Justia California Court of Appeals Opinion Summaries

A tax-sharing agreement between the County of San Benito and the City of Hollister requires the city to pay the county a fixed fee (Additional Amount) per residential unit constructed on land annexed into the city from the county during the period covered by that agreement. Plaintiff’s predecessor entered into an annexation agreement with the city, agreeing to comply with “all applicable provisions” of that tax sharing agreement. When the plaintiff purchased the annexed land and sought to develop it into subdivisions, the city informed the plaintiff that it was liable for the Additional Amount fees. Plaintiff paid the fees under protest, then sued, seeking a declaration of its rights and duties under various written instruments.The court of appeal affirmed a defense judgment. Plaintiff is contractually liable for the Additional Amount by the terms of the annexation agreement. Any challenge to the calculation of the Additional Amount is beyond the scope of a declaratory relief action and time-barred. The court rejected the plaintiff’s arguments that neither the annexation agreement nor the tax sharing agreement requires the plaintiff to pay the Additional Amount and that the fees violate the Mitigation Fee Act and federal constitutional constraints on development fees as monetary exactions. View "BMC Promise Way, LLC v. County of San Benito" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs challenged a surcharge that Long Beach imposes on its water and sewer customers by embedding the surcharge in the rates the Water Department charges for service. The surcharge funds are transferred from the Water Department to the city’s general fund, to be used for unrestricted general revenue purposes. The surcharge was approved by a majority of the city’s voters under California Constitution article XIII C. The plaintiffs argued that notwithstanding majority voter approval, the surcharge violates article XIII D, which prohibits a local agency from assessing a fee or charge “upon any parcel of property or upon any person as an incident of property ownership” unless the fee or charge satisfies enumerated requirements the city acknowledges were not met.The trial court found the surcharge unconstitutional and invalid. The court of appeal affirmed the judgment and an award of attorney fees. Because the surcharge qualifies as a “levy other than an ad valorem tax, a special tax, or an assessment, imposed by an agency upon a parcel or upon a person as an incident of property ownership, including a user fee or charge for a property related service,” it satisfies the definition of “fee” or “charge” in article XIII D and must comply with article XIII D, section 6(b)’s requirements regardless of voter approval. View "Lejins v. City of Long Beach" on Justia Law

Chavez-Cortez filed a representative cause of action under the Private Attorneys General Act (PAGA, Lab. Code 2698), seeking civil penalties for wage-and-hour violations. The suit was dismissed for failure to satisfy the requirement of notice to the Labor and Workforce Development Agency (LWDA). Relying on precedent (Khan), the defendants argued that the notice provided did not inform the LWDA “of the claims of any other alleged similarly situated but unidentified individuals” or that Chavez-Cortez “intended to pursue this matter on behalf of these unnamed individuals.”The court of appeal reversed. The notice at issue in Khan differs substantially from plaintiffs’ notice; here, the plaintiffs’ notice alerted the agency and defendants to ongoing Labor Code violations that were not by nature isolated or unique to plaintiffs. The notice was not deficient for failing to reference other aggrieved employees implicated by the representative action. Plaintiffs’ letter provided fair notice to the agency of representative claims for meal breaks, rest breaks, and overtime violations. View "Santos v. El Guapos Tacos, LLC" on Justia Law

Appellants John Tos et al. (Tos parties) appealed a trial court's a judgment that section 2704.78 of the Safe, Reliable High-Speed Train Bond Act for the 21st Century (Bond Act) (Sts. & Hy. Code, section 2704 et seq.) did not violate the state debt provision of the California Constitution set forth in article XVI, section 1. Subdivision (d) of section 2704.08 of the Bond Act, approved by the voters in 2008 as Proposition 1A, required an independent financial report indicating, among other things, that each corridor or segment of a corridor of the high-speed train system, if completed according to a “detailed funding plan,” would be “suitable and ready for high-speed train operation.” The Tos parties contended the meaning of “suitable and ready for high-speed train operation” set forth in section 2704.78 (a), constituted an implied partial repeal of the Bond Act in violation of section 1 of article XVI of the California Constitution. To this, the Court of Appeal disagreed: "The 'single object or work' of the Bond Act was (1) the initial planning and construction of a high-speed train system under (2) a 'mandatory multistep process to ensure the financial viability of the project,' which we described in California High- Speed Rail Authority v. Superior Court (2014) 228 Cal.App.4th 676 (Rail Authority). ... The multistep planning and review process in section 2704.08, subdivision (d), remained intact." The judgment was thus, affirmed. View "Tos, et al. v. California" on Justia Law

When a city delegates the administration of ambulance services to the surrounding county, which then assumes control, the city may not later attempt to resume administration of those services. In this case, the Court of Appeal concluded that the trial court properly applied this holding when it denied a motion for a preliminary injunction sought by the City to prohibit the County and Ventura County Emergency Medical Services Agency (VCEMSA) from contracting for ambulance services within City limits.The court concluded that there was no error in the trial court's determination that the City lacks the authority to contract for its own ambulance services under the EMS Act. In this case, the City contends it meets the criteria for Health and Safety Code section 1797.201 grandfathering because it contracted for ambulance services on June 1, 1980, as one of the signatories to the joint powers agreement (JPA). However, on that date the JPA empowered the County, not the City, to contract for and administer ambulance services. Therefore, this fact is fatal to the City's contention. Furthermore, even if the court assumed that the provision of ambulance services is a police power, the exercise of that power is subject to constitutional constraints. The court explained that the City ceased contracting for, providing, and administering ambulance services when it signed the JPA in 1971. Regardless of whether it withdraws from the JPA, it may not now resume providing those services absent the County's consent. View "City of Oxnard v. County of Ventura" on Justia Law

