Citizens for a Green San Mateo v. San Mateo County Community College District

In this action under the California Environmental Quality Act (Pub. Resources Code, § 21000 et seq.; CEQA), San Mateo. Community County Community College District and San Mateo County College District Board of Trustees (collectively District) appeal from the judgment granting the petition for a writ of mandate brought by Citizens for a Green San Mateo (Citizens), challenging the District’s approval of a mitigated negative' declaration for the College of San Mateo (CSM) facilities improvement project (the Project). The Project involves the renovation, demolition and/or new construction of numerous buildings, as well as renovation of parking lots, pedestrian walkways, and vehicle circulation. Citizens contends the District violated CEQA when it removed trees on the hillsides surrounding the CSM campus, alleging that the “clear-cutting” of more than 200 mature trees was outside the scope of the Project. The District argues, among other things, that Citizens’s challenge is untimely. Finding Citizens’s action is barred under the applicable statute of limitations, we reverse.

I. BACKGROUND

The District, established in 1922, owns and operates three public community colleges in…