{"id":22483,"date":"2025-10-25T03:15:09","date_gmt":"2025-10-25T03:15:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/22483\/"},"modified":"2025-10-25T03:15:09","modified_gmt":"2025-10-25T03:15:09","slug":"la-jolla-push-to-secede-from-san-diego-can-proceed-following-judges-ruling","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/22483\/","title":{"rendered":"La Jolla push to secede from San Diego can proceed following judge’s ruling"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"La<\/a>La Jolla. (File photo by Chris Stone\/Times of San Diego)<\/p>\n

A drive by a La Jolla nonprofit to turn the community into its own municipality can resume following a judge\u2019s order issued Friday.<\/p>\n

Superior Court Judge Judy Bae tentatively ruled against the city of San Diego and in favor of the Association for the City of La Jolla<\/a> and the San Diego Local Agency Formation Commission<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

The city\u2019s June lawsuit against LAFCO, which is empowered with approving or denying proposed changes in local government boundaries, challenged the community\u2019s ongoing effort to secede. <\/p>\n

The city contended that LAFCO improperly certified a previous ACLJ petition drive seeking to place La Jolla\u2019s incorporation on a future ballot.<\/p>\n

The regional agency\u2019s plans to proceed with the incorporation review process, the city said in the suit, would impose \u201csubstantial irreparable harm\u201d due to costs associated with city staff time required to review ACLJ\u2019s proposal.<\/p>\n

ACLJ filed a motion in August in response to the city lawsuit, arguing that the city\u2019s lawsuit is \u201ca meritless attempt to obstruct democratic participation and silence a public-interest effort through costly litigation. The city\u2019s shifting legal claims, first alleging insufficient (ballot initiative) signatures<\/a>, and now citing economic inconvenience, reveal its true intent: to suppress lawful civic engagement. This is a textbook case of voter suppression.\u201d<\/p>\n

In its motion, ACLJ maintained that San Diego voters should be \u201cdeeply alarmed that City Hall is using public funds to attack a process that simply seeks an open and transparent assessment of whether La Jolla could operate as an independent city.\u201d<\/p>\n

The court\u2019s ruling was hailed as a victory by ACLJ and its board.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe want to make sure the intent of those who signed the petition is honored and hope to move forward in this process,\u201d said Sharon Wampler, a member of the ACLJ board, which includes Diane Kane, Ted Levis, Ed Witt, Mary Munk and Jeff Scott.<\/p>\n

LAFCO also issued a statement, saying the agency is \u201cpleased with the trial court\u2019s ruling\u201d affirming that Executive Officer, Keene Simonds \u201cacted fully within his statutory authority when overruling the Registrar of Voters\u2019 improper rejection of signatures due to minor misspellings, nonstandard abbreviations, or legibility issues.\u201d<\/p>\n

The La Jolla incorporation process now is set to proceed to the next stage, which involves a comprehensive review by LAFCO. If the agency approves the application, the cityhood proposal would then go to a public vote.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis is truly a community-driven campaign,\u201d said ACLJ\u2019s president Diane Kane, who previously noted there is much work left to do. She pointed out the association will have to hire a consultant to conduct a final feasibility report on whether La Jolla could be viable as its own city, a process she expects to take six to nine months. <\/p>\n

If all continues to go well, Kane added ACLJ\u2019s current timeline is to get the question of cityhood for La Jolla placed on a ballot in 2028.<\/p>\n

The city has previously said it would likely appeal the LAFCO ruling to the California Supreme Court.<\/p>\n

ACLJ was clear in contending who the organization feels should be the final arbiter of incorporation for La Jolla. \u201cIn the end, the decision of becoming a city belongs to the voters,\u201d said the group.<\/p>\n

READ NEXT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"La Jolla. (File photo by Chris Stone\/Times of San Diego) A drive by a La Jolla nonprofit to…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":22484,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[28],"tags":[17869,930,17870,74,76,75,10177],"class_list":["post-22483","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-san-diego","tag-association-for-the-city-of-la-jolla","tag-la-jolla","tag-local-agency-formation-commission","tag-san-diego","tag-san-diego-headlines","tag-san-diego-news","tag-san-diego-superior-court"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22483","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=22483"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22483\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/22484"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22483"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22483"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22483"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}