By Jorge Casuso

April 25, 2025 -- A bill that would focus and streamline California's environmental process for major developments was approved by a key Senate committee this week.

SB 607 would "slash costs, delays and frivolous lawsuits" by amending the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) that requires governments to analyze and mitigate the environmental impacts of major developments, its sponsor said.

The bill sponsored by Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco) was approved by the Senate Environmental Quality Committee by a 6 to 0 vote.

"Environmental review under CEQA frequently takes years to complete, creating a major barrier to building," Wiener's office said.

"By speeding reviews for a wide range of projects, including infill housing, SB 607 helps to lower costs and restore trust in government efficiency."

Known as the Fast & Focused CEQA Act, SB 607 exempts "re-zonings that are consistent with an already approved housing element," Wiener's office said.

It also "focuses specifically on reducing delays on housing" by clarifying a key exemption for housing projects in urban areas.

SB 607 is among a number of bills sponsored by Wiener to make it easier and faster to build housing, although it has more far-reaching implications.

“For California to succeed as a state, we need to build more of the things that make people’s lives better and more affordable," Weiner said in a statement Thursday.

Such developments include housing, child care centers, transportation and clean energy, Wiener said.

"Without relaxing any of the standards of environmental review, SB 607 focuses on speeding approvals for environmentally friendly and environmentally neutral projects," Wiener's office said.

It does so "while maintaining existing processes for potentially environmentally destructive projects like fossil fuel facilities."

“SB 607 allows communities to challenge significant environmental threats while dramatically reducing the delays, legal uncertainties, and costs that CEQA currently imposes on even the most worthy projects," Wiener said.

CEQA's "extremely broad scope and standards of relevancy" open it up "to appeals and lawsuits that can increase project costs and time," Wiener's office said.

"The breadth and vagueness of CEQA means that the law has in practice allowed basically anyone who can hire a lawyer to use CEQA to obstruct projects they do not like for reasons that have nothing to do with the environment."

Critics of the bill worry it will weaken California's 55-year-old environmental law.

SB 607 "is designed to narrow the scope of CEQA review and to make it easier for new development -- from freeways to sprawling housing complexes in wildfire-prone areas -- to be built without in-depth environmental reviews," said a recent editorial in the Times of San Diego.

"CEQA protects every Californian," the editorial said. "We must stop the relentless attempts of special interest groups and pro-developer lobbyists to chip away at its provisions and our public rights."

The bill now heads to the Senate Local Government Committee.