Storke

This action was brought by plaintiff as a resident and taxpayer of the City of Santa Barbara to annul a certain contract purporting to have been entered into on behalf of said City with Norman E. McPadden authorizing the latter to make “a scientific appraisal” of the real property within said City for the purposes of municipal assessment; also to require the said McFadden to repay to the City treasurer certain sums of money received by him as compensation for part of work performed pursuant to said contract, and to enjoin any further payment from being made thereunder. A demurrer to the complaint upon the grounds of insufficiency of facts, mis joinder of parties defendant, and uncertainty was sustained by the court with leave to amend, and plaintiff having declined to amend, judgment of dismissal was entered, from which judgment plaintiff appeals.

The City of Santa Barbara was organized under a freeholders’ charter, adopted and ratified, pursuant to the amendment of 1914 to section 6 of article XI of the state constitution (Stats. 1917, p. 1824). Said charter became effective on the first Monday in January, 1918, and under it the City was being governed when the transaction in…