Board Challenges Judge’s Authority on Malibu Cityhood

Ignoring a judge’s order, Los Angeles County supervisors on Tuesday chose not to set a June cityhood election for Malibu and instead had lawyers for the county challenge the judge’s authority in a state appellate court.

Irate cityhood backers said that, barring a ruling by the state Court of Appeal, their lawyers plan today to ask Superior Court Judge Dzintra Janavs to cite the supervisors for contempt.

“What we’re seeing is an unmitigated outrage,” said Walt Keller, co-chairman of the Malibu Committee for Incorporation, referring to the county’s latest move.

Janavs last week ordered the supervisors to comply with an order she issued in January that county officials set an election no later than this Friday. That is the last day that the supervisors can include the cityhood vote on the June 5 ballot.

But with Supervisor Ed Edelman dissenting, three other supervisors took the advice of county attorneys Tuesday and decided not to obey the order. Supervisor Kenneth Hahn was absent. He has voted with the majority in opposing Malibu cityhood until a sewer system the county wants to build there is under way.

“I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I think we should put the matter on the ballot and let the people vote,” Edelman said. “To continue resisting makes us look awfully bad.”

County lawyers asked the appellate court Tuesday afternoon to overrule Janavs, contending that she did not have jurisdiction when she lifted a stay of the county’s appeal of her original election order.

A majority of supervisors have opposed Malibu incorporation for years, insisting that the sewer system--which they say is needed for environmental reasons--be installed before cityhood is established. They are afraid that unless the sewer system is under way before cityhood, a new Malibu government will try to block it.

Although the supervisors began an incorporation hearing last Oct. 19, they voted 4 to 1 in November to indefinitely postpone a decision on the matter--thus putting off the hearing’s conclusion--until construction permits for the sewer system are issued. The hearing, required by state law so that proponents and opponents can express their views, is the last step before an election can be set.

Cityhood backers, many of whom regard the county’s sewer plans as a prelude to widespread development, filed a lawsuit against the supervisors in December. They accused the county officials of violating a state law that sets a 60-day limit on the duration of a hearing before an election date is set.

In siding with cityhood proponents in January, Janavs rejected the county’s argument that state law sets guidelines recommending--but not necessarily mandating--the 60-day limit on concluding the hearing.

However, County Counsel DeWitt Clinton on Tuesday raised a technicality in advising against the setting of the election.

Clinton said that because the hearing was postponed indefinitely, and not continued to a specific date, state law requires that the public be given at least 15 days notice before it is resumed, which he said the judge did not take into account last week when she imposed the March 9 deadline.

In two sessions of the incorporation hearing, only one Malibu resident expressed opposition to holding the election, and county officials acknowledged that they had received no written protests.