SMW Assists Five Cities in Successful Opposition to Dangerous Freeway Extension
Photo credit: Ken Lund, Flickr In 2015 the firm represents South Pasadena and four other cities in opposing a plan by Caltrans and the L.A. Metropolitan Transportation Authority to extend the SR-710 freeway under the City of Pasadena. Thanks in large part to the firm’s critique of the environmental impact report for the project, the […]
Victory for Environmental Justice in Southern California
The firm successfully defends the South Coast Air Quality Management District’s regulation of airborne arsenic and other toxic air pollutants against a challenge by a lead acid battery recycling facility in a predominantly low-income, Latino neighborhood in Vernon, California. Following the firm’s victory in Los Angeles Superior Court, the facility shuts down in 2015. (Exide […]
SMW Drafts and Defends Anti-Fracking Initiatives
In 2014 the firm drafts initiatives in Santa Barbara and San Benito Counties that ban the use of land for fracking. The San Benito measure passes, and subsequent litigation challenging the measure fails. In 2016, Monterey County voters pass an anti-fracking measure drafted by the firm. The firm is defending the Monterey measure from multiple […]
California Supreme Court Upholds Significant Regulation of Emissions from Paints
The California Supreme Court upholds the South Coast Air Quality Management District’s authority to adopt “technology-forcing” rules in a challenge to the District’s regulation of paints, the second largest source of smog-forming emissions after motor vehicles. Dan Selmi and firm partner Matt Zinn receive the California Lawyer Attorney of the Year (CLAY) Award for this […]
Stockton General Plan Litigation Leads to Adoption of Landmark Climate Action Plan
Photo credit: Eric Sonstroem, Flickr, CC BY 2.0 As a result of litigation filed by the firm challenging the City of Stockton’s General Plan update, and pressure from the state Attorney General’s office, the City agrees to prepare a Climate Action Plan, one of the earliest such plans in California. (Sierra Club v. City of Stockton […]
Ninth Circuit Rules that EPA’s Waiver Decision Violates the Clean Air Act
Representing intervenor South Coast Air Quality Management District, the firm joins California Air Resources Board’s challenge to the Environmental Protection Agency’s denial of California’s request for a waiver. The Ninth Circuit holds that EPA’s action violated the Clean Air Act. (Gray Davis v. U.S. EPA, 348 F.3d 772 (9th Cir. 2003).)