X

Thank you for sharing!

Your article was successfully shared with the contacts you provided.

JUSTICE BLACKLOCK delivered the opinion of the Court. Plaintiff Elizabeth Perez filed this case in 2015 challenging the City of Houston’s assessment, collection, and expenditure of a “drainage fee.” Perez alleged that the ordinance authorizing the drainage fee was invalid because the ordinance was premised on a faulty amendment to the city charter. She sought a variety of relief for herself and a class of similarly situated taxpayers, including a declaration of the drainage fee ordinance’s invalidity, an injunction against the City’s collection of drainage fees, and reimbursement of drainage fees already paid. The nature of this case changed dramatically in November 2018, while the case was on appeal. The City passed a new charter amendment curing many of the defects Perez alleged in the drainage fee ordinance. Although the parties’ briefing is less than clear about the effect on this case of the 2018 charter amendment, Perez conceded at oral argument that the passage of the new charter amendment significantly truncated her original claims. As we construe what remains of this case after the November 2018 amendment, Perez has two ongoing claims—one for reimbursement of the drainage fees she paid prior to 2018, and one for a narrow prospective injunction against the future expenditure of fees collected prior to 2018. As explained below, we affirm the lower courts’ dismissal of these claims, but we remand the case to the district court to allow Perez to replead in light of intervening events. I. In November 2010, voters in the City of Houston approved “Proposition One,” which amended the City’s Charter to allow the City to create a “Pay-As-You-Go” Dedicated Drainage and Street Renewal (DDSR) Fund to pay for drainage projects. See Dacus v. Parker, 466 S.W.3d 820, 822 (Tex. 2015). The 2010 amendment (Charter Amendment) included multiple funding sources for the DDSR Fund— drainage fees assessed on real property, a fixed percentage of property-tax revenue shifted from debt service to the Fund, federal grants, and developer “impact fee” revenue. Perez and two other voters filed an election contest challenging Proposition One’s adoption. See id. With the election contest pending, the City moved forward as planned, enacting the Drainage Fee Ordinance (DFO) in April 2011. The DFO created a new public utility, the Houston Drainage Utility System. DFO § 47-803. The DFO required the City to (1) establish drainage fees “against all real property in the city subject to such charges” and (2) “provide drainage[1] for all real property in the city on payment of drainage charges unless the property is exempt.” Id. § 47-801. The DFO based the amount of drainage fees on the benefited property’s type and square footage. Failure to pay drainage fees could result in various penalties, including disruption of utility service and late fees. Id. § 47-842. Beginning in July 2011, the City collected drainage fees from Perez and other property owners. Perez paid $11.38 per month in drainage fees for her primary residence and $3.38 per month for additional property she owned for a time. This fee was added to her utility bill. Perez failed to pay her bill a few times, which resulted in a $1.13 drainage-fee penalty in addition to a separate penalty for non-payment of other parts of the utility bill. In 2015, we held in Dacus—the election contest challenging the Charter Amendment—that Proposition One’s ballot language misleadingly described the Charter Amendment, rendering the Amendment invalid. We remanded that case to the district court for further proceedings. Dacus, 466 S.W.3d at 828–29. On June 17, 2015, a few days after our decision in Dacus, Perez filed this lawsuit. Perez sought a declaration of the DFO’s invalidity, a prospective injunction, and reimbursement of fees previously collected. She also sought to represent a class of similarly situated taxpayers. Perez’s amended petition alleges that the DFO charge, like the Charter Amendment, is void given this Court’s decision in Dacus. Perez further alleged that City Officials were acting ultra vires by using drainage fees to pay for projects unrelated to drainage and by excluding the fees from the City’s revenue and spending caps, which they lacked authority to do without the recently invalidated Charter Amendment. Perez alleged related state and federal constitutional claims and a claim under 42 U.S.C. § 1983. The City filed a combined plea to the jurisdiction and motion for summary judgment. After a hearing, the district court granted the plea to the jurisdiction on all claims. The court held that Perez’s constitutional claims premised on the Charter Amendment’s invalidity were not ripe because Dacus was still pending when she filed her suit; that Perez lacked standing to challenge the collection of drainage fees under the Charter Amendment or the DFO because she had no particularized injury; that she lacked standing to seek reimbursement of her drainage fees; and that her ultra vires claims were insufficiently pleaded and therefore barred by governmental immunity. Perez appealed. The court of appeals affirmed. 