Unfair Competition Law Litigation Saved in The Special City

California has 58 counties and thousands of cities, but only one combined city and county government:  San Francisco.  In other words, the chief executive of the county of San Francisco is the mayor, the legislature for the City of San Francisco is the County Board of Supervisors, and there is no county counsel, only a city attorney.  Why should this matter?

Here’s why, as reported at LegalPad:  This involves California’s infamous Unfair Competition Law, which has very little to do with competition and everything to do with general purpose public interest litigation against business practices deemed to be unlawful, unfair or fraudulent.  The UCL allows suit to be filed by individuals who suffer injury in fact as a result of these practices, or by county counsel, or by city attorneys of cities with a population of 750,000 or more.  San Francisco’s city attorney has traditionally been more active in filing UCL litigation than just about any city attorney in California.

For years and years, the cities with populations in excess of 750,000 have been San Francisco, San Jose, Los Angeles and San Diego.  But guess what?  San Francisco is shrinking, and some companies sued by the city attorney believe the population has slipped below 750,000.  If so, this would not only deprive the city attorney of standing to file new UCL cases – it would likely deprive him of standing to continue prosecuting future cases.

So San Francisco’s city attorney’s office lobbied State Senator Carol Migden, and she carried a bill to allow UCL litigation to be filed and prosecuted by the city attorney representing any combined city and county.  So the one and only combined city and county – San Francisco – can safely have its city attorney continue to torment businesses, err, I mean, continue to protect consumers, using the UCL.