By Paul Krueger / Special to the OB Rag
The California Supreme Court on Tuesday, December 30, placed another hurdle in the City of San Diego’s effort to allow high-rise development throughout the Midway/ Pacific Highway area.
The state’s highest court affirmed a lower court ruling that the city must fully analyze the negative environmental impacts of high-density, multi-story projects and give voters that information before they agree to override the existing 30-foot height limit in the Midway/ PacHwy district.
Voters twice — but narrowly — approved the height limit waiver. But state courts said the environmental impact studies failed to study possible negative and unavoidable impacts of high-rise development on traffic, noise, pollution, and other issues.
The most recent ruling against the city was a strongly worded and unanimous October 17 decision by the state Appellate Court.
Mayor Todd Gloria and City Attorney Heather Ferber both denounced that ruling, and the City Council voted 6-2 (with Council Member Henry Foster absent) to ask the State Supreme Court to overrule the lower court and allow high-density development throughout the Midway/ PacHighway district.
The City Attorney’s office filed that appeal on November 25. Attorney Everett Delano, representing the “Save Our Access” community group, filed its response on December 15. Lawyers for the City filed their reply to that response on December 24.
It took the Supreme Court just six days to reject the City’s appeal. Chief Justice Patricia Gurerro recused herself from the case and did not participate in the review.
Mayor Gloria and supporters of the Midway Rising development say that high-density, high-rise project will continue as planned, despite the need for another area-wide environmental study.
Midway Rising’s proponents say other state laws provide an exemption for that residential project, because it includes some “affordable” housing.
The attorney for Save Our Access — the community group that challenged the city’s waiver of the 30-foot height limit — Everett Delano — told the OB Rag today that “The the City’s attempt to take this to the Supreme Court was a distraction from the real issues, when what the City should be doing is preparing and circulating an environmental analysis, consistent with the Court of Appeal’s well-reasoned decision, that adequately addresses the many significant environmental impacts associated with removing the Coastal Zone Height Limit.”
Fantastic end-of-year news, Paul! A great way to end this year!
So Todd Gloria and his garbage cronies are taking a page from the worst despot our country has ever seen and is forging ahead with a project determined to be a no go from the California Supreme Court? Am I reading that correctly? The article states: “Mayor Gloria and supporters of the Midway Rising development say that high-density, high-rise project will continue as planned, despite the need for another area-wide environmental study.” If, so, that little turd and the rest of the Diarrhea that support him needs to flushed out of office.
What a perfect way to end 2025! Well done, Paul, and congrats to Save Our Access. Can we find out how much this imbecilic appeal cost taxpayers? When City Hall reopens, let’s ask for a public accounting from Gloria, Ferbert, and the six Councilmembers who insisted on pursuing this losing effort.
Great idea, Kate. Thank you Kate and Paul for your top-notch reporting.
Voted to Appeal (6): Joe La Cava, Jennifer Campbell, Stephen Whitburn, Kent Lee, Marni von Wilpert, Sean Elo-Rivera.
Voted Against (2): Vivian Moreno, Raul Campillo.
Absent (1): Henry Foster.
The attorney for Save Our Access — the community group that challenged the city’s waiver of the 30-foot height limit — said he hasn’t received official word from the Supreme Court confirming Tuesday’s ruling. But the attorney — Everett Delano — told the OB Rag today that “The the City’s attempt to take this to the Supreme Court was a distraction from the real issues, when what the City should be doing is preparing and circulating an environmental analysis, consistent with the Court of Appeal’s well-reasoned decision, that adequately addresses the many significant environmental impacts associated with removing the Coastal Zone Height Limit.”
Time to flush Turd Gloria. The nerve of that man and his cronies taking a page from the Despot I the White House and completely ignoring the California Supreme Court.
These environmental documents are usually a waste of time and immaterial bureaucracy, but to be told multiple times they were incomplete and to continue to ignore that jeopardizing an enormous legacy defining project is just…. well…. embarrassing. Strong turn your homework late in energy from the City of San Diego under Mayor Gloria. Regardless of where someone stands on this issue they should be disappointed by the City.
The City is sinking deeper and deeper into the abyss of moral depravity.
Well now you know why home prices are high, and you know why your kids will never be sble to live anywhere mear where they grew up. Midway area is a tragic homeless dump.
We drove by a couple of nights ago and were amazed by the number of homeless at just about every street corner. I think there used to be a mental health facility near the shopping center where the See’s Candy store is. Supposedly 6 motels for veterans etc. being sited in the area.
