Lauri Gavel                                 
Director of Communications 
UCLA School of Law 
(310) 206-2611 
gavel@law.ucla.edu

LOS ANGELES, Jan. 22, 2009 - UCLA School of Law, in conjunction with the UCLA Ziman Center for Real Estate, will convene a high-level panel of environmental, real estate, planning and legal experts to examine crucial implementation questions surrounding SB 375, California's new anti-sprawl law, which has been called the most important and far-reaching land use legislation since the Coastal Act. The event will be held on Tuesday, January 27 from 10:30 a.m. - 12:15 p.m. in room 1347 at UCLA School of Law.  In a sign of the intense interest SB 375 has generated and the ongoing questions that remain about how it will work in practice, the event has attracted record numbers of registrants.

Recently enacted, the bill alters decades of practice in land use planning, transportation funding and CEQA law, and could transform development and the built environment in California. Key questions remain about how SB 375 will work in practice.  Panelists will address what the new requirements mean for local governments, developers, community groups, housing advocates, environmentalists and commuters, and will include:

• Bill sponsor Tom Adams, Chair of the California League of Conservation Voters
• Hasan Ikhrata, Executive Director, Southern California Association of Governments
• Kevin Ratner, President, Forest City Residential West
• Mike Woo of the Los Angeles Planning Commission.

Cara Horowitz, the Andrew Sabin Family Foundation Executive Director of the Emmett Center on Climate Change and the Environment, will give an overview of the new law, and UCLA Law Professor Jonathan Zasloff, Associate Director of the UCLA Ziman Center for Real Estate, will moderate the discussion.

This conference is sponsored by the Emmett Center on Climate Change and the Environment, the Evan Frankel Environmental Law and Policy Program and the Richard S. Ziman Center for Real Estate at UCLA.  The event will also be simultaneously webcast online at mms://msmedia.law.ucla.edu/event11.  For more information, please visit the Emmett Center Web site.

About UCLA School of Law
Founded in 1949, UCLA School of Law is the youngest major law school in the nation and has established a tradition of innovation in its approach to teaching, research and scholarship.  With approximately 100 faculty and 970 students, the school pioneered clinical teaching, is a leader in interdisciplinary research and training and is at the forefront of efforts to link research to its effects on society and the legal profession.