629 S.W.3d 270 (Tex. App.—Houston [1st Dist.] 2019). The court of appeals held that Perez’s claims based on the Charter Amendment’s invalidity were not ripe. Id. at 279–80. It further held that Perez had neither pleaded an injury particular to her nor properly invoked taxpayer standing. Id. at 282–83. Having concluded Perez lacked standing, the court of appeals affirmed the district court’s judgment without considering the other issues presented by Perez’s appeal. Id. at 284. Perez petitioned for review in this Court, and we granted the petition. II. In 2018, while Perez’s appeal was pending, the voters of Houston approved a new charter amendment that lacks the infirmity identified in Dacus. As a result, much of the case Perez originally pleaded has been overtaken by events. Taking this development into account, we construe Perez’s briefing in this Court to preserve two remaining theories of liability: (1) a claim for reimbursement of the allegedly illegal drainage fees paid between 2011 and 2018, see Dall. Cnty. Cmty. Coll. Dist. v. Bolton, 185 S.W.3d 868, 877 (Tex. 2005); and (2) an ultra vires claim for prospective injunctive relief prohibiting City Officials from spending any drainage fees collected between 2011 and 2018 that may remain in the City’s accounts.[2] The court of appeals affirmed the dismissal of all Perez’s claims for lack of subject-matter jurisdiction, either on ripeness or standing grounds.[3] We begin with ripeness, an inquiry that focuses on whether a case’s “facts are sufficiently developed ‘so that an injury has occurred or is likely to occur, rather than being contingent or remote.’” Waco Indep. Sch. Dist. v. Gibson, 22 S.W.3d 849, 852 (Tex. 2000) (quoting Patterson v. Planned Parenthood of Hous. & Se. Tex., Inc., 971 S.W.2d 439, 442 (Tex. 1998)). The court of appeals held that all Perez’s claims premised on the Charter Amendment’s invalidity were not ripe because no court had finally adjudged the amendment invalid at the time Perez filed her suit. See 629 S.W.3d at 279. Although this Court had already declared the Charter Amendment invalid in Dacus, we had remanded that case to the district court, so no judgment against the City was yet operative when Perez sued. See Dacus, 466 S.W.3d at 829. And, as the court of appeals saw it, “Any claims that the City or City officials acted improperly in failing to recognize the invalidity of the Charter Amendment before its invalidity was judicially determined were premature at the time Perez filed this suit.” 629 S.W.3d at 279. This approach to ripeness was error. Perez did not need a final judgment in Dacus as a jurisdictional prerequisite to her claims premised on the Charter Amendment’s invalidity. Ripeness asks primarily whether the plaintiff has alleged a past injury or a likely future injury, rather than a speculative, remote injury that may not come to pass. See Patterson, 971 S.W.2d at 442. A claim of an ordinance’s invalidity is ripe if the ordinance is currently injuring the plaintiff, whether or not a court has already adjudged the ordinance invalid. Many of Perez’s claims for relief were premised on the Charter Amendment’s invalidity, but her injury was the assessment and payment of drainage fees. The outcome of Dacus changed nothing about the reality or imminence of that injury. To be sure, the outcome of Dacus made it far easier for Perez to succeed in demonstrating the Charter Amendment’s invalidity, but Dacus had nothing to do with the ripeness of Perez’s claims. Whether Perez demonstrated the Charter Amendment’s invalidity using a final judgment in Dacus, this Court’s opinion in Dacus, or her own novel arguments, the Charter Amendment’s invalidity was an element of her claims—not a jurisdictional prerequisite that had to be established before she sued.[4] The court of appeals also held that Perez lacks standing to bring her claims. See 629 S.W.3d at 281–84. Before delving into the standing question, we must distinguish between Perez’s obligation to establish standing and her obligation to overcome governmental immunity, separate matters that the parties to some extent conflate. Although both requirements implicate the courts’ jurisdiction, they are distinct requirements that demand distinct showings. The City defends the court of appeals’ decision that Perez lacks standing. It does so on two grounds—(1) that she has not alleged a particularized injury, and (2) that her pleadings do not establish the drainage fee’s invalidity. The first point is a matter of standing. The second is not. As explained below, the City is correct that Perez’s pleadings must adequately allege the drainage fee’s invalidity, but any failure to do so means