Then they complain their kids never come to see them.
The housing planned for this area is apartment/rentals. There’s no indication that high-rises would be built any different than in Hillcrest, downtown, Kearny Mesa, North Park, etc. These are not for sale units, and would have no impact on the buy-to-own housing market.
Construction of thousands of market-rate rental units (and some below-market rate units) will have absolutely no impact on the cost of for-sale housing. Building more studio and one-bedroom apartments that rent for $2000-$3000 a month will never reduce real estate sales prices. And six years of essentially unfettered market-rate apartment construction has not lowered rents in any meanful way. Studios and one-bedrooms are still renting for $2000-plus. The issue isn’t whether we need to reimagine and redevelop the Midway corridor (I think there’s universal agreement on that). The issue is how we accomplish that redevelopment in a way that benefits all San Diegans, not just developers and land owners, and the politicans who they put in office to do their bidding.
This ruling may also have a positive affect on the Turquoise Tower. Fortunately the tower also has to be approved by the FAA given its proximity to several airports and military facilities. Hopefully common sense will prevail and end the insanity being imposed on us by Gruesom, Gloria and Weiner, who is no Pelosi.
I wouldn’t give that too much credence. We’re fighting a mega complex in Middletown (on Columbia Street, just north of the descent pattern). FAA gave it a waiver.
I have noticed that many of these approvals are based on the information provided by the applicant on a form. It is perhaps that data that caused it to be approved. What did the applicant tell the FAA?
Turquoise Tower is a different kind of fight. It is not primarily a CEQA question. It is being driven by state zoning preemption, Density Bonus law, and a largely ministerial permitting track. That is exactly why public statements from elected officials are not enough. What matters is how City staff applies the rules in writing, including base density, objective standards, health and safety findings, and any discretionary hooks that do or do not get used. NFABC has filed CPRA requests so the public can see the City’s actual procedural posture and communications, not just quotes.
Bravo to the defenders of WE THE PEOPLE who have spoken once again and walk in step with the brave not the corrupted City Council and WEAK Mayor!!!
The people!!!! already voted 2 times to raise the hight limit and let the project move forward.
But “the People!!!!” voted for the original 30 foot height limit by much larger margins that those that were able to muster a few percentage points. So =– which “people” do we ignore?
It passed in 1972 that is a very different electorate with a large portion of voters being dead now than 2022
Hey Jason, the people who voted in the Bill of Rights to our Constitution are now all dead too.
The bill of rights was never voted on by the public Frank. It was passed by Congress in 1789 and then ratified by States in 1791 as a series of amendments to the Constitution.
Respectfully, if your argument is predicated on the legislators who voted on the Bill of Rights now being dead as a reason why both recent Midway votes being illegitimate repeals of 1972’s Prop D, you’re off the mark. The Bill of Rights AMENDED the Constitution, which as we know has been amended repeatedly since then.
What I said still stands. Should we do away with the Constitution and the Bill of Rights because the people who voted for them are all dead now? That’s an extension of your argument.
Frank no that is not my position. I am refuting your position that comparing the 1972 height limit vote to the Bill of Rights is apt because it is not. Not only does it fail because no popular vote was ever held for the Bill of Rights, but also because the Bill of Rights amended the constitution, which undermines your position.
Not only has the constitution been amended many times over the last two centuries, it is strange to compare votes from legislators to votes from the public. Even then, if Congress and 2/3 of States voted to amend the constitution today, they could do so, just as San Diegans can (and did) vote to amend the Coastal Height Limit Overlay Zone to exclude Midway in 2020 and 2022.
These are all democratic processes that have nothing to do with whether or not someone is alive or dead. Ballot measures can be repealed or modified by the very same mechanism that enables them (popular vote).
Questions for you: Why do you insist that the 1972 height limit vote is sacrosanct, when the 2020 and 2022 ballot measures were the same mechanism? Did the will of San Diegans stop mattering after 1972? Are ballot measures no longer valid expressions of popular will?
I would really like it if you could address those questions because it would help me understand what your thinking is on this.
Zack, over the course of the last month or so, the Rag has run multiple articles about the 30-foot height, its status, significance and history. check those out, why don’t ya?
Are you going to answer my questions or address my points?
And yes, for the record Frank, I have definitely read all of the other Rag articles on the 30 foot height limit. What does that have to do with what I asked you? Can you connect the dots for me please because I am confused.
