Development Agreement

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When a tract of land is governed by both a vesting tentative map and a subsequent development agreement and the terms of the two documents conflict, the development agreement controls. North Murrieta Community v. City of Murrieta, No. E072663 (4th Dist., June 8, 2020).

North Murrieta Community, LLC, is the master developer of a large community in Riverside County called the “Golden City Project.” In 1999, the City of Murrieta approved a two-year Vesting Tentative Map for a subset of the overall project property. In 2001, four months before the Vesting Tentative Map was set to expire, North Murrieta and the City entered into a Development Agreement, which covered the entire project, including the tract subject to the 1999 Vesting Tentative Map.

The Development Agreement extended the Vesting Tentative Map for fifteen years, locking in regulations and fees for the same period, although now with an effective date of 2001. Importantly, in addition to the new effective date, the City expressly reserved rights in the Development Agreement to impose additional fees (or increase fees) in the future for city-wide impacts that were not fully mitigated at the time of project approval. The Vesting Tentative Map and Development agreement were both subsequently extended, with final expiration dates of 2019 and 2021, respectively.

In 2003, the City passed the Transportation Uniform Fee Program Ordinance (TUMF) to raise funds to improve the regional transportation system. Originally, the TUMF contained an exemption for projects subject to existing vesting tentative maps or development agreements, but the Murrieta City Council voted to remove the exemption in 2010. The City subsequently collected TUMF fees for development within the Golden City Project.
Continue Reading Development Agreement, Not Vesting Tentative Map, Governed Whether New Fees Applied to Project

An action for breach of a statutory development agreement should be reviewed as a breach-of-contract case, not as an administrative law proceeding in which the court gives deference to the City’s findings. Oakland Bulk & Oversized Terminal, LLC v. City of Oakland, No. 18-16105 (9th Cir., May 26, 2020).

The City of Oakland entered into a statutory development agreement with the plaintiff to redevelop a portion of the decommissioned Oakland Army Base as a commercial shipping terminal. While development agreements generally freeze existing regulations in place, this agreement provided that the city could adopt and apply new regulations if the City determined “based on substantial evidence and after a public hearing that a failure to do so would place existing or future occupants or users . . . neighbors, in a condition substantially dangerous to health or safety.”

Subsequently, in response to public opposition to shipping coal through the terminal, the City Council held public hearings, analyzed evidence presented by experts, and approved an ordinance prohibiting coal shipping. The City Council adopted factual findings in support of its determination that shipment of coal created a substantially dangerous health or safety condition.

The appeal turned on whether the case should be treated as a breach-of-contract action (in which the trial court makes factual findings based on the evidence presented at trial, which are accorded deference on appeal) or as an administrative law proceeding (in which the evidence is limited to the record before the agency and the agency’s factual findings upheld if supported by substantial evidence). The court concluded that administrative law principles should not apply in a breach-of-contract action because, among other things, deferring to the government agency’s findings would “effectively create an escape hatch for the government to walk away from contractual obligations” through “self-serving regulatory findings insulated by judicial deference . . . .”  The court therefore concluded that the trial court owed no deference to the City’s factual determinations and did not err in considering evidence not presented at the public hearings to “shed light on the adequacy of the evidence that was actually before the City Council.”…
Continue Reading Suit for Breach of Development Agreement Should Be Treated as a Breach-of-Contract Action, Not an Administrative Law Proceeding