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The fate of a 1,200-unit housing development in the Montebello hills could come down to whether the city, which is 74 percent Latino, sent out notices of its June 2015 City Council hearings in Spanish.
Shortly after, the City Council approved the project on a 4-1 vote, but Citizens for Public and Open Participation, a group of open-government advocates, sued the city, challenging the environmental impact report on the development.
The group lost in Norwalk Superior Court and now is appealing a Norwalk Superior Court judge’s May 2016 ruling rejecting the lawsuit.
On Tuesday, the two sides squared off in appellate court. During the oral arguments before a three-member panel, justices wanted to know if the notices were sent in both English and Spanish. If they weren’t, it’s “troubling,” Justice Jeffery Johnson said.
“It’s problematic. It’s not something I would gloss over,” he said.
Michelle Oulette, attorney for the city, disagreed, saying notices were mailed in Spanish, although she conceded none of the environmental documents is translated into Spanish.
“We’re not required by (state environmental law) to do it in Spanish,” Oulette said.
It’s a moot point, argued Boyd Hill, attorney for the development company, Cook Hill Properties because the language gap wasn’t part of the original lawsuit or challenged during the City Council hearings.
Anthony Kim, attorney for the open-government group, said these issues were raised but never considered by Norwalk Superior Court Judge John Torribio, who also declined to consider other claims, such as whether the environmental report violated requirements concerning earthquake mapping and public participation.
In rebuttal, Hill said Torribio rejected the claims because they were made after the original lawsuit had been filed and thus couldn’t be considered.
“They were making an end-run around the 90-day statute of limitations,” he said.
Newport Beach-based Cook Hill Properties’s development calls for building homes on 174 of 488 acres of oil land now owned by Engelwood, Colorado-based Sentinel Peak Resources, which in October 2016 purchased the land from Freeport-McMoRan Oil and Gas.
Once the project will built out, expected by 2022, 4,000 people are expected to live in the development. The remainder of the land will be devoted to open space and habitat protection.
hidden mirror door hinges The oil company will continue to drill for oil but plans to place the oil drilling underground.