We, the people, in order to establish…to preserve the common resources…
The Supreme Court’s decision confirms the Appeals Court ruling that the City failed to produce a complete and required environmental study that would have given voters the information they need to properly assess the negative (and often irreversible) impacts of high-rise, high-density development throughout the more than 1,000 acre Midway/Pacific Highway area. The courts had warned the city previously about its failure to comply with environmental law, but the city proceeeded with two ballot measures despite those warnings. It can put it on the ballot again, after following the court’s guidance.
Jaxson there is something even more unconstitutional in the cryptic way Jen Campbell’s City Council behind closed doors dictated all of this as. President of the Council E got onto the ballot without virtually any public scrutiny. The agenda item was conveniently rescheduled more than once. Then City deliberately cut off television access to the Council meeting to the largest San Diego voting block’s cable provider Spectrum for the first time ever. A deliberate act to eliminate as much public opposition testimony as possible for “the Party”.
Additionally, Campbell willfully limited public input, and rammed the removal of the 30ft height limit through the council to get it on the ballot where corporate housing monopolists in “the Party” created the disinformation campaign that became Prop E.
It is outright dishonest to say the Sports Arena and the Height Limit were not fraudulently presented to the voters in Prop C. It is farcical for you to say “the Mayor” did not propagate misinformation for the Measure C Ballot Measure when the official campaign slogan fraudulently promised “Homes for Working Families”. Working Family Homes were the first set of parcels eliminated altogether by the Termini development team just a few short weeks after the proposition breathlessly passed.
It is duplicitous to imply that “the Mayor” hasn’t had anything to do with the neutering Community Planning Groups when then Assemblymember Gloria Hole set up shop to sell housing legislation to the highest bidder, and worked with Corporate Real Estate Lobbyists to craft AB 3243 in the State Housing Committee.
AB 3243 cut Community Planning Groups effective power by a factor of three. And it proved profitable enough to fill the Gloria Hole with the necessary of campaign cash for “the Party” to repay him by backing his run for Mayor; under the stipulation that he finish the job which he did almost immediately. Fraud Gloria and the crooked Council Cabal has unilaterally eliminated any power once concentrated in the hands of the People volunteering for Community Planning Groups.
As a registered Dem it is comical the way “the Party” in San Diego used to vilify Conservatives as “the problem.” Then the Party’s implementation of the childish NIMBY divisional tactic to vilify the Democratic Voters in order to divide and conquer. And now it is the Democratic Supermajority “State” which leaves us so powerless to self govern? And you wonder why 73% of voters in California no longer identify with either party?
Jaxson it is disingenuous, duplicitous and dishonest (and idiotic) to assume you can run interference for the feeble attempt at pacification by isolating factors as if they took place and take place in a vacuum.
RECALL TODD GLORIA
This is the game plan the city and developers always use, move the homeless to and allow the homeless to stay in an area that they want to developed, Get the public so sick of it the we beg them to redevelop, then onto the next plot
I agree, the CITY Council could care less that they are Destroying such a Beautiful City such as San Diego. Buckle up with these Morons making the decisions and Stuffing their Pockets. We’re headed for Toilet City..
Yes to this decision and Geoff’s solid reporting of it to start our new year out hopeful.
Yes to the demand for a cost accounting for the appeals, which were not only unjustified (especially at a time of damaging budget cuts to public services) but also (as has been noted) a diversion from doing the full environmental analysis that should have been done in the first place.
And to those wishing for improvements to the Midway area, remember that it was overreach that led to this decision: Instead of just asking for a lifting of the height limit there and doing the necessary studies, the mayor & his compliant council unnecessarily (and misleadingly) demanded approval of a higher height limit for the much larger Pacific Highway area–which would have been a forever gift to developers of much of San Diego that especially merits extra protection.
Editordude: The YIMBYs have all been up in arms about this and the Rag has been flooded with comments from about 3 individuals accusing “Boomers” of everything, of course.
How appropriate. And (I know you should never start a sentence with “and”) for the cherry on top, the New Year’s day flooding proves how inappropriate high density development is in this site.
It’s okay, just not in legal briefs.
I think the California Supreme Court declined to review the 4th District Court of Appeals and declined to have that case depublished, so precedent couldn’t be relied on by other cases. There was no hearing or oral argument on Save Our Access at the Supreme Court. By declining to review the 4th District Court of Appeals decision, that ruling is affirmed, in that the Supreme Court is allowing that ruling to stand.