the City retains governmental immunity, not that Perez lacks standing. Generally, to establish standing, a plaintiff must plead a particularized, concrete injury, distinct from that of the public, which courts have the power to redress. Heckman v. Williamson County, 369 S.W.3d 137, 154–55 (Tex. 2012). We generally apply a test like the federal test for standing: First, the plaintiff must have suffered an “injury in fact”— an invasion of a legally protected interest which is concrete and particularized, and (b) “actual or imminent, not ‘conjectural’ or ‘hypothetical.’” Second, there must be a causal connection between the injury and the conduct complained of—the injury has to be “fairly . . . trace[able] to the challenged action of the defendant, and not . . . th[e] result [of] the independent action of some third party not before the court.” Third, it must be “likely,” as opposed to merely “speculative,” that the injury will be “redressed by a favorable decision.” Id. (quoting Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560–61 (1992)). As we recently explained, “a plaintiff does not lack standing simply because some other legal principle may prevent it from prevailing on the merits; rather, a plaintiff lacks standing if its ‘claim of injury is too slight for a court to afford redress.’” Data Foundry, Inc. v. City of Austin, 620 S.W.3d 692, 696 (Tex. 2021) (quoting DaimlerChrysler Corp. v. Inman, 252 S.W.3d 299, 305 (Tex. 2008)). The threshold standing inquiry “in no way depends on the merits of the [plaintiff's] contention that particular conduct is illegal.” Id. (quoting Andrade v. NAACP of Austin, 345 S.W.3d 1, 7 (Tex. 2011)) (internal quotation marks omitted). Although a plaintiff’s standing does not depend on the merits of his claim, a plaintiff suing the government may still be required to demonstrate his claim’s potential validity at the pleading stage. Even if a plaintiff has the concrete, particularized, and redressable injury required for standing, sovereign or governmental immunity can still bar a court from hearing the case. To defeat a plea to the jurisdiction based on sovereign or governmental immunity, a plaintiff must plead facts that, if true, establish a viable claim that is not barred by immunity. Matzen v. McLane, S.W.3d , 2021 WL 5977218, at *4 (Tex. Dec. 17, 2021) (“As we have said before, to defeat a plea to the jurisdiction, the plaintiff suing the state or its officers must plead facts that, if true, affirmatively demonstrate that sovereign immunity either does not apply or has been waived.”) (citations omitted); NAACP of Austin, 345 S.W.3d at 11 (noting that “the Secretary retains immunity from suit unless the voters have pleaded a viable claim”) (citations omitted). If the plaintiff’s claim lacks merit even when taking the pleaded facts as true, the pleading has not overcome the government’s immunity. Matzen, 2021 WL 5977218, at *4; NAACP of Austin, 345 S.W.3d at 11. Thus, when the government contends that a plaintiff has not adequately pleaded a violation of law, it typically does so to rebut the plaintiff’s attempt to overcome governmental immunity, not to show a lack of standing. Standing, on the other hand—which looks to matters such as injury, causation, and redressability—involves not the viability of the pleaded claim but the nature of the injury alleged. With these initial observations in mind, we turn to Perez’s remaining claims. Again, we consider two claims to remain live: (1) a claim for reimbursement of the allegedly illegal drainage fees paid between 2011 and 2018; and (2) an ultra vires claim for prospective injunctive relief prohibiting City Officials from spending any drainage fees collected between 2011 and 2018 that may remain in the City’s accounts. We consider first whether Perez has standing to pursue these claims. We conclude that she does. We then consider whether she has adequately pleaded these claims so as to overcome the City’s governmental immunity. We conclude that she has not. III. A. We begin with the threshold jurisdictional question of standing. We first consider whether Perez has standing to bring a claim seeking an injunction against the future expenditure of illegally collected drainage fees. In general, regardless of the claim asserted, “a plaintiff must show that he has suffered a particularized injury distinct from the general public.” Andrade v. Venable, 372 S.W.3d 134, 137 (Tex. 2012) (citing Bland Indep. Sch. Dist. v. Blue, 34 S.W.3d 547, 555–56 (Tex. 2000)). However, Texas law has long recognized an exception to this particularity requirement for taxpayers seeking to “enjoin the illegal expenditure of public funds.” Bland Indep. Sch. Dist., 34 S.W.3d at 556. We have called such suits “drastic” and have required a plaintiff pursuing one to “bring himself strictly within the established rules.” Osborne v. Keith, 177 S.W.2d 198, 200 (Tex. 1944). Properly construed, taxpayer standing “provides important