F & L FARM CO. v. City Council
Opinion
Opinion
Vartabedian, J.
When a city in California has deprived California residents of constitutionally protected property interests and a judgment has been entered against it to compensate the residents for the wrongs committed, may the city simply refuse to pay the judgment on the basis that it has no spare money? We think not. Accordingly, we affirm the judgment entered below, which ordered issuance of a peremptory writ of mandate to compel payment of the judgment.
Facts and Procedural History
The City Council of the City of Lindsay, the present appellant (hereafter the city), for many years accepted saline industrial waste from a local enterprise known as Lindsay Olive Growers. The city placed this waste water into percolation ponds and, in subsequent years, into lined evaporation ponds. Much of the salt from the waste water percolated into the ground through the original ponds and through holes in the liners of the later ponds. The salt eventually entered the groundwater and caused injury to farms in the vicinity of the ponds. The injury consisted primarily of lost profits from crops and permanent reduction of the value of the land comprising the farms.