Stumpf v. Board of Supervisors of San Luis Obispo County

HAYNES, C.

This is a proceeding to review the action of the board of supervisors of San Luis Obispo county in the matter of the alleged creation of Templeton sanitary district in said county.

The plaintiff based his application for the writ upon an affidavit as required by section 1069 of the Code of Civil Procedure. The writ was issued and served and a return thereto was made, setting out the petition for the formation of the district, which purported to be signed by twenty-seven “residents and freeholders” of the district therein described.

On Eovember 7, 1898, the board made an order reciting that “a petition in due form having been received from residents and freeholders of the district hereinafter described,” praying for the creation of a sanitary district, and ordering that an election be held on December 10th by the qualified electors residing within the district, the boundaries of which were stated in the order, designating the place at which th'e election should be held and the persons who should conduct the same, and further ordering “that a copy of said order be posted for four successive we'eks prior to said election in three public places within the proposed district,” and that it should be published for four successive weeks in the “Templeton Advance.”

The return to the writ further shows that officers of the district were nominated, and an affidavit of the publication of said order calling an election was made and filed; that on January 4, 1899, the board canvassed the returns of the election and found the whole number of votes cast to be, for a sanitary district, fifty-nine votes, and against it forty-four votes, and that persons therein named had been elected respectively to the

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offices of sanitary assessor and members of the sanitary board, and declared that “a sanitary district, to be known and designated Templeton sanitary district, has been duly established,” with boundaries therein described.

The return does not show that any evidence was taken or heard as to whether the signatures to the petition were genuine, nor whether twenty-five of them were each a resident freeholder within the boundaries of the proposed district, nor does the return show that the order calling an election was posted in three public places within said proposed district for four weeks, or at all, or that any evidence in regard thereto was heard.