Subdivision Question for the AG

[mpallamary]

Is anyone familiar with this request?

18-902

When a subdivider owns one parcel and subdivides that parcel pursuant to a parcel map, then sells off the resulting new subdivided parcels, and subsequently acquires a contiguous parcel and seeks to divide that parcel pursuant to a parcel map, should the local agency count the previously subdivided contiguous parcels as part of the application?

Sacramento County Counsel Robyn Truitt Drivon

Medeiros

09/13/2018

[Ian Wilson]

Yes. It is a question that comes up from time to time but has never been answered under Case Law or in a previous AG Opinion.

This should be interesting.

Make some popcorn and break out the root beer, will ya, Mike?

[mpallamary]

Amen brother!

[Jim Frame]

I would think that the agency would have to demonstrate (probably in court) that there was a conspiracy to execute sham transactions for the sole purpose of avoiding the final map process in order to deny the application(s). That's a pretty high bar, as the presumption would be that the applicant has clean hands.

[Ian Wilson]

Jim,

Of §66242 and §66426 [SMA], only one uses any time reference. §66424 mentions "...whether immediate or future..."

As I stated, there has never been a ruling as to separation of "contiguous units" by time. Separation by space has already been covered and found contiguous over "street-sized" gaps.

I suspect that the purpose of the request is to have some sort of formal writing as the separation by time factor.

[steffan]

The opinion below may be pertinent to the discussion:

OFFICE OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL OF CALIFORNIA Opinion No. CV 77‐163
61 Op. Atty Gen. Cal. 114
March 15, 1978

[Ian Wilson]

61 Op. Atty Gen. Cal. 114 is silent as to the time issue.

[steffan]

Perhaps. Perhaps not.
Parts of the opinion give me pause for consideration, such as this from the conclusion:
“Thus, we conclude that the successive division of contiguous parcels by the same subdivider must be considered together in determining the applicable standards to be applied under the Map Act. The fact that the contiguous parcels were created by a third party in compliance with the Map Act or other law applicable at that time or that a part of an earlier division had been transferred by sale or otherwise should not detract from the application of the Map Act standards to the division of land where the purpose of the Map Act is to secure the orderly development of land”