Extends environmental review exemption for university housing

The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) requires a lead agency, as defined, to prepare, or cause to be prepared, and certify the completion of an environmental impact report (EIR) on a project that it proposes to carry out or approve that may have a significant effect on the environment or to adopt a negative declaration if it finds that the project will not have that effect. CEQA also requires a lead agency to prepare a mitigated negative declaration for a project that may have a significant effect on the environment if revisions in the project would avoid or mitigate that effect and there is no substantial evidence that the project, as revised, would have a significant effect on the environment.

Existing law, until January 1, 2030, exempts from CEQA a university housing development project carried out by a public university on real property owned by the public university if the project meets certain requirements, including that each building within the project is certified as Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) Platinum or better by the United States Green Building Council. Existing law requires the lead agency, if the university housing development project is exempt from CEQA under the above provision, to file the LEED certificate for buildings within the project and a notice determining that the construction impacts of the project have been fully mitigated with the Office of Planning and Research and the county clerk of the county in which the project is located. Existing law requires a university housing development project carried out by the University of California, in order to be exempt from CEQA under this law, to be consistent with the most recent long-range development plan EIR certified on or after January 1, 2018, as provided.

This bill would extend the application of the university housing development project exemption until January 1, 2032. The bill would instead require a university housing development project carried out by the University of California, in order to be exempt from CEQA under the above-described exemption to be located on a campus site identified for housing in the most recent long-range development plan EIR or an EIR prepared for any subsequent amendment to that plan relating to housing, as specified. The bill would repeal the requirement to file the LEED certificate with the county clerk of the county in which the project is located.

Existing law requires a public university or a relevant public agency with authority to issue a certificate of occupancy for a building within an exempt university housing development project to not issue the certificate of occupancy for the building unless the lead agency receives certification of LEED Platinum or better from the United States Green Building Council for the building and the lead agency determines that the construction impacts of the project have been fully mitigated.

This bill would instead require a public university to obtain LEED Platinum certification for each building within a university housing development project no later than 18 months from the issuance of the building’s certificate of occupancy or an equivalent certification, or its initial usage, and would authorize a public university to obtain 2 extensions for this LEED certification compliance requirement in 6-month increments, as provided. The bill would prohibit a public university that has exempted an approved university housing development project pursuant to the above-described exemption from applying that exemption to a subsequent university housing development project until the public university has obtained LEED Platinum certification for each building within the prior exempted university housing development project, except as specified. The bill would also make other related changes.