Streamlined Review Process Puts Burbank in Spotlight : Development: Supporters say the new law will help revive the local economy. Others see legal challenges ahead.

Critics call a radical change in development procedures approved by the Burbank City Council last week a curse on citizen control rather than a cure to the city’s economic woes.

Supporters call the new development review ordinance Burbank’s best possible response to a recession that has stripped city coffers and slowed new construction to a crawl. They said Burbank’s prescription is an example that the entire state may want to follow in order stop the exodus of business.

Whichever side is right, it is clear the new ordinance is an experiment in streamlining that will be closely watched by developers, environmentalists and land-use experts throughout the state.

The new ordinance, approved last Tuesday, cuts the approval process from an average of more than three months to about a month by allowing most projects that comply with city codes to bypass environmental reviews and citizen appeals.

It exempts small and medium-size projects that are consistent with the zoning codes from discretionary review by the council and the city’s Planning Board. Under a discretionary review, public officials can reject or approve a project based on factors that have nothing to do with zoning laws. For example, in some cities projects have been rejected because elected officials found the building designs ugly.

It also eliminates environmental review and appeals procedures for residential projects with fewer than 500 units and commercial buildings with fewer than 1,000 employees, provided the projects comply with city zoning codes. The new ordinance would not affect projects that require zoning changes.

The new process permits appeals only if residents contend that a project violates the city’s zoning code, city planners said. Developers have said that many appeals are frivolous and that environmental reviews are unnecessary.

“I don’t think I’ve seen anything as broad-ranging as what Burbank is doing,” said William Fulton, Ventura-based publisher of a newsletter on land-use issues. “This could be the start of big changes in development review on the local level. Two years ago, I would have said this is extremely unusual, but the economic situation is forcing a lot of cities to rethink their economic priorities.”

UC Berkeley professor John Landis said Burbank’s new ordinance may be a turning point in the development trends in the state.

“It’s a great idea. . . . It’s very counter to the trends of the ‘70s and ‘80s, when there was an expansion of the discretionary review process. This was a time when California grew more than many people wanted it to and people took development for granted,” said Landis, a professor in UC Berkeley’s city and regional planning department, who specializes in California land-use. “Things have really changed because of this recession.”

While the increase in discretionary review scrutiny discouraged shoddy developments by “forcing developers to run the gantlet,” Landis said, it also increased building and planning costs. Overall, frequent discretionary reviews make for poor public policy, he said, because municipalities undermine their own zoning laws because of a project’s unpopularity.

“We’ve been moving more and more in California so that zoning doesn’t mean that much,” Landis said. “Zoning is the land-use contract a city has with its current and future residents. We shouldn’t undermine it on a piecemeal basis.”

Councilman Thomas E. Flavin, a strong backer of the ordinance, agreed. If every project is subject to discretionary review, he asked, then why have any zoning requirements at all?

The council’s action was born of need. It follows a dramatic drop in the number of new residential and commercial projects in the past two years. Before 1990, an average of 1,000 dwelling units a year were being built. But in the past two years, that has fallen to 31 units per year, according to Burbank City Planner Rick Pruetz. Commercial development has also dropped dramatically. Since 1990, the city has also lost about 12,000 jobs, including many in the aerospace industry.

Right now, the problems in Burbank are so bad that the streamlined development process may have little effect on a dismal real estate market, especially for new office development. Most California municipalities are seeking office and commercial development because businesses pay taxes into city coffers but do not need as much in new municipal services as residential developments.

Supporters such as Flavin tout the new ordinance as a long-term growth strategy they hope will be mimicked throughout the state.

“We can’t take economic growth for granted anymore in California,” Flavin said. “I hope they notice this in Sacramento. We’ve taken the economic health of California for granted for many, many years.”

Some people in Sacramento already agree with Flavin.

A state commission, appointed by Gov. Pete Wilson and chaired by Peter V. Ueberroth, identified cumbersome local zoning policies as one of the state’s biggest impediments to economic growth.

The commission’s report, issued last year, recommended streamlining those policies. But the recommendations have so far not translated into legislation on the state level. Landis and Fulton said local changes may stimulate action on the state level.

The soft market for office space has been exacerbated by the recent pullout of several developers who ran into financing trouble or could not find tenants for their already approved projects. For example, the Homart Office Development Co. pulled out of plans to build a million-square-foot office complex and 300-room hotel in downtown Burbank.

“Whatever Burbank does right now is not going to bring projects in right now or at least not get them built,” said Bill Kelly, who headed Burbank’s Community Development Department until March and who is now a private consultant. “But when the economy comes back, there will be a lot of pent-up demand for commercial and residential growth, and Burbank will be ready with open arms.”

Since the passage of Proposition 13 in 1978, California municipalities have “become hooked on growth,” Landis said, because the newly developed homes and offices pay much higher property taxes than longtime owners of real estate.

Several experts said they expect the ordinance to face legal challenges. Although the Burbank city attorney’s office has assured the council it would stand up in court, that may not deter litigious opponents of a project.

“If they say a 300-unit project has no significant impact, I imagine someone is going to take them to court, especially using traffic as an issue,” Landis said.

There could also be a political backlash in several years. Currently, the mood among Burbank voters is pro-growth. They have supported pro-development candidates and rejected two slow-growth ballot initiatives in last year’s elections. But that could change once the economy rebounds, especially if development then takes off too fast for many people.

“Cities swing from black to white and to black again,” Kelly said. “When I was leaving Burbank, I found there was so much agony over the recession and Lockheed leaving that there was a swing back toward easier developments. But if they do too much too fast, there will be a reaction the other way.”