protection to the public from the illegal expenditure of public funds without hampering too severely the workings of the government.” Bland Indep. Sch. Dist., 34 S.W.3d at 556. Taxpayer standing is generally limited to plaintiffs who can show “(1) that the plaintiff is a taxpayer; and (2) that the public funds are being expended on an allegedly illegal activity.” Williams v. Lara, 52 S.W.3d 171, 179 (Tex. 2001) (citation omitted). “A taxpayer does not have an interest direct enough to warrant standing unless the activity challenged involves an expenditure of public funds that would not otherwise be made.” Andrade, 372 S.W.3d at 139. In Jones v. Turner, we recently decided that taxpayer standing applies when the allegation is that funds have been allocated illegally toward otherwise lawful ends. S.W.3d , 2022 WL 1815031, at *7 (Tex. June 3, 2022). In Jones, we did not require the plaintiff to allege that the actions taken using the challenged funds are independently illegal. Instead, the unlawful expenditure itself provided the “illegal activity” required by our precedent. In deciding whether to afford taxpayer standing, we asked whether “[t]he rationale underlying taxpayer standing applies . . . : ‘protecting the public from the illegal expenditure of public funds without hampering too severely the workings of the government.’” Id. at *4 (quoting Bland Indep. Sch. Dist., 34 S.W.3d at 556). We have also looked to whether or not “there has . . . been a pecuniary injury to the taxpayers generally” such that “the taxpayer’s interest is . . . direct enough for his suit to proceed.” Andrade, 372 S.W.3d at 138. As explained below, we conclude that Perez’s claim—which alleges that the drainage fee was altogether illegal and seeks an injunction against the expenditure of the proceeds—is the kind of claim to which “the rationale underlying taxpayer standing applies.” Jones, 2022 WL 1815031, at *4. To begin with, Perez alleges that she is a taxpayer, and the City does not contend otherwise. Most of Perez’s claims for prospective relief have been rendered moot by the 2018 charter amendment, which cured the defects in the earlier Charter Amendment we considered in Dacus. But Perez contends that she retains a narrow ultra vires claim for prospective injunctive relief against the continued expenditure of drainage fees illegally collected between 2011 and 2018.[5] The City characterizes Perez’s claim for injunctive relief against expenditure of drainage fees as a challenge to the validity of the DFO. Proceeding from this understanding of the claim, the City argues that Perez must allege a particularized injury to have standing to challenge the DFO. The City is correct that plaintiffs seeking the judicial invalidation of a city ordinance generally must allege a particularized injury. See Bland Indep. Sch. Dist., 34 S.W.3d at 555–56. But taxpayer standing is an exception to the usual particularized injury requirement. A taxpayer’s request for an injunction against the expenditure of an illegally collected tax may or may not require the courts to decide whether a city ordinance is valid. That alone does not tell us whether taxpayer standing applies. Instead, we look to the gravamen of the claim and to whether “[t]he rationale underlying taxpayer standing applies” to such claims. Jones, 2022 WL 1815031, at *4. Here, it plainly does. Perez’s claim is that the drainage fee was an altogether unlawful tax that resulted in the collection of millions of dollars that cannot be lawfully spent for any purpose. No particular taxpayer has a unique stake in such a claim, which alleges “a pecuniary injury to the taxpayers generally.” Andrade, 372 S.W.3d at 138. Perez’s claim is narrowly focused on the alleged illegality of a tax and does not seek to overturn other policies or decisions of the City that happen to involve spending money. Moreover, Perez alleges a “measurable, added expenditure” of funds that she claims should never have been collected and therefore cannot be spent; she does not challenge expenditures “that would have been made in spite of” the alleged illegality. Id. (citation omitted). Instead, the alleged illegality is the collection and expenditure of the tax. As in Jones v. Turner, “we do not hold that a taxpayer has standing to challenge every use (or nonuse) of taxpayer money of which he does not approve.” 2022 WL 1815031, at *4. But when the allegation is that the tax itself was unauthorized by law, a plaintiff who paid the tax may rely on taxpayer standing when seeking an injunction against the expenditure of the illegally collected funds.