I'm gonna sue [myself]

At least when Well Fargo sues itself, it has the common decency of hiring two different law firms to prosecute and defend itself.

This is not the case when the Kauai County Government in Hawaii decides to sue itself! Instead, they spend $250,000 dollars and have the county attorney represent both sides of the case against itself.

Here's the deal:
The local residents are being taxed out of their homes. Its not a matter of not keeping up with the mortgage, its a matter of property values being driven so high by out of state speculators that the residents can no longer afford the taxes on their long owned but newly valued homes. Which is fine by the county government, because that means they can pull in tax money from the out of towners and run record budgets as high as $123 MILLION! I mean, what county doesn't need to spend that kind of money on day to day operations?

So the residents, silly as it sounds, decided to pretend like they lived in a democracy. They got a measure on the ballot that caps the property taxes on any home that is owner-occupied. In spite of heavy lobbying by the county government and using the tax gains in a coordinated attack on the ballot measure, it passed by a 2 to 1 margin.

Rather than accepting defeat and trying to get by on tax revenues most counties only dream of, they decided their best course of action was to sue itself. This way, they could get the court to declare that the people of the county had no right to propose and vote on the ballot measure. The Hawaii Supreme Court agreed, saying that only the county government has a right to police itself, not the citizens.

Sometimes the articles I summarize do it better themselves:
Now, under Hawaii law, when government officials do not agree with the outcome of an election, they are free to concoct a friendly lawsuit, fund the litigation with taxpayer money, and ask a local court to strike the measure down.

THIS is whyhawaiianspaytaxes.

read more: HAWAII GOVERNMENT SUES ITSELF TO QUASH PROPERTY TAX RELIEF - AND WINS (flashreport.org)