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SLO County contemplating suing California over stay-at-home order

January 7, 2021

By JOSH FRIEDMAN

San Luis Obispo County is considering suing the state of California in an attempt to break away from the Southern California region and emerge from Gov. Gavin Newsom’s regional stay-at-home order, though the county’s top attorney is cautioning against doing so.

On Tuesday, the SLO County Board of Supervisors voted 3-2 to explore the possibility of lawsuit against the state.

During the board meeting, Supervisor John Peschong raised the possibility of following the lead of San Bernardino County, which sued the state last month in an attempt to exit the Southern California region and assume local control over its coronavirus response. Peschong said he expects the stay-at-home order to go on for months, and he would like for SLO County to explore the possibility of a lawsuit.

“Right now what I’m finding is our small businesses are suffering,” Peschong said.

Supervisor Bruce Gibson objected to Peschong’s proposal, arguing the county would have almost no chance at succeeding in court against the state. Gibson said suing the state would be a “frivolous attempt to voice our frustration.”

Gibson and Supervisor Dawn Ortiz-Legg cast the dissenting votes after Peschong put forth a motion to explore the possibility of a lawsuit.

County Counsel Rita Neal said such a successful lawsuit would require proving Newsom abused his discretion in placing SLO County in the Southern California region.

“Being able to show there was an abuse of discretion by the governor is, I think, a very, very difficult hurdle to overcome,” Neal said.

Neal said courts have ruled that officials have broad authority to issue public health orders to slow the spread of a contagious disease.

SLO County previously petitioned the state to exit the Southern California Region and join Santa Barbara and Ventura counties in a new Central Coast region. But, Newsom has stated he is not considering relieving any counties from stay-at-home orders, Neal said.


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And the attorneys make all the money, taxpayers money on both sides, plus raises. No wonder one government entity wants to sue another, easy when it’s not your money.


12

Really does not matter at this point, agree with the Board minority ( that’s rare) . Wasted effort . Focus on doing everything possible to get the vaccine out . The vaccine clinics should be going seven days a week, 15 hours a day and no time off for holidays . We need to act like this is as urgent as it is .


-1

While I agree with the sentiment behind the Board’s action, it does look like an exercise in futility. Newsom’s map was an act of stupidity rather than an abuse of his discretion, but it does cry out for exposing the utter lack of logic behind it. The French Laundry, the EDD multi-billion dollar scandal, and his poorly thought-out executive orders? Now there’s some real abuses of Newsom’s discretion!


6

Neal, Bruce and now D.O.L. nearly always on the wrong side of issues. At least they get a “C” for Consistency.

The modest legal resources needed to speak out against Gov. Newsom’s characteristic abuse of authority is miniscule money next to our businesses and their employees’ suffering.


8

I have to agree with Gibson and Legg, the County would be wasting monies that could continue to fund their existing law suite against local property owners, property owners who are protecting their existing State Constitutional water rights. The County and other water purveyor’s want land owners to surrender their property, as in no water no land. .


4

“It’s shocking that the two lefties are against business!”- said no one ever.


13

Something to consider might be that in LA County, someone dies of covid every 8 minutes. I am self employed and completely shut while this is going on, but would I be better off if people in this county were dying every 8 minutes? Would anyone’s business? As decisions go, this is a very hard one. We need to get people inoculated, which will help. Perhaps we could concentrate on that.


-39

Uh, we don’t have the population to have a death every 8 minutes.


28

Uh, what the supervisors are doing is fanning flames of ignorance and will cost us. This is the same leval of insanity as we all saw on the news just a few days ago, literal insanity, hate and denial of reality and should be criminal. It’s a global pandemic, and our case count is out of control, Santa Barbara is or is about to run out of ICU beds. Lord, lock them up.


-16

Uh, what do you mean ‘Mark’? Here are some random numbers to help you along. We have a county population of approx. 283,000 people. A death every 8 minutes would mean 180 dead per day. LA County has a population of approx. 10,400,000 people. How about we all make a new years resolution to try and be a bit more specific in our dialogues – there are a lot of pretty unconstructive conversations going on these days and it seems to be leading to some reasonably real consequences.


-12

Gonna go out on a limb here and guess you did not major in mathematics.


9

Didn’t take long for Newsoms lapdog, Dawn to start helping him out,

Yep, straight party,screw the Residents vote for keeping us Locked down.

Thanks for bringing this up for a Vote Lynn,

That’s called Leadership.


10

It’s simple, then. Back the recall of Newsom by physically signing the petition for recall that is circulating. End this man’s career before he goes further in his attempts to rule our country.


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