Although Factual In Nature, Case Demonstrates How Litigants Need To Be Pragmatic In This Area Of Fee Recovery With Respect To Expectations.
Co-contributor Mike lives in South Orange County. He can attest to a lot of public attention devoted toward renovating and bringing life to the San Juan Capistrano Mission area. There is vibrant development in this area, COVID-19 notwithstanding, some of which gave rise to this background and ultimate results in this particular matter.
SPM-Fairfield, LLC v. City of San Juan Capistrano (O Properties, Inc.), Case No. G057482 (4th Dist., Div. 3 June 2, 2020) (unpublished), unfortunately, pitted a battle between two longstanding Orange County residents’ development companies relating to competing hotel developments in San Juan Capistrano. In the end, one of the developers obtained a writ of mandate against the rival hotel project based on CEQA noncompliance/City general plan violation. Winner brought a motion for private attorney general attorney’s fees (we would bet it was a big number given the involvement of a large Southern California firm), a request denied by the trial court based on the winner’s large financial stake in forestalling the rival development.
The 4/3 DCA affirmed the fee denial, in a 3-0 panel decision authored by Justice Fybel. The appellate court did a nice job of describing recent financial benefit cases after the guiding decision in Conservatorship of Whitley, 50 Cal.4th 1206 (2010) [one of our Leading Cases]. The winner’s diminishment of its financial stake was disbelieved by the lower court, a factual finding entitled to deference. Also, the fact that winner and losers were competitors in the boutique SJC hotel business helped cement the result in the lower court. (See, e.g., Summit Media, LLC v. City of Los Angeles, 240 Cal.App.4th 171, 193-194 (2015); Arnold v. California Exposition and State Fair, 125 Cal.App.4th 498, 51-511 (2004).).
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