San Jose Mercury News: For 30 years, as California’s growing population led to sprawling suburbs, traffic jams and fewer farms, attempts to craft statewide laws to stop it have failed again and again. City councils worried about losing local control. Property rights advocates bristled. And the ranch house with a back yard - the centerpiece of Sunset magazine and the Brady Bunch lifestyle - proved a powerful symbol. But now, in what many observers are calling the most significant environmental bill of …