproving or reducing the density of a housing development project for very low-, low- or moderate-income households, that the project "is inconsistent with both the jurisdiction's zoning ordinance and general plan land use designation as specified in any element of the general plan as it existed on the date the application was deemed complete, and the jurisdiction has adopted a revised housing element in accordance with Section 65588 that is in substantial compliance with this article. For purposes of this section, a change to the zoning ordinance or general plan land use designation subsequent to the date the application was deemed complete shall not constitute a valid basis to disapprove or condition approval of the housing development project or emergency shelter." The final sentence of this provision was added effective January 1, 2018. (Stats. 2017, ch. 368, § 1 (Sen. Bill 167); Stats. 2017, ch. 373, § 1 (Assem. Bill 678).) Save Lafayette argues that the final sentence of this provision cannot be applied retroactively. We question whether applying the full provision to a project approval in 2020 constitutes retroactive application of the 2018 amendment (see Walnut Creek Police Officers’ Assoc. v. City of Walnut Creek (2019) 33 Cal.App.5th 940, 245 Cal.Rptr.3d 398 ; Citizens for Positive Growth & Preservation v. City of Sacramento (2019) 43 Cal.App.5th 609, 626, 255 Cal.Rptr.3d 889 ), but in any event, we need not consider this contention because the added sentence only reinforces the rule already set forth in the statute: a project must be judged by the planning and zoning standards that existed when the application was deemed complete, not by any later changes to those standards.
Finally, the Permit Streamlining Act addresses processes for permitting housing and other development projects. (See Gov. Code, § 65920 et seq. ) At least two aspects of the PSA are relevant here. First, the statute requires public agencies to specify up front what information an applicant for a development project must supply, and then the agency must review applications for completeness within 30 days of receiving them. ( Gov. Code, §§ 65940, subd. (a)(1), 65943, subd. (a).) The PSA requires an agency to notify an applicant what information, if any, is missing, and then the process iterates if the applicant provides further information. "Upon receipt of any resubmittal of the application, a new 30-day period shall begin, during which the public agency shall determine the completeness of the application." ( Gov. Code, § 65943, subd. (a).) If the agency does not determine in writing within 30 days whether an application for a development project is complete, "the application shall be deemed complete." (Ibid .) And whether an application is complete for purposes of the PSA is also relevant under the HAA, which incorporates by reference the PSA's definition of a complete application. (See Gov. Code, § 65589.5, subd. (h)(5).)
Once a development application is deemed complete, the PSA establishes deadlines for a public agency to approve or disapprove it, deadlines that vary with the extent of environmental review required. ( Gov. Code, § 65950, subd. (a).) The longest timeline, which appears to apply here, runs 180 days from the time an EIR is certified. ( Gov. Code, §§ 65950, subd. (a)(1).) The PSA allows only a single 90-day extension of that period. ( Gov. Code, § 65957.) With exceptions not at issue here, "[n]o other extension, continuance, or waiver of these time limits either by the project applicant or the lead agency shall be permitted," and "[f]ailure of the lead agency to act within these time limits may result in the project being deemed approved pursuant to the provisions of subdivision (b) of [Government Code] Section 65956," which establishes requirements for public notice. ( Gov. Code, § 65957.) That is, if the agency fails to act within the statutory period and the applicant provides timely notice (enabling the agency to cure), the project may proceed without agency action, as if it had been approved. ( Gov. Code, §§ 65956, subd. (b), 65957 ; Linovitz Capo Shores LLC v. California Coastal Com. (2021) 65 Cal.App.5th 1106, 1120, 280 Cal.Rptr.3d 511.) The goal of the PSA is "to relieve permit applicants from protracted and unjustified delays in processing their permit applications." ( Riverwatch v. County of San Diego (1999) 76 Cal.App.4th 1428, 1438, 91 Cal.Rptr.2d 322 ( Riverwatch ).)
The Legislature added the prohibition on waiving the PSA's strict time limits in 1998, in response to our high court's decision in Bickel v. City of Piedmont (1997) 16 Cal.4th 1040, 1043, 1048–1052, 68 Cal.Rptr.2d 758, 946 P.2d 427, which had held that applicants could waive the PSA's time limits. The applicants in Bickel sought to remodel their house and encountered opposition. After a number of continuances over the course of almost two years—continuances the applicants either sought or agreed to—the planning commission denied the application. The applicants then claimed their application was deemed approved by operation of law under the PSA's time limits, a contention the city council and superior court rejected. ( Id. at pp. 1044–1046, 68 Cal.Rptr.2d 758, 946 P.2d 427.) On review, the high court considered whether an applicant could waive the PSA's time limits, and answered in the affirmative. It reasoned that the time limits primarily benefit the applicant ( id. at pp. 1048–1049, 68 Cal.Rptr.2d 758, 946 P.2d 427 ) and that nothing in the PSA's language "prohibits an applicant from voluntarily relinquishing, for the applicant's own benefit ..., the right to an agency decision within the statutory time limits" ( id. at p. 1052, 68 Cal.Rptr.2d 758, 946 P.2d 427 ). Upholding the trial court's finding that the applicants had waived the PSA's time limits, the high court rejected the argument that the project was deemed approved. ( Id. at pp. 1052–1054, 68 Cal.Rptr.2d 758, 946 P.2d 427.)
