Questions to ask when reviewing a draft environmental impact report

Ray Williams, professor emeritus of biology at Rio Hondo College and veteran of many successful efforts to protect threatened areas of the Southern California, provided the Friends this list of helpful tips.

While a draft environmental impact report may seem intimidating at first--the Montebello Hills Specific Plan DEIR certainly intimidated me--they cover a broad spectrum of areas. And even the most technical areas can be scrutinized by non-specialists.

Good, basic questions are important in bringing to light the flaws, inconsistencies and short cuts in a DEIR. As in sports, its important not to neglect the fundamentals.

The list:

1. What are the project's significant unavoidable impacts?

2. Do the alternatives addressed in the draft EIR deal with those impacts?

3. What significance thresholds are used for each impact category?

4. Do the significant thresholds reflect adopted local policies and/or criteria established by a regulatory agency?

5. Does the draft EIR gauge potential impacts against existing physical conditions?

6. Does the draft EIR address all of the environmental topics relevant to proposed project?

7. Does the technical information provided in the draft EIR support the document’s findings?

8. Did the draft EIR include discussion of environmental issues raised during the scoping phase and in responses to the Notice of Preparation?

9. Does the draft EIR adequately define the resources that might be impacted?

10. Does the draft EIR provide a clear line of reasoning in its conclusions related to impacts, their level of significance or non-significance, and the level of mitigation that would be achieved by proposed mitigations measures?

11. Does the draft EIR’s statement of project objective allow for a reasonable range of alternatives?