⚖ Oral Arguments, with Context

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit hears an appeal in City of Calimesa versus Everest Reinsurance Company. The case turns on a collision between two very different statutory clocks in California law. On one side, two statutes impose a ninety-day deadline to challenge local government land-use decisions — government code sections 65009 and 66499.37. On the other side is a much longer clock for conflict-of-interest claims. Section 1090 of the California government code, on the books since 1943, bars public officials from having a financial interest in the contracts they help make. Section 1092 lets a party to such a tainted contract go to court to void it, and in 2007 the Legislature gave those claims their own four-year deadline — one that runs not from the day the contract was signed, but from the day the party discovered, or with reasonable care should have discovered, the violation. The factual backdrop involves subdivision bonds issued by Everest to guarantee infrastructure improvements for an industrial warehouse development in Calimesa. Years after the project moved forward, Everest raised counterclaims alleging that the underlying agreements were void from the start because of prohibited financial conflicts of interest involving city officials. The city responded that the ninety-day land-use limitations period had long since expired. The district court agreed and dismissed those counterclaims, then, on Everest's own motion, certified the resulting legal questions to this appellate panel. At stake is whether California's short statute of limitations for land-use challenges bars even parties to a contract from later raising conflict-of-interest defenses.

City of Calimesa v. Everest Reinsurance Company (No. 25-7356) — U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit, argued August 6, 2026.