County of El Dorado v. Superior Court
Annotate this CaseReal parties in interest Thomas and Helen Austin (the Austins) filed an action to recover development impact fees under the Mitigation Fee Act for the failure of petitioners County of El Dorado and its Community Development Agency (collectively “County”) to make prescribed findings to justify the continuing need for 11 fees assessed by the County and its special districts. The trial court denied a second demurrer that renewed the County’s previous claim that the limitations period for the Austins’ action expired. On the County’s petition for a writ of mandate to overturn this ruling, the Court of Appeal issued an alternative writ or order to show cause and issued a stay of proceedings. On plenary review, the Court of Appeal vacated the stay and denied the County's petition for a writ of mandate. While the Court agreed with the County that a one-year limitations period applied, if not made within one year of the deadline for findings, the Court surmised the plaintiff has only a limited remedy for the subsequent payments made within one year before filing a refund action, not the entire corpus existing at the time of the deadline. The County’s liability for failure to comply with its statutory duty is accordingly limited. The Court determined the trial court thus correctly overruled the demurrer, because there is at least some portion of the Austins’ cause of action for a refund that is timely. "Whether this merits further litigation of this matter is for the Austins to determine."
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