The City of Sedona took one on the chin with the courts demanding the city pay the Save Sedona Committee $33,872.50, plus $320.29 for its legal costs defending itself against the city’s lawsuit attempting to prevent an initiative from appearing on the ballot for this coming election.
Below is a copy of the court’s Summary Judgement:
According to Bill Noonan, Save Sedona Committee member:
The City Must Pay the Legal Fees of Prop 403. The City sued Prop 403 and lost. Now the judge has told the City it must pay $33,872.50 in legal fees to the attorneys who defended Prop 403 against the City’s baseless litigation. These fees are on top of the tens of thousands of dollars the City already wasted suing the initiative.
The City sued to stop the residents from lawfully voting on Prop 403, which reveals the City’s disrespect for the people they are supposed to represent and suggests hidden agendas.
VOTE YES on Prop 403 to preserve Sedona’s Cultural Park as a non-residential city park. It will keep the entire park open for hiking, biking, and other recreational and cultural activities such as film festivals. It does not require operation of an amphitheater.
VOTE YES on PROP 403 to preserve the natural beauty of this last great scenic open space in the city, both for us and future generations.
VOTE YES ON PROP 403 to stop traffic congestion that will be caused by continued residential overdevelopment in West Sedona.
VOTE YES ON PROP 403 to stop the City from ignoring Sedona residents who ranked housing at the Cultural Park a low priority in the April 2026 Sedona survey of registered voters.
VOTE YES ON PROP 403 to protect our natural environment and way of life from those who would ruin it.
VOTE YES on PROP 403 to reject the political operatives who falsely claim Prop 403 would increase traffic. Such distortions suggest suspicious motives. The person behind those “no to more traffic” signs is the same political operative who urged the City to waste City funds to sue PROP 403.
VOTE YES on PROP 403 to join your neighbors in protecting the natural beauty and scenic wonders of Sedona’s Cultural Park. Once it is lost it can never be regained.
8 Comments
This is what happens when the City of Sedona hires an incompetent City Attorney and tries to thwart the will of the voters in the City of Sedona. The City is not supposed to take partisan positions against the will of City voters who present legal and valid requests for action and a competent City Attorney is supposed to advise them of that.
Nearly every city in the country and world for that matter have been sued at one time or another. Has absolutely nothing to do with city attorney competence in most cases. Love to know if the city is appealing this nonsense, especially the payout to the pro bono attorneys who filed on behalf of their very partisan clientele?
Sawry already voted a Bigly COFEFE NO!
You mean this group that didnt charge them are getting paid? Wow making a profit now? Nice Grift!
Here are the details of the case:Who provided the help: The Arizona Center for Law in the Public Interest (ACLPI) gave free (pro bono) legal help to the committee.What pro bono means: A lawyer works for free. They do not charge the client for their time.What the lawsuit was about: The city tried to block “Proposition 403” from getting on the ballot. The initiative wants to save the Sedona Cultural Park and use it as a public park.Who won: The court ruled against the city. The initiative was put back on the ballot.The final result: The judge ordered the city to pay the committee’s lawyers about $34,000 to cover all legal costs
“You mean this group that didnt charge them are getting paid? Wow making a profit now? Nice Grift!”
That was exactly my same thought when I saw it Mr Dave. They claim to run to halt non existent “out of control spending” while grifting the city over a frivolous law suit I hope the city is appealing and wanting to spend multiple millions on a music venue that will only cause headache and heartache (traffic, crime and over tourism) for everyone.
The city government of Sedona has shown a history of not wanting to listen to its voters. They bully anyone or anything that gets in the path of their unpopular projects. Prop 403 is not the first time the city has tried to silence the voters. I prefer a public park to the high density housing proposed by the city. I have voted YES on Prop 403.
Just because you personally cannot do whatever you want does not mean the city is bullying you. It means your ideas are not that of the many but rather of the very, very few.
People cannot live in a public park. They can in affordable workforce housing. Glad you prefer something that Sedona does not need (we have plenty of local parks and thousands of trails) for yourself over something that helps out a lot of good people. And somehow you think the city has unpopular ideas when you want to waste money on things we already have and do not need? It’s akin to saying you prefer a pile of red rocks as a monument to yourself over affordable housing.