Fight Continues Over Lot-Line Adjustments in Napa County

02/16/11

The Sierra Club and a Napa resident have filed separate appeals of two Napa County Superior Court rulings that upheld Napa County’s policy on allowing “successive” lot-line adjustments involving four or fewer parcels.

The County’s policy on lot-line adjustments first came under assault in connection with long-time grape grower and vintner, Will Nord, whose company, Calness Vintners, represented by Dickenson, Peatman & Fogarty, applied to reconfigure six existing legal parcels in the unincorporated area of Napa County on the eastern boundary of the Town of Yountville. Residents of an adjacent residential subdivision, led by Carol Vendrillo, appealed the County’s ministerial approval of the second of two lot-line adjustments, claiming that State law required approval of a discretionary subdivision map. The Napa County Board of Supervisors unanimously rejected the appeal, and Vendrillo sued.

Following Vendrillo’s lawsuit, the Board passed an Ordinance clarifying the County’s longstanding policy of allowing approval of lot-line adjustments to occur in succession as long as the prior lot-line adjustment had been recorded. The Board’s rationale was that the State Subdivision Map Act is silent on the issue, leaving local governments free to decide whether to allow successive four-parcel lot-line adjustments or whether to “aggregate” the parcels previously involved in a lot-line adjustment with the parcels currently proposed for adjustment and require a subdivision map. (A subdivision map is required where five or more parcels are being reconfigured and is a discretionary approval requiring CEQA review.) The Sierra Club filed suit against the County over the Ordinance.

The November court rulings on both challenges firmly sided with the County. According to the Court, “[I]f the legislature had intended to bring all sequential lot line adjustments within the purview of the Map Act, it easily could have used alternative language to make that intention clear.” The ruling in the Sierra Club case also called out plaintiff’s counsel’s inability “to answer whether the court should also interpret into the statute a time limitation as to when the previous adjustment might have occurred.” In other words, opposing counsel did not answer the question of whether lot-line adjustments occurring 5, 10 or 100 years apart should be considered “successive?”

For more information or assistance with land use matters in Napa County contact Dickenson, Peatman & Fogarty at [email protected].

Sonoma County Proposes Revisions to the Rules for Williamson Act Contracts

02/04/11

The Sonoma County Permit and Resource Management Department has drafted new rules to be applied to properties in Williamson Act agricultural preserve contracts. The proposed 49 pages of rules will replace the existing seven pages of rules that were originally adopted in 1970. Much of the new document clarifies existing state law and county policies, but a few new recommendations are proposed. There will be an increase in the amount of farm income to qualify for agricultural preserve on prime land from $200 per acre to $800 per acre. Also, a minimum of 50 percent of the prime land or six acres, whichever is more, has to be continuously used for agricultural production. The minimum parcel size to qualify for an agricultural preserve on prime land is 10 acres while on non-prime land the minimum is 40 acres.

The rules also eliminate some existing land uses that have been considered compatible with contracted land such as forestry, raising of horses, residential uses and quasi-public uses, but new allowed uses are added such as raising ornamental trees, apiaries and irrigated pasture crops.

Wineries and other agriculture processing faculties will still be permitted but will be classified as “compatible uses” rather than as straight agricultural uses. As such, they will be limited to occupying no more than five percent of the parcel area or five acres, whichever is less.

The first public hearing on the proposed rules was held on January 20, 2011 in front of the Sonoma County Planning Commission. There will be at least one more Planning Commission hearing before the rules are considered by the Board of Supervisors because so many people showed up to comment on the new rules.

The controversy surrounding this revision is warranted as all Williamson Act contracts have a clause which allows for revisions and binds the landowner to comply no matter how the rules are amended in the future. Even more troublesome is the fact that the landowners who are under contract and facing greater restrictions on the uses permitted on their property may not reap the benefit or purpose of being under contract. The Williamson Act program itself is in peril. Governor Jerry Brown has targeted the funds typically provided to counties and cities across California to subsidize the tax breaks that these property owners receive as a place to reduce the deficit. If the program funding is eliminated on a state level, many counties will have to decide whether they can continue to forego the tax revenue without any chance of subsidy from the State.

For more information on land use issues in Sonoma County contact Dickenson, Peatman & Fogarty at [email protected]

Proposed California Budget Could Impact Williamson Act Subventions

01/13/11

This week, California Governor Jerry Brown unveiled his budget proposing to cut state spending by $12.5 billion dollars. Some of these cuts will directly impact land use and agriculture. Specifically, the Governor’s budget proposes the permanent suspension of Williamson Act subventions. The Williamson Act allows agricultural landowners to commit their properties to agricultural uses in exchange for discounted county property taxes. The state then reimburses counties for lost property tax revenues through annual subventions. At this time, it is not clear whether this budget will be adopted as proposed or how severely this budget action will impact those wine-growing counties that have embraced the Act.