[6] The City contends, and the court of appeals held, that Perez must demonstrate the drainage fee’s illegality in order to establish her standing as a taxpayer. We disagree. The key showing required by our precedent on taxpayer standing is “that the public funds are being expended on an allegedly illegal activity.” Williams, 52 S.W.3d at 179 (emphasis added). Here, there is no dispute that public funds are being expended, and Perez has alleged that the expenditure is illegal. The threshold dispute in cases like Williams and Andrade was whether the challenged activity involved the expenditure of public funds at all. We required the plaintiffs to show that measurable, significant public funds that would not otherwise have been spent were truly at stake in order to assert taxpayer standing. But we did not require the plaintiffs, as a prerequisite to standing, to demonstrate that the allegedly illegal activity was actually illegal. That merits-related inquiry is not a proper part of a standing analysis—although it may come into play at the pleading stage when assessing governmental immunity, as explained below.[7] Perez has standing, as a taxpayer, to seek an injunction against expenditures of allegedly illegal drainage fees. Perez also has standing to bring her reimbursement claim. In Garcia v. City of Willis, we held that a plaintiff had standing to seek reimbursement of a fine because the plaintiff was “out the money he paid to satisfy an allegedly unconstitutional fine.” 593 S.W.3d 201, 208 (Tex. 2019).[8] Like Perez, the plaintiff in Garcia would have had to show a local ordinance’s invalidity in order to succeed on his reimbursement claim. See id. at 209. This did not affect the standing analysis, which focused on the injury to the plaintiff, not whether the claim involved the validity of an ordinance. Similarly, the plaintiff in Garcia did not lack standing just because no court had yet declared the disputed ordinance invalid. Like Perez, Garcia sought to establish the ordinance’s invalidity as an element of his reimbursement claim. We did not require him to show a prior declaration of the ordinance’s invalidity just to have standing. Instead, as with any other plaintiff, his standing turned on the nature of his injury, and we found his personal payment of a fine to be sufficient injury to confer standing to seek reimbursement. See id. at 208. In Garcia, and here, the merits question of the ordinance’s invalidity was not a matter of standing. To the extent the court of appeals suggested that Perez lacked standing to assert a reimbursement claim because the DFO had not yet been declared invalid by another court, this was error. 629 S.W.3d at 281. Just as in Garcia, Perez is out the money she paid toward the allegedly illegal fee. And the remedy she seeks—reimbursement— would redress her injury. The injury is particular to her, and though relatively small, it is sufficient to confer standing. See also Data Foundry, 620 S.W.3d at 696 (holding that payment of charges assessed by the government is sufficiently particularized injury to confer standing to challenge the charges). Perez therefore has standing to bring her reimbursement claim, irrespective of its merits. We therefore reject the City’s argument that Perez lacks standing to seek reimbursement unless she can show a particularized injury beyond her payment of taxes. We do not comment on other potential defects in Perez’s reimbursement claim, including whether she adequately pleaded the duress required by our precedent. See Bolton, 185 S.W.3d at 877. But, on the preliminary question of Perez’s standing to bring such a claim, her reimbursement claim focuses discretely on the personal financial injury to her and seeks to redress it by getting her money back. We can discern no standing defect in such a straightforward claim, whether or not its success on the merits is premised on an ordinance’s invalidity, and whether or not the claim may suffer from other defects we do not address. Perez’s reimbursement claim may nevertheless fail at the pleading stage for other reasons, apart from standing, which we address below. See, e.g., Garcia, 593 S.W.3d at 208, 210 (holding that Garcia had standing to seek reimbursement of fines paid but that his claim did not survive the city’s assertion of governmental immunity). B. We turn to the City’s assertion of governmental immunity. At the pleading stage, “[a] plaintiff suing the [government] must plead facts that, if true, affirmatively demonstrate that [governmental] immunity either does not apply or has been waived.” Matzen, 2021 WL 5977218, at *4 (citation omitted). This is because the government “retains immunity from suit unless the [plaintiff] has pleaded a viable claim.” NAACP of Austin, 345 S.W.3d at 11. We therefore assess whether either of Perez’s two remaining claims, as we understand them, is viable as pleaded.[9] Both Perez’s reimbursement claim and her claim for injunctive relief are premised on the City’s alleged lack of authority to assess the drainage fees.