Cohen

— The factual and legal setting of this case is complex, involving the Legislature’s decision to dissolve the many redevelopment agencies which became a fixture of local government financing over decades, and involving the way the moneys remaining in the redevelopment agency coffers around the state would be redistributed.

But the narrow dispute on appeal turns on the straightforward interpretation of a few statutes. As the trial court correctly reasoned, those statutes authorized plaintiffs City of Emeryville and Successor Agency to the Emeryville Redevelopment Agency (collectively, Emeryville) to “reenter” into three agreements entered into before the dissolution of redevelopment agencies. And, contrary to the view of defendant director of the Department of Finance (Department), nothing in the statutory scheme providing for the orderly distribution of redevelopment funds subsequently invalidated these reentered agreements. Accordingly, we shall affirm the judgment, which in effect compels the Department to acknowledge the validity of those agreements.

BACKGROUND

General Legal Background

As briefly summarized by our Supreme Court: “In the aftermath of World War II,…