Nordyke

This is an appeal from a preliminary injunction preventing the enforcement of an addendum to the lease between the Santa Clara County Fairgrounds Management Corporation (SCCFMC) and the owner of the Fairgrounds, Santa Clara County. The addendum, approved by the County Board of Supervisors on January 23, 1996, reads as follows: “[e]xcept for uses that are required under Existing Contracts, Tenant [SCCFMC] shall not permit any gun shows on the Premises.” In April, 1996, the County Counsel sent a letter to the SCCFMC to “clarify the intention of the Board of Supervisors with respect to” the addendum. That letter states:

We interpret the addendum in accordance with the County’s clarification thereof and hereafter shall refer to both as the “addendum.” 1 This prohibition was both vigorously defended and attacked within Santa Clara County. The purposes of the ban were stated by the Board of Supervisors to be to “avoid sending the wrong message to the community relative to support of gun usage,” “to improve the Fairgrounds’ image,” and to reduce “the fiscal impact of criminal justice activities in response to gun-related violence.”

On May 14, 1996, the Nordyke appellees, who previously…