The Madrona project in Brea won in court by Shute, Mihaly and Weinberger because the City of Brea didn’t follow its own laws. We’ve found a very similar situation with the City of Yorba Linda.
The Leadership Team hired Shute, Mihaly and Weinberger to submit a letter outlining three things:
- How the pre-annexation agreement is inconsistent with the City Planning Documents,
- How the Municipal Park Abandonment Law of 1939 bars the Pre-Annexation Agreement as presented, and
- That the road proposal must be approved by the electorate through a Measure B vote.
The City Council was being asked to find the Esperanza Hills Parkway consistent with the Planned Development of Tract 9813 (the Dominguez Hills project). The only way to determine whether the proposed road is consistent with the zoning in this particular tract is to compare it to the applicable development plan pursuant to the Municipal Code Section 18.16.110A. There is no way to make a finding without a copy of the Development Plan. It wasn’t included in the staff report and therefore, the Council is being asked to make a decision with only a portion of the information and not only that, but they were asked to make a finding of consistency with the missing information.