Just wanted to clarify.
I’m not a lawyer, but I think that by refusing to review or “depublish” the appellate court’s unanimous decision requiring a more comprehensive EIR, the Supreme Court did, in fact, establish the appellate court’s ruling as precedent on this issue. So it’s a big win for those who support a vigorous environmental review for district-wide zoning changes and the waiver of height limits.
Zack, you’re not confused. You’ve consistently held views contrary to the 30-foot height limit or efforts to save it and you consistently disparage those — like the Rag — that attempt to maintain it. I’ve seen your comments. If your “questions” haven’t been answered by those articles, then nothing I say will convince you otherwise. Honestly, Zack, why should I waste my time and effort arguing against a brick wall? Seriously. Get on with it. You’re not seriously trying to hold a discussion, you’re just trying to engage us so you can postulate your positions.
How do We STOP High rise Buildings along our Coastline in San Diego? These people are Driven by GREED. All involved are Based in Los Angeles and look at How they DESTROYED LA !! How can they just change or Rewrite the Laws for their Benifit????
Epitome of a San Diego Special. Something with broad popularity that the city needs, but it’ll never get built because some NIMBYs are worried about their overinflated property values dipping if the city’s housing stock ever came close to meeting demand. Instead we’ll be stuck indefinitely with a decrepit, blighted Vietnam War era arena that no major sports team or performer is willing to play at, surrounded by 40 acres of space wasted as a crumbling parking lot, in the middle of a decaying district whose own residents have been begging for redevelopment. The 30-foot height limit in Midway is absurd, and the fact that the people of San Diego have repeatedly and consistently voted to eliminate it shows that the 55-year-old rule is out of touch with the present scale of the city and will of the voters.
LOL. Had the city done a complete environmental report, this could have been a moot point, or maybe voters would have said, hey let’s not pass this. Maybe direct your anguish toward the city?
Major sports teams have failed. An arena is not necessary. Viejas is available. Redevelopment at a lower height scale would likely be welcome. The beach communities do not need to be an extension of downtown with forced public transit.
I totally agree with you on this, Chris, and thanks for posting your thoughts.
This ruling does not focus on the proposed Midway Rising development. The Supreme Court’s refusal to overturn the Appelate Court’s ruling in fact applies to the entire, 1,000-plus acre Midway/Pacific Highway corridor.
The courts have repeatly told the city that if it wants to allow high-rise/high-density development throughout that area, it must provide voters and decision makers with a comprehensive environmental review that explains the negative and often irreversible impacts of that development.
The Mayor, City Attorney, and the Midway Rising developers have all expressed strong optimism that these rulings will not stop the Midway Rising project, which they say is allowed by other state laws that allow high-rise development that includes low/moderate income housing, regardless of local zoning restrictions.
None of the people I know who oppose Midway Rising and advocate for what we consider to be responsible growth in that area are motivated by preserving our “overinflated property values.” There is no connection between these two issues, because buildling more rental housing will not increase or decrease for-sale housing prices.
If the voter-approved Proposition D height limit is “out of touch with the present scale of the city and will of the voters,” then voters should decide on a case-by-case basis if they want to overrule the height-limit. Or they can simply overturn Proposition D. But San Diego voters should make those decisions, not the Governor, his financial backers, and his allies who don’t live or work here. (As you may know, a La Jolla resident has announced a signature effort for a ballot measure this year that would overturn Prop D.)
Mayor Todd Gloria and City Atty Heather Ferbert just released this response to the Supreme Court’s decision requiring an in-depth environmental review before asking voters to allow high-rise, high-density housing throughout the Midway/Pacific Highway area:
“While we are disappointed that the Supreme Court declined to hear the City’s appeal, this procedural decision does not change our commitment or our momentum to redevelop the Sports Arena site. We continue to disagree with the lower court’s ruling, but we are not standing still.
“The City is actively pursuing options that will provide a clear and durable path forward for this transformational project — one that will deliver thousands of new homes, including affordable housing, permanent jobs, a modern entertainment venue, and significant economic benefits for San Diego.”
Should have read, pursuing options that circumvent the courts.
And I hear Newsome and Bonta are lobbying for the city now with legal briefs.
This is great news and I hope the City really does the required negative impact studies this time and presents those findings to the voters.
Thank you Paul and Frank, Mr. Delano and SaveOurAccess to keeping on this issue of what changing or bypassing the Coastal Zone Height Limit will do to the residents in our City and especially those within that zone.