Mesmer

A demurrer interposed to the amended complaint of plaintiff was sustained, and this appeal was taken from the judgment of dismissal which followed.

By the provisions of a freeholders’ charter of the city of Los Angeles, adopted in 1903, there was created a water department which was provided to be placed under the control of a board consisting of five members. In March, 1911, an amendment to the charter was regularly adopted, by which amendment a department of public service was provided for, which department, in addition to being given charge of the water service, was given control and management also of such electric works and electric systems as might thereafter be acquired. The board of public service commissioners created under the latter amendment became the successors of the board of water commissioners first referred to. Plaintiff’s complaint set out that the last named board, on the eighth day of November, 1909, for the purpose of acquiring property upon which to erect a building for the uses of its department, contracted to purchase a lot in the city of Los Angeles for the sum of one hundred and ninety-five thousand dollars, payable five thousand dollars in cash, the…