[10] As Perez sees it, in the absence of the Charter Amendment, the City Officials lacked authority to enact the DFO and therefore lacked authority to charge the fees. The City disagrees, arguing that it had home-rule authority apart from the Charter Amendment to enact drainage ordinances and assess drainage fees. The City is correct. Houston is a home-rule city governed by a city charter. Home-rule cities have “all the powers of the state not inconsistent with the Constitution, the general laws, or the city’s charter.” Proctor v. Andrews, 972 S.W.2d 729, 733 (Tex. 1998); see TEX. CONST. art. XI, § 5(a). Perez cites no authority for the proposition that the City of Houston’s background, home-rule authority does not include the power to address the city’s well-known drainage challenges and to assess taxes or fees for that purpose. In other words, we do not understand Perez to argue that the City cannot act with respect to drainage unless a state statute specifically authorizes it to do so. Instead, Perez contends that the City’s DFO impermissibly conflicts with a state statute called the “Municipal Drainage Utility Systems Act” (MDUSA). The Legislature, of course, may limit “the broad powers granted to home rule cities,” although we have required such limitations to be stated with “unmistakable clarity.” City of Sweetwater v. Geron, 380 S.W.2d 550, 552 (Tex. 1964). Perez’s contention is that MDUSA has the effect of withdrawing from the City any home-rule authority the City would have had to enact the DFO and assess the drainage fee. See TEX. LOC. GOV’T CODE §§ 552.041–.054. We disagree. Perez contends that the DFO’s broad definition of “drainage” impermissibly authorizes the City to exceed the scope of the drainage expenditures contemplated by MDUSA.[11] But this attempt to use MDUSA to limit the City’s home-rule authority never gets out of the starting gates. We need not parse the various provisions of MDUSA and compare them to the DFO to know whether MDUSA constrains the City’s authority with the unmistakable clarity our precedent requires. Instead, MDUSA tells us—with unmistakable clarity—exactly what its effect on the authority of home-rule cities is: None. MDUSA plainly states that it does not “enhance or diminish the authority of a home-rule municipality to establish a drainage utility” under its home-rule powers or “preclude a municipality from imposing impact fees or other charges for drainage authorized by law.” Id. § 552.054; see also Beck Steel, Inc. v. City of Lubbock, No. 14-19-00060-CV, 2020 WL 4461277, at *5 (Tex. App.—Houston [14th Dist.] Aug. 4, 2020, no pet.) (holding that home-rule cities’ drainage ordinances may add to MDUSA’s terms). MDUSA could hardly state its non-preemptive effect any more clearly. Perez cannot allege a valid reimbursement claim or a valid ultra vires claim to the extent these claims are premised on her contention that the drainage fee’s illegality stems from a conflict with MDUSA. Even so, while the City had home-rule authority to enact the drainage ordinance without the Charter Amendment, it did not have authority to exceed its charter’s revenue or spending caps without the Charter Amendment. If collection or expenditure of the fee in a given year between 2011 and 2018 caused the City to exceed its revenue or spending caps, then Perez conceivably could establish the fee’s illegality irrespective of MDUSA. However, Perez does not argue this theory of the drainage fee’s invalidity to this Court. She focuses entirely on the alleged conflict with MDUSA, which is immaterial given MDUSA’s explicit disclaimer against preemption. We will not reverse the dismissal of Perez’s claims under a legal theory not advanced in this Court. Both of Perez’s remaining claims required her to articulate a viable theory of the DFO’s illegality in order to overcome the City’s governmental immunity. Because the only theory she has advanced in this Court fails as a matter of law, we affirm the dismissal of her claims.[12] IV. The court of appeals erred by dismissing some of Perez’s claims as unripe and by dismissing others for lack of standing. 629 S.W.3d at 279, 284. Nevertheless, we affirm the dismissal of Perez’s claims because we agree with the court of appeals that Perez has advanced no viable theory under which the disputed drainage fee exceeded the City’s authority. Several years have passed since Perez’s most recent amended pleading in 2016. Given the passage of time and the intervening events bearing significantly on Perez’s original claims, we conclude she should have the opportunity to replead on remand. See Tex. Dep’t of Transp. v. Sefzik, 355 S.W.3d 618, 623 (Tex. 2011). Although dismissal of all her claims was not erroneous, we cannot say that “[t]he allegations found in the pleadings . . . affirmatively . . . negate the court’s jurisdiction.” City of Waco v. Kirwan, 298 S.W.3d 618, 622 (Tex. 2009). As a result, “the plaintiff should be given an opportunity to amend the pleadings.” Id. The court of appeals’ judgment of dismissal is affirmed, but that judgment is reversed in part to the extent it denied Perez the opportunity to replead. James D. Blacklock Justice OPINION DELIVERED: June 10, 2022

