The city of La Cañada Flintridge is facing two additional lawsuits after losing its case to the nonprofit Californians for Homeownership, where the judge ruled that its housing element was not in compliance without proper rezoning.
Since the judge’s determination on the builder’s remedy, the owners of 600 Foothill Blvd. filed a lawsuit against the city on July 21, regarding the denial of a mixed use housing project. The California Housing Defense Fund, a California nonprofit public benefit corporation, has also filed a lawsuit against the city addressing the 600 Foothill Blvd. project.
“CalHDF was formed, in part, to advocate for the construction of housing at all income levels throughout the state, including in La Cañada Flintridge, to meet the needs of California residents,” according to the paperwork filed by the nonprofit on July 25.
Both petitioners also added details about the city’s housing element and how it is still not in compliance with state law. They also mentioned sites that the city provided in their housing element that, “do not properly assess the suitability of non-vacant sites,” and that the city did not, “identify actions that would be taken to ensure the sites in its housing site inventory would be available for the city’s projected housing needs.”
As a refresher, the city continues to say that their housing element was adopted on Oct. 4 but in actuality, a third version was adopted on Feb. 21 with minor changes.
Since then, the city has been told that its housing element is actually not in compliance with state law by the California Department of Housing and Community Development and, more recently, the Los Angeles Superior Court.
Now these two petitioners are addressing the May 1 denial from the City Council of the 600 Foothill Blvd. project since the city did not have a compliant housing element, and by law should have not denied the project.
As proposed in the preliminary application, according to the owners, the project would consist of an 80-unit mixed use housing project, including 14 hotel rooms, 7,791 square feet of office space, and two levels of underground parking. Of the 80 dwelling units, 16 are proposed to be reserved for low-income residents.
The California Housing Defense Fund presented two causes of action in their lawsuit compared to 11 from the 600 Foothill owners on the subject of the city’s housing element and the denial of the 600 Foothill Blvd. project.
“For the current Sixth Cycle (October 2021-October 2029), the city has a Regional Housing Needs Allocation obligation of 612 units, including 252 very low-income units, 135 low-income units, 139 moderate income units and 86 above moderate-income units,” according to the court documents filed by the owners. “As of the date of this petition, the Sixth Cycle is already 20% complete, and the city has not approved a single affordable unit.”
Only the California Housing Defense Fund has received a hearing date of Nov. 2. The two lawsuits at hand have been on the agenda in the last two weeks for its closed session LCF City Council meetings.
First published in the August 3 print issue of the Outlook Valley Sun.
