California sets deadlines for Coastal Commission permit appeals

Sacramento, California; July 17, 2026: Gov. Gavin Newsom signed Senate Bill 963 into law yesterday, requiring the California Coastal Commission to decide coastal development permit appeals on a set timeline. The law replaces a process that let the Commission take years to issue a final ruling once it agreed to review an appealed permit.

“Property owners have waited years for the Coastal Commission to decide appeals it had full authority to resolve quickly,” said Rees Empey, state policy manager with Pacific Legal Foundation. “SB 963 doesn’t take away the Commission’s oversight — it requires the government to actually make a decision, instead of leaving people’s homes and livelihoods on hold indefinitely.”

SB 963 gives the Commission 30 days to request any additional information after finding a substantial issue, 30 more days to review it, and 180 days to hold a hearing and issue a final decision, putting a deadline on a process that previously had none.

Pacific Legal Foundation has for years fought the CCC practice of holding property rights hostage. PLF’s research on the Commission’s appeals process found it took an average of 330 days to deny an appealed permit and 511 days to approve one with conditions — and in one case, 1,525 days (more than four years) passed before a final decision. PLF represents a Dana Point couple who waited more than three years for a ruling in Seidensticker v. California Coastal Commission and recently won a unanimous California Supreme Court ruling reining in the Commission’s appeal power in Shear Development Co., LLC v. California Coastal Commission.