Cohen

*5 During the freeze period under the legislation that eventually dissolved community redevelopment agencies in California (the Dissolution Law), Culver City's former redevelopment agency made an unauthorized transfer to Culver City (the City) of about $12.5 million. The Department of Finance (DOF) discovered the unauthorized transfer after the former redevelopment agency was dissolved and the City took over as the successor agency. Based on that discovery, DOF authorized the county auditor-controller to reduce by about $12.5 million the tax increment revenue made available to the successor agency to pay the successor agency's enforceable obligations. 1

In a prior action, now final, the Sacramento Superior Court held that the reduction to the amount made available to the successor agency for payment of its enforceable obligations was proper because the former redevelopment agency's transfer of $12.5 million to the City was unauthorized under the *6 Dissolution Law. ( City of Culver City v. Matosantos (Super. Ct. Sacramento County, 2013, No. 34-2013-80001446-CU-WM-GDS) ( Culver City I ).) In other words, the former redevelopment agency should have retained the $12.5 million to pay…