Lake Tahoe Planners Win Limits on ‘Monster Houses’

A federal judge this week upheld regulations designed to stem the construction of ostentatious new homes on the shores of Lake Tahoe, adding to a string of legal victories that regional planners have won in recent years.

A U.S. District Court judge in Reno dismissed a lawsuit Monday by a group of property owners who claimed that a 2-year-old scenic review ordinance violated their constitutional rights.

The rules, adopted by the Tahoe Regional Planning Agency, created design standards and a rating system that amounted to a virtual ban on building more “monster houses” that officials argued were detracting from the lake’s stunning scenery.

“What you had here was a demonstrated degradation in scenic quality over time,” said John L. Marshall, the agency’s general counsel.

“In some sense the aesthetic has changed,” he added. “Originally homes were set back in trees and single stories. The trend is to knock them down and rebuild them, trying to maximize the square footage, make them as close to the lake as possible and wide and high as possible.”

To counter that, the scenic ordinance set up a point system that rewarded natural-looking designs that blend with the surroundings and penalized those featuring lots of glass, bright colors or unbroken lines that would make new or extensively remodeled homes stand out on the shore. If a house doesn’t score enough points, it can’t be built.

The 70-page opinion by Judge Edward Reed rejected arguments that the restrictions amounted to a property taking, violated free expression rights and should not have been adopted without completion of an environmental analysis.

“The court really affirmed that [the Tahoe planning agency] not only has the authority, but the obligation, to protect scenic quality,” Marshall said.

The ruling nonetheless allows the plaintiffs, the Committee for Reasonable Regulation at Lake Tahoe, to file an amended suit.

“We were disappointed in the decision itself. But we’re very pleased we’re still alive on two of our main issues,” said the committee’s attorney, Ronald Zumbrun. “The fact that the judge has given us the ability to amend our pleadings is very significant to us; we feel we have the ball and if we make the case, we will prevail.”

The lawsuit was among a number filed by disgruntled landowners against the bistate agency, which oversees development in the basin. Some of the suits are still pending, and the agency paid a $600,000 settlement to an elderly widow who was barred from building on a lot she had acquired with her husband in the 1970s. But planners have successfully fought off several other challenges filed in federal court.

A late 1990s ban on water scooters with two-stroke engines was upheld. The U.S. Supreme Court in 2002 rejected claims that property owners affected by a 1980s building moratorium deserved compensation. And a federal appeals court upheld growth-control regulations in another suit.

The challenges have been followed closely by both property rights advocates and regulators. This week’s ruling, Marshall said, “is a very positive decision for not just [the Tahoe agency] but other planning agencies in California, Nevada and the country.”