Case Studies

California launched a statewide effort to clear dangerous vegetation in high-risk fire zones—work critical to preventing catastrophic wildfires, protecting communities, and saving lives.

Opponents sued under CEQA—arguing CAL FIRE’s wildfire experts were wrong about the benefits of brush clearing and that protecting native plants was a better fire prevention strategy than the one selected by professional firefighters. The litigation sent the program back to the beginning stages, delaying critical wildfire prevention work ahead of the devastating 2025 wildfire season.

Liberty Lane was a 100% affordable housing project designed to provide stable homes for military veterans with few alternatives. 

Opponents filed CEQA challenges over alleged “aesthetic and noise” concerns—despite the project complying with applicable standards. After six years of delay and a 70% cost increase, the project ultimately lost its funding entirely—leaving veterans without housing and taxpayers with nothing to show for years of process.

The Sunrise Powerlink was designed to deliver reliable renewable energy from solar and wind farms in the Imperial Valley to homes and businesses in San Diego—strengthening grid reliability and supporting California’s clean energy goals.

Under CEQA, the project applicant was forced to analyze more than 100 alternative routes and configurations—including options that were never feasible and some that rerouted transmission lines across state lines and back—resulting in nearly five years of environmental review and more than 11,000 pages of analysis. It then required 70 permits from more than two dozen agencies before construction could begin, adding further delay and cost that is ultimately passed on to electricity customers.

A local school district proposed modernizing an aging elementary school—upgrading classrooms and improving traffic flow to make drop-off and pick-up safer for families.

Opponents sued under CEQA, arguing in part that modernization would reduce the size of the school field. The litigation stalled construction for years, forcing students into temporary portable classrooms while project costs continued climbing.

UC Berkeley proposed transforming a parking lot and underused portions of the campus into desperately needed student housing.

After extensive planning, environmental review, a public process and approval, opponents sued under CEQA, arguing the project didn’t sufficiently study “social noise” from future student residents—despite being located on an active university campus.

This project was designed to strengthen the electrical grid and ensure reliable power for communities across the Central Coast—supporting homes, businesses, and critical services.

Despite its clear public benefit, the project entered environmental review in 2017 and still has not received final approval. Years of delay have been driven in part by disputes over the subjective “visual impacts” and “aesthetic character” of transmission lines—stalling critical grid upgrades while reliability needs continue to grow.

A modest suburban housing project was proposed to add new homes in Marin County, a region with long-standing housing shortages.

Opponents challenged the project under CEQA, arguing the county inadequately considered an alternative proposal with 10 fewer units. After nearly half a century of litigation and delay, the project was never built—eliminating new housing entirely through process alone.

After Portola Middle School was deemed seismically unsafe, the West Contra Costa Unified School District moved to replace it by converting and expanding a nearby elementary school.

Despite extensive public review and mitigation, opponents sued under CEQA, arguing the district needed to further study the effects of reassigning elementary students to nearby schools. The lawsuit delayed the replacement school nearly four years and cost the district more than $10 million in litigation and construction-delay costs.

In 2007, the University Gateway Project was proposed near USC, adding housing for more than 1,600 students within walking distance of campus and a regional transit station.

A competing student-housing landlord sued under CEQA to stop the project as a part of an aggressive effort to block new competition in the student housing market. The lawsuit stalled construction for roughly two years before ultimately being settled in court.

UCSF approved a $3 billion expansion of its Parnassus Heights campus to modernize a 70-year-old hospital, meet seismic safety standards, add roughly 200 hospital beds and build 762 units of student and faculty housing. The expansion addressed a critical shortage of hospital capacity: UCSF’s hospitals were consistently full, and between 2017 and 2019, UCSF turned away roughly 40% of requested medically necessary patient transfers because it lacked capacity.

Despite the urgent need, opponents sued under CEQA, raising claims that included the project's potential impact on aesthetics and potential bird collisions. The courts ultimately rejected the challenges—but only after litigation delayed groundbreaking on a major hospital modernization project for years.

In 2017, LA Metro began environmental review for a new 15-mile light rail line connecting historically underserved communities in Southeast Los Angeles County to the regional transit system. The line is expected to serve an area with 1.4 million residents and 600,000 jobs, while reducing traffic, expanding transit access and cutting emissions.

The project took seven years to complete environmental review. During that time, the project's estimated price tag climbed from approximately $3.75 billion to $8.6 billion—a nearly $5 billion increase ultimately borne by taxpayers.

Sites Reservoir has been a state-priority water resilience project for decades. As California endured severe droughts and water shortages, the project spent six years preparing thousands of pages of environmental review.

Nearly a decade after the approval process began, permitting remains unfinished—and the project's estimated cost has increased from approximately $3.9 billion to $6.8 billion.