California Court of Appeal

In a suit brought by a Unified School District, minor school children, their parents, and the Board of Education against the state over construction costs for school facilities, trial court's denial of plaintiffs' petition for writ of mandate is affirmed where: 1) the State Allocation Board (SAB) and the trial court properly construed the applicable statute and regulation; 2) substantial evidence supports the finding that the certificates of participation (COP) proceeds were not encumbered; 3) there was no abuse of discretion in SAB's conclusion that COP proceeds are the type of funds that should be included when calculating a school district's ability to make a matching contribution; 4) the SAB did not act in excess of its authority when enacting the Regulation, and by deeming money in the district's general fund to be available; 5) substantial evidence supports a finging that the district possessed the $89 million in available COP proceeds; 6) the Regulation and the Statute are not facially unconstitutional, nor unconstitutional as applied; and 7) plaintiffs' argument, that the trial court erred by not making requested findings of fact and sustaining the State's evidentiary objections while overruling plaintiffs' evidentiary objections, is rejected.

Appellate Information

• Decided 11/19/2009
• Published 11/19/2009

Judges

Court

• California Court of Appeal

Counsel

• For Appellant:
  
• Parker & Covert, Spencer E. Covert, Jonathan J. Mott, Tustin, and Michael T. Travis, for Plaintiffs and Appellants.


• For Appellees:
  
• Edmund G. Brown, Jr., Attorney General, Douglas J. Woods, Assistant Attorney General, Jonathan K. Renner and Thomas M. Patton, Deputy Attorneys General, for Defendants and Respondents State of California, State Allocation Board, Office of Public School Construction, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Michael C. Genest and John Chiang., Marsha Bedwell, Sacramento, and Todd M. Smith, Bakersfield, for Defendant and Respondent Jack O'Connell.