Filed 3/29/19

CERTIFIED FOR PUBLICATION

IN THE COURT OF APPEAL OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA

SECOND APPELLATE DISTRICT

DIVISION ONE

MESA RHF PARTNERS, L.P.,

Plaintiff and Appellant,

v.

CITY OF LOS ANGELES, et 

al.,

Defendants and 

 Respondents.

 B288355

 (Los Angeles County

 Super. Ct. No. BS140224)

HILL RHF HOUSING 

PARTNERS, L.P.,

Plaintiffs and Appellants,

v.

CITY OF LOS ANGELES, et 

al.,

Defendants and 

 Respondents.

 B288356

 (Los Angeles County

 Super. Ct. No. BS138416)
2

APPEALS from orders of the Superior Court of Los Angeles 

County, Amy D. Hogue, Judge. Affirmed.

Reuben Raucher & Blum, Timothy D. Reuben, Stephen L. 

Raucher, and Hana S. Kim for Plaintiffs and Appellants.

Michael N. Feuer, City Attorney, Beverly A. Cook, 

Assistant City Attorney, and Daniel M. Whitley, Deputy City 

Attorney, for Defendants and Respondents.

____________________________

Mesa RHF Housing Partners (Mesa), Hill RHF Housing 

Partners (Hill), and Olive RHF Housing Partners (Olive) appeal 

from orders denying motions to enforce settlement agreements 

under Code of Civil Procedure section 664.6.1 The trial court 

denied those motions on the merits. We affirm the trial court’s 

orders, but we do so based on our conclusion that the trial court 

was without jurisdiction to hear the motions.

BACKGROUND

Hill and Olive filed a petition for peremptory writ of 

mandate and complaint for declaratory and injunctive relief 

against the City of Los Angeles and the Los Angeles County 

Assessor’s Office on July 18, 2012 challenging various provisions 

regarding the City’s establishment of the Downtown Center 

Business Improvement District (DCBID) by ordinance of April 

10, 2012. On January 13, 2013, counsel for Hill and Olive filed a 

notice of settlement of entire case stating that the parties had 

settled the case on December 20, 2012. The parties’ settlement 

agreement contained the following language: “The Court shall 

retain jurisdiction pursuant to Code of Civil Procedure section 

664.6 to enforce the terms of the Settlement Agreement.” On 

 

1 Statutory references are to the Code of Civil Procedure 

unless otherwise specified.
3

March 1, 2013, counsel for Hill and Olive filed a request for 

dismissal on Judicial Council form CIV-110 that contained the 

following language counsel inserted into the document: “Court 

shall retain jurisdiction to enforce settlement per C.C.P. §664.6.” 

A deputy clerk entered the dismissal “as requested” on the same 

day. 

On November 1, 2012, Mesa filed a petition for peremptory 

writ of mandate and complaint for declaratory and injunctive 

relief against the City of Los Angeles, the San Pedro Historic 

Waterfront Property and Business Improvement District

(SPBID), and the San Pedro Property Owners Alliance 

challenging various provisions regarding the City’s establishment 

of the SPBID by ordinance of October 4, 2012. On February 27, 

2013, counsel for Mesa filed a notice of settlement of entire case 

stating that the parties had settled the case that same day. The 

parties’ settlement agreement contained the following language: 

“The Court shall retain jurisdiction pursuant to Code of Civil 

Procedure section 664.6 to enforce the terms of the Settlement 

Agreement.” On September 26, 2013, counsel for Mesa filed a 

request for dismissal on Judicial Council form CIV-110 that 

contained the following language counsel inserted into the 

document: “The Court shall retain jurisdiction to enforce the 

settlement agreement per Code of Civil Procedure §664.6.” A 

deputy clerk entered the dismissal “as requested” on the same 

day. 

The parties’ settlement agreements purported to settle all 

of the matters raised by the Olive, Hill, and Mesa petitions. The 

City agreed to “undertake to make [Hill and Olive] whole” for any 

assessments by the DCBID against properties those entities 

owned when the DCBID was formed. “For so long as [Hill and 
4

Olive] remain the owners of these properties,” the settlement 

agreement provided, “and the DCBID continues in its current 

formulation, the City will remit to [Hill and Olive] an amount 

sufficient to satisfy the amounts paid by [Hill and Olive] to the 

DCBID . . . .” The Mesa settlement agreement contained the 

same operative language and commitment from the City “[f]or so 

long as Mesa[] remains the owner of this property, and the 

SPBID continues in its current formulation.” 

The DCBID and SPBID each expired on December 31, 

2017. They were renewed pursuant to statute for a new term to 

begin on January 1, 2018. During the parties discussions 

regarding the Business Improvement Districts’ (BIDs) renewals, 

the City informed Mesa, Hill, and Olive that it believed the 

settlement agreements terminated with the BIDs’ expiration. 

The City contended that the renewal discontinued each of the 

BIDs “in its current formulation,” and that the City would 

therefore no longer be required to remit to Mesa, Hill, and Olive 

amounts the BIDs had assessed those entities. 

On January 4, 2018, Hill, Olive, and Mesa filed motions to 

enforce the settlement agreements under section 664.6. The trial 

court heard and denied the motions on January 31, 2018 on the 

merits. Mesa, Hill, and Olive filed timely notices of appeal. 