The following year, the Legislature responded by amending Government Code section 65957 to specify that the PSA's time limits may not be waived by either the project applicant or the lead agency. (Sen. Bill 2005, Stats. 1998, ch. 283, § 4.) In an uncodified portion of the legislation, the Legislature declared that it was aware of Bickel , and that it intended to clarify that the PSA "does not provide for the application of the common law doctrine of waiver by either the act's purpose or its statutory language." (Sen. Bill, 2005, Stats. 1998, ch. 283, § 5; see Riverwatch , supra , 76 Cal.App.4th at p. 1439, 91 Cal.Rptr.2d 322.) B. Analysis
Save Lafayette does not dispute that the apartment project, when originally proposed, was consistent with the zoning and general plan designations for the site in 2011. And nobody disputes that the project is inconsistent with the zoning and general plan designations in effect on June 15, 2018, when the applicant terminated the process agreement and asked the City to resume processing a variant of its original application. The question before us is whether, under the HAA, the general plan and zoning standards in effect when the application was deemed complete in 2011 govern the project, or whether the PSA's time limits deprived the City of the power to act on the application, such that the applicant must be treated as if it had resubmitted its application when it asked the City to resume processing an apartment application in 2018. This is fundamentally a legal issue, which requires us to decide how the HAA and the PSA apply to undisputed facts. We thus conduct our review of this question de novo. (See Peterson v. Wells Fargo Bank, N.A. (2015) 236 Cal.App.4th 844, 850, 186 Cal.Rptr.3d 842.) In carrying out this review, we bear in mind that, at least to the extent we must construe the HAA, the Legislature has instructed that its provisions "be interpreted and implemented in a manner to afford the fullest possible weight to the interest of, and the approval and provision of, housing." ( Gov. Code, § 65589.5, subd. (a)(2)(L) ; California Renters , supra , 68 Cal.App.5th at p. 836, 283 Cal.Rptr.3d 877.)
The PSA includes no provision for " ‘suspend[ing]’ " consideration of a project, as contemplated by the process agreement. We thus assume for purposes of our analysis that the multi-year delay following the process agreement violated the PSA. But that does not mean we agree with Save Lafayette that the application's 2011 " ‘substantially complete’ " determination lapsed under the PSA, or that the City lost power to act on the application 180 or 270 days after certifying the EIR. According to Save Lafayette, the applicant's request to resume processing should be treated as a resubmission in June 2018 of its project application, or the application should be deemed resubmitted and reviewed under the standards in effect on a new " ‘deemed complete’ " date.
In practical effect, Save Lafayette's interpretation would mean the application was deemed disapproved by operation of law when the City failed to act on it within 180 or 270 days. But the PSA says no such thing. Rather, the consequence the statutory scheme provides for failure to act is that a project is deemed approved , if notice requirements are met. ( Gov. Code, §§ 65956, subd. (b), 65957.) Specifically, if an agency fails to approve or disapprove a development project within 180 or 270 days after certifying an EIR, the applicant may elect to provide the necessary public notice, including a description of the proposed development and its location, the permit application number, the name and address of the permitting agency, and a statement that the project will be deemed approved if the permitting agency does not act within 60 days of the notice. ( Gov. Code, § 65956, subd. (b).)
An argument could be made that the PSA, taken as a whole, forces a choice on an applicant where the agency does not act promptly on a complete application: either provide public notice under Government Code section 65956 or submit to an application lapsing, thus losing the benefit of the HAA. That is not an impossible reading of the statutory scheme, but neither does the PSA compel this conclusion. Even less does it compel a conclusion that an agency implicitly loses power to act on an application once the statutory time limits pass. We reject Save Lafayette's reading of the statute for four reasons.
First is the fact that the statute nowhere states that an application is deemed withdrawn, deemed disapproved, or deemed resubmitted at a later date if, after the agency fails to act within the PSA's time limits, the applicant fails to perfect its right to "deemed approval." (See Gov. Code, § 65956, subd. (b).) Given that the statute is elsewhere explicit about deeming an application complete or deeming it approved ( Gov. Code, §§ 65943, subd. (a), 65956, subd. (b) ), we consider this silence significant.
