5 - PUBLIC COMMENT_DAVIS (SAFER)

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SAFER Comments on Addendum to One Broadway Plaza EIR March 30, 2020 Page 2 of 11 to residential use. Addendum, p. 1. Specifically, the Project would incorporate residential uses within up to 19 floors that were previously designated for office uses under the 2004 Project. The Project would provide up to 402 apartment units for a total of approximately 254,472 square feet of residential space. Id. The residential units would include penthouse suites, standard and executive residential units, and affordable units. Id. The non-residential component of the Project would include office, restaurants, commercial uses, a wellness fitness center with spa, and a parking structure. LEGAL STANDARD CEQA contains a strong presumption in favor of requiring a lead agency to prepare an EIR. This presumption is reflected in the fair argument standard. Under that standard, a lead agency must prepare an EIR whenever substantial evidence in the whole record before the agency supports a fair argument that a project may have a significant effect on the environment. Pub. Res. Code § 21082.2; Laurel Heights Improvement Ass’n v. Regents of the University of California (1993) (“Laurel Heights II”) 6 Cal. 4th 1112, 1123; No Oil, Inc. v. City of Los Angeles (1974) 13 Cal.3d 68, 75, 82; Quail Botanical Gardens v. City of Encinitas (1994) 29 Cal.App.4th 1597, 1602. The City relies on CEQA Guidelines § 15162 and 15164 to claim that no CEQA review is required. The court of appeal recently stated, “The addendum is the other side of the coin from the supplement to an EIR. This section provides an interpretation with a label and an explanation of the kind of document that does not need additional public review.” “It must be remembered that an addendum is prepared where ‘(2) Only minor technical changes or additions are necessary to make the EIR under consideration adequate under CEQA; and (3) The changes to the EIR made by the addendum do not raise important new issues about the significant effects on the environment.’ ([Guideline] 15164, subd. (a).)” Save Our Heritage Org. v. City of San Diego, 28 Cal. App. 5th 656, 664–65 (2018) (emphasis added). Section 15164(a) of the State CEQA Guidelines states that “the lead agency or a responsible agency shall prepare an addendum to a previously certified EIR if some changes or additions are necessary, but none of the conditions described in Section 15162 calling for preparation of a subsequent EIR have occurred.” Pursuant to Section 15162(a) of the State CEQA Guidelines, a subsequent EIR or Negative Declaration is only required when: (1) Substantial changes are proposed in the project which will require major revisions of the previous EIR or negative declaration due to the involvement of new significant environmental effects or a substantial increase in the severity of previously identified significant effects; (2) Substantial changes occur with respect to the circumstances under which the project is undertaken which will require major revisions of the previous EIR or Negative Declaration due to the involvement of new significant environmental effects or a substantial increase in the severity of previously identified significant effects; or (3) New information of substantial importance, which was not known and could not have been known with the exercise of reasonable diligence at the time the previous EIR was