Excuses abound when people want to stop a homeless shelter or other social services for low-income individuals. Popular arguments include buzzwords like “traffic and safety” and “neighborhood suitability.” But food bank opponents are trying something new in Alameda, California.
Their line of attack? They say the proposed location for humanitarian relief is a “historic parking lot” that must be preserved. They say this with straight faces. They even use the language in court filings.
The property in dispute looks nothing special. Google Maps shows a dilapidated slab of asphalt surrounded by old buildings on a decommissioned Naval base that operated from 1940 to 1997 about 7 miles from Oakland Coliseum near San Francisco Bay. Cars still park in some of the spots, and public planners hope to increase traffic through waterfront projects.
Alameda Food Bank, the targeted organization, already operates in the neighborhood. It provides meals across the street from the disputed site. But existing facilities are cramped, and the organization needs room to grow. This must not happen, critics say.
Normally, when charities hit regulatory roadblocks, the opposition comes from zoning officials. City Hall agents have flexed their authority in recent years to hinder a homeless shelter outside Kansas City, another homeless shelter in North Wilkesboro, North Carolina, and an affordable housing project in Calhoun, Georgia.
Officials got especially nasty in Bullhead City, Arizona, when retired grandmother Norma Thornton started serving hot meals to homeless neighbors at a public park. The police showed up and arrested her. Our public interest law firm, the Institute for Justice, represents her in a lawsuit against the city.
The situation in Alameda is different. The food bank has the city’s support. But a clumsy law known as the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) allows private parties to intervene with lawsuits to prevent people from using their land in otherwise lawful ways.
In other words, property owners who survive the permitting obstacle course can still face a citizen lawsuit saying the government should have stopped them. This is what happened in Alameda. Two individuals stepped forward and sued the city to stop the food bank.
It’s a double buzzsaw.
Even when neighbors make nonsensical arguments like the existence of a historically significant parking lot, judges must act like it’s a real thing because courts have developed legal standards in the past 100 years that favor almost any property rights infringement—no matter how outlandish.
The absurdity started in California and spread east.
Los Angeles passed the earliest U.S. zoning laws in 1904, and Berkeley added single-family zoning in 1916. The goal was to keep Asian Americansout of white neighborhoods. Similar policies followed.
Bruce’s Beach, a resort near Los Angeles, opened in the early 1900s as a retreat where Black beachgoers could buy meals, rent bathing suits, and swim. Other Black families purchased property nearby, and the community flourished.
Local officials responded by taking the land through eminent domain. Their excuse was the need for a public park. Despite the obvious dishonesty, courts allowed the injustice to stand.
California has come a long way since then. In the past 10 years, state lawmakers have passed more than 100 reforms to streamline planning, zoning, permitting, and building. Yet property rights violations persist.
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Overzealous zoning police in Santa Clara County, for example, have been harassing winery owners Michael and Kellie Ballard since 2017. Their crime is kindness. When a longtime employee lost his lease, they allowed him and his family to live rent free in a trailer at the back of their 60-acre parcel.
The trailer is not visible from the highway or neighboring properties, yet the zoning police ordered the Ballards to evict their tenants. When the Ballards refused, the county imposed daily fines that swelled to $120,000. The Ballards fought back with a lawsuit on Sept. 12, 2024, with representation from our firm.
The outcome of the winery case will not affect CEQA. To fix this problem, state lawmakers must step up one more time. Until then, California will be stuck with historic parking lots and anything else citizens can invent.
Historic potholes, streetlamps, and bus shelters could be next.
Ari Bargil is a senior attorney and leader of the Zoning Justice Project at the Institute for Justice in Arlington, Virginia. Daryl James is an Institute for Justice writer.