Opinion ID: 796311
Heading Depth: 3
Heading Rank: 3

Heading: The Families' Alternative Theories of Standing

Text: 26 We reject the families' other theories of standing. The Breens' and the Barnes-Wallaces' purposeful avoidance of the parklands leased by the Boy Scouts as a protest against the Scouts' exclusionary policies is not a sufficient injury. We have held that people can suffer a direct injury from the need to avoid large religious displays, such as giant crosses or life-size biblical scenes. See, e.g., Buono, 371 F.3d at 549 (five to eight-foot-tall cross); SCSC, 93 F.3d at 619 (fifty-one-foot-tall cross); Ellis, 990 F.2d at 1520 (thirty-six-foot and forty-three-foot-tall crosses); Kreisner v. City of San Diego, 1 F.3d 775, 777 (9th Cir.1993) (ten by fourteen-foot displays containing life-size statuary of biblical scenes). But there are no displays in either Camp Balboa or the Aquatic Center that would be so overwhelmingly offensive that families who do not share the Scouts' religious views must avoid them. See Valley Forge Christian Coll. v. Americans United for Separation of Church & State, Inc., 454 U.S. 464, 485, 102 S.Ct. 752, 70 L.Ed.2d 700 (1982) (requiring the plaintiffs to show a personal injury suffered as a consequence of the alleged constitutional error) (emphasis omitted). 27 Nor have the families suffered a direct injury caused by the requirement that they pay a fee to the Desert Pacific Council to use Camp Balboa or Fiesta Island. It is undisputed that user fees are deposited into the Council's general operating fund and therefore may be used for purposes other than the administration and upkeep of the parklands. Nonetheless, the families' injury is conjectural or hypothetical because they never paid the fee to the Boy Scouts. Lujan, 504 U.S. at 560, 112 S.Ct. 2130 (citation omitted). Moreover, there is no showing that the fee conveys a net benefit to the Boy Scouts; on the contrary, the costs of maintaining the facilities exceed the user fees. 28 Finally, we disagree with the district court and conclude that the families do not have standing as municipal taxpayers because they have not suffered a direct dollars-and-cents injury. Doremus v. Bd. of Educ. of Hawthorne, 342 U.S. 429, 434, 72 S.Ct. 394, 96 L.Ed. 475 (1952). The families characterize the leases as tax expenditures, but the Supreme Court recently held that state taxpayers have no standing under Article III to challenge ... state ... spending decisions simply by virtue of their status as taxpayers. DaimlerChrysler Corp. v. Cuno, ___ U.S. ___, ___, 126 S.Ct. 1854, 1864, 164 L.Ed.2d 589 (2006). 5 The Court reasoned that the taxpayers lacked standing to challenge a state tax break, in part because it was unclear whether the tax breaks would deplete the treasury and thus cause the taxpayers to suffer an actual or imminent injury. Id. at 1862 (internal quotations omitted). This rationale applies equally to the municipal taxpayer challenge in this case. Cammack v. Waihee, 932 F.2d 765, 770 (9th Cir. 1991). The families' injury is not actual or imminent because it is unclear whether San Diego is expending tax dollars to support the leased property. 29 The leases are more reasonably characterized as a potential loss of municipal revenues, but even this loss is not particularized enough to create standing. There is no evidence that, if the leases were invalidated, the City would use the land to generate revenue. See id. at 1862 (finding the plaintiff taxpayers' alleged injury too conjectural because it depended on legislators' responses to the tax breaks). The City's Director of Real Estate testified that [t]he City would likely seek another lessee to operate a recreational facility ... under similar terms and conditions in the existing ... lease ... [because the] City Council has never had a policy of using the . . . property in a manner that maximizes the revenue that potentially could be generated by this site. [SER 4 ¶ 12.] Thus, the families have not suffered an injury to their pocketbook, as is necessary for taxpayer standing.