Second is the implausibility of the argument Save Lafayette makes in favor of restarting the clock in 2018. Save Lafayette contends that the applicant's request for continued permit processing on the resumed project served as a resubmittal of the project application, and that the application should be deemed complete on the date of this ostensible resubmittal. For this view, Save Lafayette relies on Government Code section 65943, the PSA's provision for determining an application's completeness. In particular, it quotes the language we quoted above: "Upon receipt of any resubmittal of the application, a new 30-day period shall begin, during which the public agency shall determine the completeness of the application." (Id. , subd. (a).) But in the context of the statute, a "resubmittal of the application" refers to a resubmittal in response to a notice that an application is incomplete, after which the agency has an additional 30 days to assess the application's completeness. ( Gov. Code, § 65943, subd. (a) ; see Orsi v. City Council (1990) 219 Cal.App.3d 1576, 1586, 268 Cal.Rptr. 912 [statutory language and legislative history "make clear that the Legislature in discussing ‘resubmittals’ was referring to applications that were resubmitted after the lead agency made a timely finding that the application as originally submitted was incomplete"].) That is not what happened here, where the City found the application to be complete in 2011, no resubmission was required, and no reevaluation of the application's completeness occurred. The third reason we reject Save Lafayette's construction of the statute is that it stands in tension with the provision of the PSA that expressly addresses disapproval of applications. Government Code section 65952.2 states that "[a]ny disapproval of an application for a development project shall specify reasons for disapproval other than the failure to timely act in accordance with the time limits" of the PSA. If the 2011 project application were deemed disapproved, that disapproval would only be because of the City's failure to "act in accordance with the time limits" of the PSA. (Ibid .) And, of course, such a silent disapproval would have occurred without anyone "specify[ing] reasons" for it. (Ibid .)
Our fourth reason for construing the PSA to avoid deemed disapproval here is because we are not dealing with the PSA in a vacuum, but rather in its relation to the HAA. The Legislature has found that California has a "housing supply and affordability crisis of historic proportions" and that millions of Californians are hurt by the "consequences of failing to effectively and aggressively confront this crisis." ( Gov. Code, § 65589.5, subd. (a)(2)(A).) The Legislative intended in adopting and subsequently expanding the HAA "to significantly increase the approval and construction of new housing for all economic segments of California's communities by meaningfully and effectively curbing the capability of local governments to deny, reduce the density for, or render infeasible housing development projects." (Id. , subd. (a)(2)(K).) We are accordingly directed to interpret and implement the HAA to "afford the fullest possible weight to the interest of, and the approval and provision of, housing." (Id. , subd. (a)(2)(L).) These considerations weigh in favor of fixing the date on which the application was complete on the date when the City actually made that determination—in 2011—rather than at some later date after the City had twice down-zoned the project site to allow for much less housing development.
Save Lafayette objects that this construction of the statute renders the Legislature's post- Bickel amendment of the PSA an idle act. When the Legislature amended the statute to specify that its time limits cannot be waived (Sen. Bill 2005, Stats. 1998, ch. 283, § 4 [amending Gov. Code, § 65957 ]), Save Lafayette protests, the Legislature must have meant for the agency to lose the power to act on an application after the statutory time limits have passed. We reject this logic. Certainly, the City should comply with the PSA. If it refuses, a writ might be in order. (See Morris v. Harper (2001) 94 Cal.App.4th 52, 58, 114 Cal.Rptr.2d 62 ; Gov. Code, § 65956 [inviting action pursuant to Code Civ. Proc., § 1085 ]; LT-WR, L.L.C. v. California Coastal Com. (2007) 152 Cal.App.4th 770, 789, 60 Cal.Rptr.3d 417 [writ relief available to compel Coastal Commission to decide permit application after deadline passed].) But Save Lafayette points us toward no statutory or case authority for the proposition that, by failing to comply with the time limits of the PSA, the City loses the power to act on a project application entirely. Indeed, the default rule is that unless the Legislature clearly expresses a contrary intent, an agency does not lose jurisdiction to act even after a statutory deadline passes. ( LT-WR, L.L.C. , at p. 788, 60 Cal.Rptr.3d 417, citing California Correctional Peace Officers Assn. v. State Personnel Bd. (1995) 10 Cal.4th 1133, 1145, 1147, 43 Cal.Rptr.2d 693, 899 P.2d 79.)
We therefore reject Save Lafayette's contention that O'Brien lost the benefit under the HAA of having submitted a complete application in 2011, after the City failed to approve the project within 270 days of certifying the EIR. The trial court rightly refused to disturb the City's approval of the resumed project; its inconsistency with the general plan and zoning standards of June 2018 was immaterial. O'Brien got a complete project application on file in 2011, and the HAA requires that such a project be assessed against 2011 general plan and zoning standards.
See footnote *, ante .
DISPOSITION
The judgment is affirmed.
WE CONCUR:
FUJISAKI, J.
PETROU, J.