The trial court granted plaintiffs’ mandate petition and invalidated 6 of 8 exceptions to the City’s general plan which the City granted in order to make Target’s proposed mega-store possible. Target appealed but also applied to the City Council to amend the general plan so as to permit the 6 features that were the subject of the trial court’s order. The City Council made the requested amendments. This decision holds that the City’s action moots Target’s appeal. Ordinarily, when an appeal is mooted, the appellate court simply dismisses the appeal. But it may vacate the judgment and remand to allow the trial court to dismiss the case if legislative or administrative action has mooted the entire case. Here, however, the appellant itself caused its own appeal to become moot and so should not be allowed to escape the collateral consequences of the judgment against it, such as awards of costs and private attorney general fees.
California Court of Appeal, Second District, Division 7 (Perluss, P.J.); August 16, 2016; 2016 WL 4368151