The California Council of The American Society of Landscape Architects (CCASLA) is made up of two members from the four different ASLA chapters found throughout California. This means there are eight total members, with two coming from the Sierra chapter, two from the Northern chapter, two from the San Diego chapter, and two from the Southern chapter. Their purpose as a council is to work with the ASLA lobbying partners to advocate for policies as the legislative level that promote natural solutions while also increasing the ability for landscape architects to practice.

 
The Sierra ASLA chapter members that are part of the CCASLA, Andrew Wickham, ASLA, and Dalton LaVoie, ASLA, have been working to raise concerns about bill AB 1573. In particular, the CCASLA members are concerned about the provision that states, "(5) Require that, beginning January 1, 2035, all new and renovated nonresidential areas install in the plant area not less than 75 percent local native plants, excluding edibles and areas using recycled water." The CCASLA members have stated that instead of the bill updating the Model Water Efficient Landscape Ordinance (MWELO) through legislation, the bill should require MWELO to be updated with the established process. This would entail putting together a panel of interested parties such as landscape architects, nursery professionals, native plant scientists, and irrigation professionals to help shape the regulations.

LASN reached out to Andrew regarding the bill and asked him what the CCASLA's thoughts were surrounding the new legislation.

Other associations agree that the bill is overstepping. The Association of California Water Agencies (ACWA) stated, "requiring native plants comes with a host of complications. For example, it may be very difficult to find a sufficient selection of appropriate native plants in nearby nurseries. Further, in many regions across the state native plants are sold only at boutique nurseries and the plants are significantly more expensive than larger commercial purveyors, making their use cost prohibitive." Therefore, the ACWA contends that the bill will make landscape design more expensive as well as more difficult to complete with local nurseries.

https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB1573