3 - The Bowery_PUBLIC COMMENT_RAMSEY

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City of Santa Ana – The Bowery May 11, 2020 Page 5 of 28 project proponent in support of its position.’ A ‘clearly inadequate or unsupported study is entitled to no judicial deference.’” (Berkeley Jets, supra, 91 Cal. App. 4th 1344, 1355 [emphasis added, quoting Laurel Heights, 47 Cal. 3d at 391, 409 fn. 12]. Drawing this line and determining whether the EIR complies with CEQA’s information disclosure requirements presents a question of law subject to independent review by the courts. (Sierra Club v. Cnty. of Fresno (2018) 6 Cal. 5th 502, 515; Madera Oversight Coalition, Inc. v. County of Madera (2011) 199 Cal. App. 4th 48, 102, 131.) As the court stated in Berkeley Jets, supra, 91 Cal. App. 4th at 1355: A prejudicial abuse of discretion occurs “if the failure to include relevant information precludes informed decision-making and informed public participation, thereby thwarting the statutory goals of the EIR process. The preparation and circulation of an EIR is more than a set of technical hurdles for agencies and developers to overcome. The EIR’s function is to ensure that government officials who decide to build or approve a project do so with a full understanding of the environmental consequences and, equally important, that the public is assured those consequences have been considered. For the EIR to serve these goals it must present information so that the foreseeable impacts of pursuing the project can be understood and weighed, and the public must be given an adequate opportunity to comment on that presentation before the decision to go forward is made. (Communities for a Better Environment v. Richmond (2010) 184 Cal. App. 4th 70, 80 [quoting Vineyard Area Citizens for Responsible Growth, Inc. v. City of Rancho Cordova (2007) 40 Cal. 4th 412, 449–450].) B. The EIR Fails to Maintain a Stable and Consistent Project Description “[A]n accurate, stable and finite project description is the sine qua non of an informative and legally sufficient” environmental document. (County of Inyo v. City of Los Angeles (1977) 71 Cal. App. 3d 185, 200.) “A curtailed or distorted project description may stultify the objectives of the reporting process” as an accurate, stable and finite project description is necessary to allow “affected outsiders and public decision-makers balance the proposal's benefit against its environmental cost, consider mitigation measures, assess the advantage of terminating the proposal (i.e., the "no project" alternative) and weigh other alternatives in the balance. (Id. at 192 – 93.) Courts determine de novo whether an agency proceeded “in a manner required by law” in maintaining a stable and consistent project description. (Id. at 200.)