Water Users Ass'n v. Board of Directors

*133 Opinion

Petitioners are landowners within the El Camino Irrigation District located in Tehama County. They seek a writ of prohibition to restrain the levy and collection of assessments to pay principal and interest of the district’s bonded debt and a writ of mandate to compel the district to submit a bond refinancing or settlement proposal for approval or rejection by the state Treasurer and by the district voters. Petitioners contend that their lands are being subjected to confiscatory assessments to pay bonds and interest which are barred by the statute of limitations.

The district has filed a return and several bondholders have appeared as real parties in interest.

This lawsuit forms another segment in the long, stormy history of the El Camino Irrigation District and its general obligation bonds. Earlier chapters of the history appear in El Camino Irrigation Dist. v. El Camino Land Corp., 12 Cal.2d 378 [ 85 P.2d 123 ]; El Camino L. Corp. v. Bd. of Supervisors, 43 Cal.App.2d 351 [ 110 P.2d 1076 ]; Pueblo Trading Co. v. El Camino Irr. Dist., 169 F.2d 312 ; May v. Board of Directors, 34 Cal.2d 125 [ 208 P.2d 661 ]; May v. Board of Directors, 40 Cal.2d 221 [ 253 P.2d 6 ].…