La Cañada Flintridge First SoCal City to Fully Approve Builder’s Remedy Project

La Cañada Flintridge is the first city in Southern California to fully approve a housing development utilizing the state’s builder’s remedy provision without settlements or concessions, breaking the barrier for other projects aiming to take advantage of California’s game-changing housing law.

The La Cañada Flintridge City Council in mid-October approved Cedar Street Partners’ project at 600 Foothill Boulevard, formally dubbed 600 Foothill, after years of legal fights and appeals, Commercial Observer has learned. The project is planned to feature 80 residential units — 13 percent of which are earmarked as affordable housing — along with 16 short-stay units and about 7,300 square feet of office space. 

“I think if someone told you that it was going to take six years and X amount of money, you probably would pass,” Jonathan Curtis, Cedar Street’s managing partner, told CO. “But, when we started this and realized what was happening, we became more dedicated to this project as a cause to do something good for this city, something good for local businesses, create jobs, and provide housing. We want to make a project that really fits into the community and benefits the community, both in the housing angle as well as the economics.”

The project is the first in Southern California to receive full approval via its use of builder’s remedy, a formerly little-known provision that allows a developer to bypass local zoning restrictions if a project contains affordable housing units and if a given city is out of compliance with state housing law. Although builder’s remedy was codified in the 1990s, it wasn’t until the early 2020s that projects citing the provision burst onto the scene, most visibly via massive apartment towers in Beverly Hills and Santa Monica proposed by developer Leo Pustilnikov. 

Cedar Street had initially proposed 600 Foothill as a smaller development in 2019, though was denied by the affluent, mountainous city a few years later. Cedar Street re-filed a preliminary builder’s remedy application for the project in November 2022, while the city was still out of compliance with the state’s housing law. La Cañada Flintridge officially became compliant in late 2023, per state data. 

The City Council again rejected the project, prompting Cedar Street to file a lawsuit in July 2023. By March of this year, La Cañada Flintridge was court-ordered to post a $14 million appellate bond to continue the fight, or vote to allow the project to proceed. With a total fiscal year budget of about $43 million, the city ultimately chose to throw in the towel. 

For Curtis — who previously served on La Cañada Flintridge’s council, and even as its mayor for a short stint — it’s both a jubilant moment and disappointing that it took so much for the city to approve a relatively small project. 

“It’s sad that [La Cañada Flintridge leadership] at that time took that kind of attitude,” said Curtis, who is also an attorney specializing in land use. “It’s a discriminatory attitude. There’s a lot of good people in La Cañada, but there’s a small group that don’t want those types of people that would live in a multifamily complex in the same town.”

A spokesperson for the city did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

Although 600 Foothill does not yet have a construction timeline, Curtis said that the project could act as a model for other builder’s remedy projects seeking full approval without settlements or other concessions. That includes Pustilnikov’s 19-story project at 125-129 South Linden Drive in Beverly Hills, which a Superior Court judge recently ruled could proceed through the entitlement process. 

Nick Trombola can be reached at ntrombola@commercialobserver.com.