Creative Reuse: The Opportunities and Challenges of Converting Office Space to Residential
California CRE to Expand in 2022
As part of an ongoing effort to address the affordable housing shortage, the Connecticut General Assembly has passed Senate Bill No. 1444 which is designed to facilitate the conversion of certain buildings to residential use....more
The Winter 2025 Allen Matkins/UCLA Anderson Forecast California Commercial Real Estate Survey highlights significant changes in California’s commercial real estate market, driven by the growing adoption of cloud computing,...more
On November 22, 2024, the First District Court of Appeal’s (Div. 4) partially-published opinion in People of the State of California ex rel. Bonta v. County of Lake (Lotusland Investment Holdings, Inc., et al. Real Parties in...more
The Live Local Act (Act), originally passed on March 29, 2023, was modified by SB328 on May 16, 2024. While the Act has been heralded as a solution to Florida’s affordable housing shortage, it has faced roadblocks since its...more
As Dayton’s defense industry continues to grow, a local developer plans to invest more than $100M in a mixed-use development aimed at attracting defense contractors....more
While the general commercial real estate markets have faced more than a year of raising interest costs, fewer deals, and economic uncertainty, the branded-residences sector has not only remained resilient but also has...more
2023 served up roughly the same number of published appellate CEQA cases as 2022 with a defense win percentage of over 80 percent, which has been the case in many, if not all, of the past ten years. A prominent theme of...more
The refusal of M&S's plans to demolish and rebuild their flagship store on Oxford Street by the Secretary of State for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (Michael Gove) has attracted much attention because of the wider...more
On July 1, 2023, Senate Bill (SB) 6 (Caballero) – also known as the Middle Class Housing Act of 2022 – went into effect. Under the bill, if a project site is currently zoned for commercial retail or parking use, a developer...more
On March 29, 2023, Governor Ron DeSantis signed Senate Bill 102 (the Act), otherwise known as the Live Local Act, into law. The Act becomes effective on July 1. This broad-ranging legislation is intended to incentivize the...more
On March 29, 2023, Governor Ron DeSantis signed into law Senate Bill 102 (Live Local Act) that becomes effective July 1, 2023. The Live Local Act, among other things, seeks to provide available and affordable housing to the...more
At this week’s City of Miami Commission meeting, the City of Miami adopted a series of important amendments to the Miami 21 Zoning Code. These amendments specifically impact the Wynwood Neighborhood Revitalization District...more
On September January 12, 2022, in Old East Davis Neighborhood Association v. City of Davis, __ Cal.App.5th __ (Case No. C090117), the Third District Court of Appeal reversed a trial court decision that granted a writ petition...more
The enactment of special CEQA streamlining legislation for the Sacramento Kings arena nearly a decade ago created a model for a series of mega-project specific bills, all aimed at reducing the development uncertainty and the...more
Generally, Pennsylvania’s private prompt payment act, the Contractor and Subcontractor Payment Act, (CASPA) does not apply to improvements to real property that consists of six or fewer residential units. But, in a recent...more
On May 3, 2021, the City Planning Commission referred out for public review a zoning text amendment that would require a special permit for the creation or material enlargement of transient hotels (Zoning Use Group 5) and...more
A recent court of appeal opinion out of San Diego demonstrates how the California Environmental Quality Act (“CEQA”) has once again been used to impede housing development—this time to the benefit of a high-end luxury spa. ...more
On March 16, 2020, in response to the COVID-19 (coronavirus) global pandemic, seven counties – Alameda, Contra Costa, Marin, San Francisco, San Mateo, Santa Clara, and Santa Cruz – issued orders requiring residents to shelter...more
In SEQRA litigation, there is an oft-quoted proposition that the Lead Agency may not abdicate or defer its responsibilities under SEQRA to another agency. See Riverkeeper, Inc. v. Planning Bd. of Town of Se., 9 N.Y.3d 219,...more
A Summary of Published Appellate Opinions Under the California Environmental Quality Act - The year 2019 saw several trailblazing opinions, indicating that courts continue to grapple with some of CEQA’s core policies. The...more
Welcome to CEQA News You Can Use, a quarterly production of Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck, LLP’s Natural Resources lawyers. This publication provides quick, useful bites of CEQA news, which we hope can be a resource to your...more
In an opinion originally filed on July 31, and belatedly ordered published on August 22, 2019, the Second District Court of Appeal (Division 3) affirmed a judgment granting a CEQA writ petition invalidating the final EIR and...more
On July 18, 2019, in Sacramentans for Fair Planning v. City of Sacramento, __ Cal.App.5th __ (2019), the Third District Court of Appeal affirmed a trial court decision denying a “vertical” consistency challenge filed by...more
In a 30-page opinion originally filed July 3, and certified for publication on July 18, 2019, the Third District Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court’s judgment denying a writ petition challenging, on zoning law and CEQA...more
The City of Coral Gables’ zoning code landscape and open space requirements were recently amended as of May 14, 2019. The Coral Gables’ zoning code now requires landscape open space to be provided at the ground level and to...more