XAVIER BECERRA Attorney General
LAWRENCE M. DANIELS Deputy Attorney General
AGO 17-1201
No. 17-1201
California Attorney General Opinion
Office of the Attorney General State of California
August 23, 2018
Proposed
relator KLAMATH-TRINITY JOINT UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT has
requested leave to sue proposed defendant PATRICIA KELLEY to
remove her from the public office of trustee of the Board of
Trustees of the Klamath-Trinity Joint Unified School District
on the ground that she did not legally reside in the trustee
area that she represents at the time of her election and
during her term.
CONCLUSION
Leave
to sue is GRANTED to determine whether proposed defendant
PATRICIA KELLEY meets the legal residency requirements for
holding the public office of school district trustee.
ANALYSIS
Introduction
The
Klamath-Trinity Joint Unified School District (District) is a
public school district in Humboldt County. The District is
organized into seven trustee areas, each represented by an
elected board trustee. On November 7, 2017, Patricia Kelley
(Kelley) was elected as trustee of Area Six, which serves the
area of Weitchpec. Kelley was sworn in as trustee on January
9, 2018.
Under
state law, a school district trustee must reside in the
trustee area he or she represents. Here, the District seeks
leave to sue Kelley in quo warranto to remove her from office
based on the District's allegation that, both at the time
of the election and since then, Kelley has resided in Area
Two, which serves the area of Willow Creek, rather than in
Area Six, which she represents. After reviewing the
parties' submissions, we find that the District has
raised substantial questions of fact and law concerning
whether Kelley resided and resides in Area Six and that it
would be in the public interest to allow the District to
pursue its claim in court. Accordingly, we grant the District
leave to sue.
Factual
Background
The
central facts regarding Kelley's residence at the
time of her election are undisputed. Kelley and her
husband own a house in Weitchpec, located in Area Six. Area
Six includes the Weitchpec Yurok Magnet/Elementary School,
which enrolls 11 students from transitional kindergarten
through third grade. Kelley also rents a property in Willow
Creek, located in Area Two. She and her husband have custody
of a granddaughter, who is in the first grade at the Trinity
Valley Elementary School in Willow Creek. Trinity Valley
serves about 210 students from transitional kindergarten
through eighth grade and is about an hour's drive away
from Weitchpec.
Kelley
states that she moved to Willow Creek from her and her
husband's house in Weitchpec about 12 years ago. After
that, she "lived most of the time" at the rental in
Willow Creek because it "was much closer to [her] job
and [their] children's sports, school (no Jr. High or
High School in the Weitchpec area), and jobs." She says,
"I did not live in Weitchpec at the time I applied to
run for the School Board." She and her husband "are
raising two young grandchildren," aged 21 months and
seven years, and they "have four grandchildren attending
schools in the district, and several planning to as they
reach school age." She explains that "the rental
near Willow [C]reek was very convenient and necessary."
At the same time, she continued to keep up the Weitchpec home
and remained "very connected to the Weitchpec
community."
Kelley
alleges that before the election, someone from the county
office of elections told her that she was eligible to run for
the seat in Area Six as long as she was registered to vote
there.1 After a manager there later informed her
that the superintendent of the District believed she was
ineligible to run because she did not live in Area
Six, she told the manager that "if policy stated [she]
had to live in Weitchpec, [she] could move in a weekend, as
[she and her husband] have a home...
