City of Industry v. City of Fillmore

The City of Industry (Industry) and the City of Livermore (Livermore) sued the City of Fillmore (Fillmore), Inspired Development, LLC (Inspired Development), MTS Consulting, LLC (MTS), and Owens & Minor, Inc. (Owens & Minor), alleging several counts arising from the alleged diversion of local sales tax revenues to Fillmore and away from Industry and Livermore. The trial court sustained demurrers to the complaint without leave to amend, granted a special motion to strike several counts, and dismissed the complaint.

Industry and Livermore contend the demurrers to several counts cannot be sustained based on their purported failure to comply with Fillmore’s claims presentation requirement, failure to exhaust administrative remedies, or lack of standing. We agree. They also contend they adequately allege counts for fraud and conspiracy. With respect to those counts, we conclude that together they constitute a single count for fraud against all defendants as coconspirators and that the sustaining of the demurrers to those counts was error.

Industry and Livermore also contend their fraud and conspiracy counts do not arise from protected activity under the anti-SLAPP statute…