 
Reprints & Licensing
Mentioned in a Law.com story?

License our industry-leading legal content to extend your thought leadership and build your brand.

More From ALM

With this subscription you will receive unlimited access to high quality, online, on-demand premium content from well-respected faculty in the legal industry. This is perfect for attorneys licensed in multiple jurisdictions or for attorneys that have fulfilled their CLE requirement but need to access resourceful information for their practice areas.
View Now
Our Team Account subscription service is for legal teams of four or more attorneys. Each attorney is granted unlimited access to high quality, on-demand premium content from well-respected faculty in the legal industry along with administrative access to easily manage CLE for the entire team.
View Now
Gain access to some of the most knowledgeable and experienced attorneys with our 2 bundle options! Our Compliance bundles are curated by CLE Counselors and include current legal topics and challenges within the industry. Our second option allows you to build your bundle and strategically select the content that pertains to your needs. Both options are priced the same.
View Now
September 18, 2024 - September 19, 2024
Dallas, TX

Join General Counsel and Senior Legal Leaders at the Premier Forum Designed For and by General Counsel from Fortune 1000 Companies


Learn More
October 15, 2024
Dallas, TX

The Texas Lawyer honors attorneys and judges who have made a remarkable difference in the legal profession in Texas.


Learn More
May 15, 2024
Philadelphia, PA

The Legal Intelligencer honors lawyers leaving a mark on the legal community in Pennsylvania and Delaware.


Learn More

Health Law Associate CT Shipman is seeking an associate to join our national longstanding health law practice. Candidates must have t...


Apply Now ›

Shipman & Goodwin LLP is seeking two associates to expand our national commercial real estate lending practice. Candidates should have ...


Apply Now ›

Epstein Becker & Green is seeking an associate to joins its Commercial Litigation practice in our Columbus or Cincinnati offices. Ca...


Apply Now ›
04/29/2024
The National Law Journal

Professional Announcement


View Announcement ›
04/15/2024
Connecticut Law Tribune

MELICK & PORTER, LLP PROMOTES CONNECTICUT PARTNERS HOLLY ROGERS, STEVEN BANKS, and ALEXANDER AHRENS


View Announcement ›
04/11/2024
New Jersey Law Journal

Professional Announcement


View Announcement ›