The issue this case presented centered on the aftermath of an Indian tribal casino’s unsuccessful suit in tribal court against appellant James Acres following a contract dispute. After dismissal of the tribal case, Acres filed his own suit in state court against two officials of the casino, the casino’s attorneys, a tribal court judge, the clerk of the tribal court, and various other individuals and entities. He alleged, among other things, that the parties he sued (collectively, respondents) wrongfully conspired to file the lawsuit against him in tribal court. He then sought monetary relief from respondents as redress for this alleged conduct. The trial court, however, found Acres’s claims against all respondents barred by sovereign immunity and, as to the tribal judge and several others, also barred by judicial or quasi-judicial immunity. On appeal, the Court of Appeal reversed in part. Because Acres’s suit, if successful, would bind only the individual respondents, and not the tribe or its casino, the Court found those respondents were not entitled to sovereign immunity. But, as to those respondents who asserted personal immunity from suit (e.g., judicial immunity), the Court agreed those respondents, with one exception, were immune from suit. View "Acres v. Marston" on Justia Law

On March 4, 2020, Governor Newsom declared a state of emergency due to the spread of COVID-19. On March 16, the Legislature enacted an emergency amendment to the Budget Act, appropriating $500 million, and authorizing additional disbursements for any purpose related to the state of emergency upon order of the Director of Finance, with notice to the Legislature, but without requiring statutory approval of each individual project. On April 15, Governor Newsom announced a $75 million Disaster Relief Fund to “support undocumented Californians impacted by COVID-19 who are ineligible for unemployment insurance and disaster relief, including the CARES Act, due to their immigration status.” Approximately 150,000 undocumented adult Californians would receive a one-time cash benefit of $500 per adult with a cap of $1,000 per household to deal with specific needs arising from the pandemic.On April 29, the plaintiffs filed suit challenging the Project as an unlawful expenditure of public funds (Code Civ. Proc. 526a.), reasoning that federal law provides that undocumented immigrants are not eligible for state public benefits, with exceptions, 8 U.S.C. 1621(a), including the enactment of a state law after the date of the enactment of the federal act. Plaintiffs alleged that the Project was not enacted by a state law and sought a temporary restraining order. The court of appeal dismissed, as moot, an appeal from the denial of a TRO. The spending has already occurred; there is no indication it will be reauthorized. View "Cerletti v. Newsom" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs-appellants, Paula and Christopher LeRoy lost their 15-year-old son, Kennedy LeRoy, to suicide two days after finishing his sophomore year at Ayala High School in Chino. The LeRoys sued the Chino Valley Unified School District, Ayala’s principal, Diana Yarboi, and its assistant principal, Carlo Purther (collectively, Respondents). The LeRoys alleged Respondents were liable for Kennedy’s suicide because of their inadequate response to his complaints of bullying by his classmates. The trial court granted summary judgment for Respondents, and the LeRoys timely appealed. After review, the Court of Appeal concluded Respondents were statutorily immune from liability and therefore affirmed the judgment. View "Leroy v. Yarboi" on Justia Law

The People filed suit against Venice Suites for violation of the Los Angeles Municipal Code (LAMC) and for public nuisance, among other causes of action, alleging that Venice Suites illegally operates a hotel or transient occupancy residential structure (TORS).The Court of Appeal affirmed the trial court's grant of summary adjudication in favor of Venice Suites. As a preliminary matter, the court concluded that the People did not raise the issue of permissive zoning in their briefing but the court exercised its discretion to consider the issue on its merits. On the merits, the court concluded that the LAMC did not prohibit the length of occupancy of an apartment house in an R3 zone. Furthermore, the court concluded that the permissive zoning scheme does not apply to the length of occupancy, and the Rent Stabilization Ordinance and Transient Occupancy Tax Ordinance do not regulate the use of an apartment house. View "People v. Venice Suites, LLC" on Justia Law

The primary issue in this case was whether imposing sales tax on in-state lessors of business equipment to a title insurer violated Article XIII, section 28(f) of the California Constitution. The California Department of Tax and Fee Administration (Department) contended it did not because the lessor, not the title insurer/lessee, was the taxpayer. In the Department’s view, whether the lessee reimburses the lessor for its sales tax obligation was strictly a matter of contract and did not implicate the constitutional limit on taxing insurers. Conversely, First American Title Insurance Company (First American) pointed out that in equipment leases not involving an insurer, the state assesses a use tax, not a sales tax. But where, as here, the lessee is constitutionally exempt from paying use tax, Regulation 1660(c)(1) solved that problem by providing that the sales tax applied instead. First American argued that as a result, Regulation 1660(c)(1) imposed a de facto use tax on title insurers in violation of Article XIII, section 28(f). The trial court agreed with First American and ordered the Department to “remove, strike out and otherwise give no force or effect to that portion of Regulation 1660(c)” providing that when the lessee is not subject to use tax, the sales tax applies. The Court of Appeal reversed: “Article XIII, section 28(f) does not prohibit a sales tax whose legal incidence is on a lessor, even though the economic burden of the tax is ultimately borne by the title insurer/lessee.” View "First American Title Insurance Co. v. Cal. Dept. of Tax and Fee Admin." on Justia Law