Buffy Wicks

(1) Existing law grants the legislative body of a city certain powers with respect to city streets and highways, including the power to construct and maintain those streets and highways. Existing law grants the board of supervisors of a county general supervision, management, and control of county highways and authorizes the board of supervisors to lay out, construct, improve, and maintain county highways.

This bill would prohibit a city or county from holding a community input meeting to reconsider, delay, or prevent implementation of a proposed pedestrian or bicycle safety project if that project is included in an approved plan that will be implemented as part of the circulation element of the city or county's general plan, as specified. At a public meeting where a contract is awarded for, or when county or city staff, as applicable, are directed to begin, the construction of a pedestrian or bicycle safety project, or anytime thereafter, the bill would prohibit the city or county from terminating the project unless the city or county makes at least one specified finding at a public meeting. If a city or county establishes a process for residents of the city or county to submit a petition to request the installation of a traffic-calming measure, the bill would prohibit the city or county from requiring the petition to contain the signatures of more than a majority of the total number of persons whose residences are located, in whole or in part, within 1,000 feet of the proposed traffic-calming measure, as specified. To the extent that the bill increases the duties of local officials, the bill would impose a state-mandated local program.

(2) Existing law, the Pedestrian Mall Law of 1960, authorizes the legislative body of a city or county to establish a pedestrian mall, as defined, and prohibit vehicular traffic on the mall, upon adoption of an ordinance establishing the mall. Before adopting the ordinance, existing law requires the legislative body to provide notice and a hearing relating to its intention to establish the mall and, in its resolution of intention, authorizes the legislative body to propose to pay damages, if any, allowed or awarded to any property owner by reason of the establishment of the pedestrian mall from the proceeds of assessments levied upon lands benefited by the establishment of the pedestrian mall. Existing law authorizes any interested person to file a written objection to the establishment of the mall and authorizes a person owning real property that might suffer legal damage by reason of establishment of the mall to file a written claim of damages. At the hearing, existing law requires the legislative body to hear and consider all claims for damages, and all objections and protests to the establishment of the pedestrian mall, and to terminate the proceedings if the owners of lands abutting on the proposed pedestrian mall representing a majority of the frontage on the proposed pedestrian mall make a written objection to the establishment of the mall. Existing law establishes a process to determine disputed claims for damages. Existing law authorizes, under certain circumstances, the legislative body to levy and collect a special ad valorem assessment for the maintenance, operation, repair, or improvement of the pedestrian mall, as specified.

This bill would enact the Pedestrian Mall Law of 2026 to establish an alternative process for authorizing the legislative body of a city or county, following a public hearing held in accordance with specified procedures, to adopt a resolution or ordinance to establish a pedestrian mall, as defined, and prohibit vehicular traffic on the mall, as specified. The bill would authorize the legislative body to make improvements to a pedestrian mall, to allow private businesses use of the pedestrian mall, and to allow those private businesses to make improvements to the pedestrian mall. The bill would prohibit improvements under the Pedestrian Mall Law of 2026 from including vehicular parking facilities. The bill would declare that establishment of a pedestrian mall is consistent with the public access requirements of the California Coastal Act of 1976.

This bill would authorize the legislative body of a city or county to establish a pedestrian mall on a state highway, or portion of a state highway, that functions as a main street, subject to approval by the Department of Transportation and compliance with the other requirements of the Pedestrian Mall Law of 2026.

(3) The California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) requires a lead agency, as defined, to prepare, or cause to be prepared, and certify the completion of, an environmental impact report on a project that it proposes to carry out or approve that may have a significant effect on the environment or to adopt a negative declaration if it finds that the project will not have that effect. CEQA also requires a lead agency to prepare a mitigated negative declaration for a project that may have a significant effect on the environment if revisions in the project would avoid or mitigate that effect and there is no substantial evidence that the project, as revised, would have a significant effect on the environment.

CEQA, until January 1, 2040, exempts from its requirements certain transportation-related projects, including, among others, pedestrian and bicycle facilities, as specified. CEQA requires, except as provided, those exempted projects to be carried out by a local agency and meet certain requirements, including certain labor requirements.

This bill would exempt from the requirements of CEQA the establishment or expansion of a pedestrian mall and would require those projects to comply with the above-described requirements applicable to those exempted CEQA projects.

(4) The bill would include findings that changes proposed by this bill address a matter of statewide concern rather than a municipal affair and, therefore, apply to all cities, including charter cities.

(5) The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement.

This bill would provide that, if the Commission on State Mandates determines that the bill contains costs mandated by the state, reimbursement for those costs shall be made pursuant to the statutory provisions noted above.