Malibu Should Make it Easier for Residents to Build More Housing on Their Property 

It shouldn’t take four years of headaches, legal briefs, and hard-fought battles just to get a permit to build a small addition on your property. But that’s exactly what happened to my family when we applied to build a modest home on our Malibu property for my mom, Renee.

Mom is a lifelong resident and a longtime leader in our community. She’s been a schoolteacher, a college professor, and a family law attorney. She’s always been my rock: supportive, steadfast, and loving.  But now, it’s time for us to help her.

Fortunately, the state legislature has adopted an official policy of encouraging the development of accessory dwelling units, or ADUs. An ADU is the perfect solution for us, since it would allow Mom to live in our care while still maintaining her safety, independence, and privacy.

Four years ago, we worked closely with our architect and with our homeowner’s association to plan an ADU that would suit our needs without being obtrusive to our neighbors. Given the state’s legal protections for ADU development, and the support of all of our neighbors, we expected smooth sailing.

But Malibu had other ideas. The City insisted that we needed to go through the complicated and cumbersome process of getting a Coastal Development Permit, or CDP, and that we couldn’t take advantage of the state’s pro-ADU laws.

And according to their interpretation of local regulations, there was no way to get our project approved. But our ADU shouldn’t have needed a CDP in the first place. It was bizarre, because the City conceded that our ADU would have no negative impact on coastal resources, yet they wanted to block it under policies designed to protect the coast.

We knew the City’s ruling was absurd. And when we reached out to lawyers from the Pacific Legal Foundation, a  public-interest law firm, we were encouraged to find out that they agreed with us and were willing to take our case free of charge.

With their help, we brought a lawsuit against Malibu in state court, arguing that the City had to abide by its own regulations and by state law to grant us a permit. We won at the trial level, getting a judgment from the court that confirmed our understanding of the law.

The City appealed, and we won again at the Court of Appeals, which upheld the trial court’s ruling. The City appealed once again, asking the Supreme Court of California to step in and review the case. But early last May, the Court declined. Our case is finally concluded, and our fight is finally over.

But as we see it, our case was about more than just us. This city, this state, and indeed, our entire nation is experiencing a severe crisis in the affordability of housing. The best solution is a simple one, and one that takes advantage of the collective ingenuity, tenacity, and know-how of all Americans: let people build more housing.

Over the last several decades, and largely out of good intentions, we’ve developed an unbearably burdensome regulatory atmosphere that makes it all too difficult to build the housing that we desperately need. California’s ADU laws are a great start, but as our case shows, local governments need to do their part to facilitate new housing – not obstruct it.

We’re thrilled that the courts agreed with us, and that we’ve finally got permission to build the ADU for Mom. But it shouldn’t take years of legal battles to affirm the right to a modest home that everyone agrees has no negative impact on the environment or on our neighbors. It’s time for Malibu, and for municipalities around the country to get on board: let people build.