Because the record contains no request for the trial court to 

retain jurisdiction as required by section 664.6, we requested 

supplemental briefing from the parties regarding the trial court’s 

retention of jurisdiction under section 664.6.2

 

2 In addition to their supplemental briefs, on February 15, 

2019, Mesa, Olive, and Hill also filed a request for judicial notice. 

We grant the request for judicial notice.
5

DISCUSSION

Although the parties try to characterize Hill, Olive, and 

Mesa’s requests for dismissal as requests to the trial court that it 

retain jurisdiction under section 664.6 to enforce the parties’ 

settlement agreements, we disagree with that characterization. 

The requests for dismissal were not signed by the “parties” (or 

even a single “party”) as that term in section 664.6 has been 

uniformly construed by California courts.

“[V]oluntary dismissal of an action or special proceeding 

terminates the court’s jurisdiction over the matter.” (In re 

Conservatorship of Martha P. (2004) 117 Cal.App.4th 857, 867.) 

“If requested by the parties,” however, “the [trial] court may retain 

jurisdiction over the parties to enforce [a] settlement until 

performance in full of the terms of the settlement.” (§ 664.6, 

italics added.) “Because of its summary nature, strict compliance 

with the requirements of section 664.6 is prerequisite to invoking 

the power of the court to impose a settlement agreement.” (SullyMiller Contracting Co. v. Gledson/Cashman Construction, Inc. 

(2002) 103 Cal.App.4th 30, 37; Critzer v. Enos (2010) 187 

Cal.App.4th 1242, 1262 (Critzer).)

A request for the trial court to retain jurisdiction under 

section 664.6 “must conform to the same three requirements 

which the Legislature and the courts have deemed necessary for 

section 664.6 enforcement of the settlement itself: the request 

must be made (1) during the pendency of the case, not after the 

case has been dismissed in its entirety, (2) by the parties 

themselves, and (3) either in a writing signed by the parties or 

orally before the court.” (Wackeen v. Malis (2002) 97 Cal.App.4th 

429, 440 (Wackeen).) The “request must be express, not implied 
6

from other language, and it must be clear and unambiguous.” 

(Ibid.)

The parties ask us to construe Mesa, Hill, and Olive’s 

requests for dismissal as section 664.6 requests for the trial court 

to retain jurisdiction.3 We will not do so. 

The request to the court that it retain jurisdiction under 

section 664.6 must be made by the parties. “[A] request that 

jurisdiction be retained until the settlement has been fully 

performed must be made either in a writing signed by the parties 

themselves, or orally before the court by the parties themselves, 

not by their attorneys of record, their spouses, or other such 

agents.” (Wackeen, supra, 97 Cal.App.4th at p. 440; Critzer, 

supra, 187 Cal.App.4th at p. 1254.) The Judicial Council form 

CIV-110 in each case was signed only by an attorney for Mesa, 

Hill, and Olive. 

The City contends that the settlement agreements, which 

were never presented to the trial court before Mesa, Hill, and 

Olive requested dismissal, were the request and that request was 

then communicated to the trial court via the Judicial Council 

form CIV-110. We disagree. 

The settlement agreements were not attached to the 

Judicial Council form requests for dismissal or otherwise

transmitted to the trial court before the cases were dismissed. 

 

3 The parties agree that the trial court retained jurisdiction 

under section 664.6 to enforce the settlement agreements. But 

subject matter jurisdiction “is not subject to forfeiture or waiver” 

and cannot be conferred by “estoppel, consent, . . . or agreement.” 

(Kim v. Konad USA Distribution, Inc. (2014) 226 Cal.App.4th 

1336, 1347; Garibotti v. Hinkle (2015) 243 Cal.App.4th 470, 481.) 

The parties’ agreement in this instance is consequently neither 

dispositive nor even germane.
7

The City’s argument runs directly contrary to our Supreme 

Court’s determination that “the term ‘parties’ as used in section 

664.6 . . . means the litigants themselves, and does not include 

their attorneys of record.” (Levy v. Superior Court (1995) 10 

Cal.4th 578, 586.) The City makes an impassioned plea that 

parties will be caught in a “ ‘Catch 22’ where any path to 

settlement enforcement potentially could be foreclosed to them.’ ” 

Given the instruction to litigants in the published cases on this 

topic, we are not persuaded by the City’s argument. Mesa, Olive, 

and Hill can, for example, file a new action for breach of the 

settlement agreement. (See, e.g., Hagan Engineering, Inc. v. 

Mills (2003) 115 Cal.App.4th 1004, 1011.) In this case, the 

parties could have easily invoked section 664.6 by filing a 

stipulation and proposed order either attaching a copy of the 

settlement agreement and requesting that the trial court retain 

jurisdiction under section 664.6 or a stipulation and proposed 

order signed by the parties noting the settlement and requesting 

that the trial court retain jurisdiction under section 664.6. The 

process need not be complex. But strict compliance demands that 

the process be followed.
8

DISPOSITION

The trial court’s orders denying the motions to enforce the 

settlement agreements are affirmed. The parties are to bear 

their own costs on appeal.

CERTIFIED FOR PUBLICATION

CHANEY, J.

We concur:

ROTHSCHILD, P. J.

WEINGART, J.

 



Judge of the Los Angeles Superior Court, assigned by the 

Chief Justice pursuant to article VI, section 6 of the California 

Constitution.