City & County of San Francisco v. PCF Acquisitionco, LLC

In an eminent domain action, may a condemner’s final pretrial settlement offer, made 20 days before trial and contingent on obtaining approvals from other government entities, be found reasonable under Code of Civil Procedure 1250.410, and thus bar a defendant who rejects it from later recovering its litigation costs? The property owners here, Convenience Retailers and PCF Acquisitionco, LLC (jointly PCF), contend such a contingent offer from the City and County of San Francisco (the City) was unreasonable as a matter of law because it was conditioned on the approval of three different government bodies, thus providing no assurance that PCF’s acceptance would result in a pretrial settlement. We agree. The City’s contingent settlement offer did not serve section 1250.410’s aims of encouraging the pretrial settlement of eminent domain actions and making property owners whole, and thus was not reasonable within the statute’s meaning. We therefore reverse the order denying PCF’s motion for litigation expenses and remand to the trial court for further proceedings.

BACKGROUND

Prior to this action, PCF was the owner of real property at the corner of 4th and Folsom Streets in…