Well, this is unusual. We usually refer to the Court of Appeal and Supreme Court as “reviewing courts” because they review the decisions of lower courts. But yesterday’s decision in Disenhouse v. Peevey, case no. D063799 (4th Dist. June 3, 2014) discloses a rare instance in which either of these courts is the court of first resort.
The Public Utilities Commission allegedly refused to allow the plaintiff to attend a commission meeting because of plaintiff’s affiliation with the Sierra Club. She sued in superior court to enjoin the meeting, on the ground that her exclusion violated the Bagley-Keene Open Meeting Act, then filed an ex parte application for a mandatory injunction requiring the commission to open the meeting to the public. The trial court held that it lacked jurisdiction and dismissed the complaint.
On appeal, the Fourth District, Division One, holds that the complaint was properly dismissed for lack of jurisdiction. The Open Meeting Act requires meetings of state bodies to be open to the public, and Government Code section 11130 provides that “any interested person may commence an action by mandamus,injunction, or declaratory relief for the purpose of stopping or preventing violations or threatened violations of [the Act].” But the California Constitution, at article XII, section 5, “confers plenary power on the Legislature to ‘establish the manner and scope of review of commission action in a court of record’ [citation],” and the legislature did so in Public Utilities Code section 1759, which gives only the Supreme Court and the court of appeal “jurisdiction to review, reverse, correct, or annul any order or decision of the commission or to suspend or delay the execution or operation thereof, or to enjoin, restrain, or interfere with the commission in the performance of its official duties[.]”
The court notes there is no real conflict between the Open Meeting Act and the Public Utilities Code provisions. They can be read harmoniously because the Open Meeting Act makes mandamus a means of enforcing the Act, and the Public Utilities Code authorizes a mandamus action to be brought in the court of appeal or Supreme Court.