Two Cities Go Against Each Other On Costs Recovery.
City of Selma v. City of Kingsburg, Case No. F072632 (5th Dist. Nov. 29, 2016) (unpublished) cast two Central Valley municipalities against each other in a situation where we would guess cities are fiscally making moves to get whatever moneys they can.
Kingsburg, which dubs itself as “Little Sweden,” filed costs memoranda in two CEQA cases for the costs of preparing the record in those matters against City of Selma. Selma’s motion to tax/strike costs was denied, prompting an appeal.
Selma did not gain any further traction on appeal. Kingsburg’s costs memos were timely filed, because the minute order directed preparation of a more formal judgment having the effect of extending the time to file costs memoranda. Selma did not satisfy its burden to justify taxing/striking costs at the trial level, because it failed to indicate how many pages were improperly included by Kingsburg in the CEQA prepared record for purposes of proving its challenge on this basis. Affirmed.