California City Municipal Code Art. 4 Use of Environmental Documents

The City shall not approve or carry out a project as proposed unless significant effects are reduced to an acceptable level. The Reviewing body shall make one or more written findings for each significant effect, accompanied by a statement of the facts supporting each finding.

( Ord. No. 14-725, § 1, 10-21-2014 )

(a) The possible findings are:

(1) Changes or alterations have been required in, or incorporated into, the project to mitigate or avoid the significant environmental effects identified in the final EIR.

(2) Such changes or alterations are within the responsibility and exclusive jurisdiction of another public agency and not the City. Such changes have been adopted by such other agency or can and should be adopted by such other agency.

(3) Specific economic, social, or other considerations make infeasible the mitigation measures or project alternatives identified in the final EIR.

(b) "Acceptable level" means significant effects feasibly avoided have been eliminated or substantially lessened as described in the findings and remaining, unavoidable significant effects are acceptable due to overriding considerations.

( Ord. No. 14-725, § 1, 10-21-2014 )

Where the decision allows the occurrence of significant unmitigated effects the City must state in writing the overriding reasons to act based on the final EIR or other information in the record. If the City makes a statement of overriding considerations, the statement shall be included in the record of the project approval and should be mentioned in the notice of determination.

( Ord. No. 14-725, § 1, 10-21-2014 )

Project approval shall be conditioned upon implementation of the mitigation measures. Mitigation measures and a program to monitor the mitigation measures shall be described in the findings.

( Ord. No. 14-725, § 1, 10-21-2014 )

(a) Where an EIR has been prepared, the EIR may be incorporated in the EIR by using a tiered EIR. The tiered EIR need not examine effects mitigated or avoided or examined in sufficient detail in the prior EIR to enable mitigation or avoidance by the site specific revisions or conditions in connection with the approval of the later project.

(b) An initial study shall be prepared to determine whether the later project may cause significant effects not examined in the prior EIR.

( Ord. No. 14-725, § 1, 10-21-2014 )

A revised EIR shall be prepared if the project is revised to produce new significant adverse environmental impacts or new significant adverse environmental impacts are discovered.

( Ord. No. 14-725, § 1, 10-21-2014 )