Citizens Coal. L. A. v. City of L. A.

A city council passed an ordinance that (1) amended its neighborhood-based "specific plan" to create a new subzone for large commercial development, and (2) placed a half-built Super Target retail store into that new subzone. Two citizens groups attacked the city's ordinance, and the trial court ruled that the city violated *319 the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) ( Pub. Resources Code, § 21000 et seq. ) 1 because the city treated the creation of the new subzone as a follow-on to its prior, initial approval of the Target store rather than as a entirely new "project" under CEQA.

This appeal presents two questions. First, when a public agency has previously approved an environmental impact report for a specific development and subsequently amends its specific plan to authorize that development, how is that subsequent amendment to be analyzed under CEQA-as an entirely new "project" (subject to CEQA's three-tiered approach), or instead as a project for which an environmental impact report has already been prepared under section 21166? Second, does the ordinance in this case constitute impermissible "spot zoning" because it places the Super Target store in an "island" of…