Amicus Curiae Brief — Office of Personnel Management, et al., Applicants v. American Federation of Government Employees, et al.

No. 24A904

In the Supreme Court of the United States

United States Office of Personnel Management, et al.,

Applicants,

v.

American Federation of Government Employees, AFL-CIO, et al.,

Respondents.

On Application to Stay the Injunction Issued by the

United States District Court for the Northern District of California and

Request for an Immediate Administrative Stay

BRIEF OF AMICI CURIAE COUNTY OF SANTA CLARA, CALIF.

AND 29 ADDITIONAL LOCAL GOVERNMENTS AND LOCAL

GOVERNMENT OFFICIALS IN SUPPORT OF RESPONDENTS

AND IN OPPOSITION TO STAY AND ADMINISTRATIVE STAY

TONY LOPRESTI

County Counsel

KAVITA NARAYAN

MEREDITH A. JOHNSON

RAPHAEL N. RAJENDRA

Counsel of Record

JENNY S. LAM

STEFANIE L. WILSON

OFFICE OF THE COUNTY COUNSEL

COUNTY OF SANTA CLARA

70 West Hedding Street

East Wing, 9th Floor

San José, CA 95110-1770

(408) 299-5900

Raphael.Rajendra@cco.sccgov.org

Additional counsel listed on signature page

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Table of Contents ............................................................................................................ i

Table of Appendices ....................................................................................................... ii

Table of Authorities ...................................................................................................... iii

Interest of Amici Curiae ................................................................................................ 1

Summary of Argument .................................................................................................. 2

Argument ....................................................................................................................... 5

I.

II.

Close and Ongoing Collaboration and Interdependence Among

Local, State, and Federal Officials Have Longstanding

Constitutional and Statutory Bases ........................................................ 5

A.

Federal, State, and Local Personnel Effectuate

Constitutional Federalism Through Robust Interaction on

Matters Essential to the Public Good. .......................................... 5

B.

Federal Employment-Related Laws Recognize and

Respect Multilayered Governance and the

Interrelationships Through Which It Is Practiced. .................... 11

Local Governments and the People Themselves Depend on

Adequately Staffed Federal Agencies. ................................................... 14

A.

Effective Preparedness and Response to Public Safety

Emergencies Demands Adequately Staffed Federal

Agencies. ...................................................................................... 14

B.

Dismantling Federal Agencies Will Undermine and

Stymie Local Public Health Agency Efforts, With

Devastating Effects on Public Health. ........................................ 20

Conclusion .................................................................................................................... 25

Additional Counsel ...................................................................................................... 27

i

TABLE OF APPENDICES

Appendix A – List of Amici Curiae ............................................................................. 1a

ii

TABLE OF AUTHORITIES

Page(s)

Cases

Alden v. Maine,

527 U.S. 706 (1999) ........................................................................................... 11

Atl. Richfield Co. v. Christian,

590 U.S. 1 (2020) ................................................................................................. 8

Bond v. United States,

564 U.S. 211 (2011) ............................................................................................. 6

Bond v. United States,

572 U.S. 844 (2014) ............................................................................................. 6

California v. United States,

438 U.S. 645 (1978) ............................................................................................. 8

Health & Hosp. Corp. of Marion Cnty. v. Talevski,

599 U.S. 166 (2023) ............................................................................................. 7

Hodel v. Virginia Surface Min. & Recl. Ass’n, Inc.,

452 U.S. 264 (1981) ............................................................................................. 8

King v. Smith,

392 U.S. 309 (1968) ............................................................................................. 8

Medtronic, Inc. v. Lohr,

518 U.S. 470 (1996) ............................................................................................. 6

Nat’l League of Cities v. Usery,

426 U.S. 833 (1976) ............................................................................................. 6

New York v. United States,

505 U.S. 144 (1992) ............................................................................................. 7

NFIB v. Sebelius,

567 U.S. 519 (2012) ............................................................................................. 6

Printz v. United States,

521 U.S. 898 (1997) ............................................................................................. 6

Wisconsin Dep’t of Health & Fam. Servs. v. Blumer,

534 U.S. 473 (2002) ............................................................................................. 8

Statutes

2 U.S.C. § 1501 ............................................................................................................... 9

2 U.S.C. § 1534 ............................................................................................................. 10

iii

5 U.S.C. § 2301 ............................................................................................................. 14

5 U.S.C. § 301 ............................................................................................................... 14

5 U.S.C. § 3101 ............................................................................................................. 14

5 U.S.C. § 3502 ............................................................................................................. 14

6 U.S.C. § 121 ............................................................................................................... 10

6 U.S.C. § 321k............................................................................................................. 10

6 U.S.C. § 361 ............................................................................................................... 13

6 U.S.C. § 753 ............................................................................................................... 10

7 U.S.C. § 7656 ............................................................................................................. 10

7 U.S.C. § 8914 ............................................................................................................. 11

12 U.S.C. § 4118 ........................................................................................................... 11

15 U.S.C. § 8521 ........................................................................................................... 12

16 U.S.C. § 551c-1 .................................................................................................. 11, 23

21 U.S.C. § 350f ........................................................................................................... 11

33 U.S.C. § 3204 ........................................................................................................... 10

34 U.S.C. § 60506 ......................................................................................................... 11

38 U.S.C. § 303 ............................................................................................................. 15

42 U.S.C. § 247d-3a ..................................................................................................... 11

42 U.S.C. § 280g-18...................................................................................................... 10

42 U.S.C. § 290bb-36c .................................................................................................. 10

42 U.S.C. § 300hh-10 ................................................................................................... 11

42 U.S.C. § 4370j.......................................................................................................... 12

42 U.S.C. § 5143 ........................................................................................................... 11

42 U.S.C. § 5144 ........................................................................................................... 11

43 U.S.C. § 3101 ........................................................................................................... 10

43 U.S.C. § 3102 ........................................................................................................... 10

47 U.S.C. § 615 ............................................................................................................. 10

Regulations

21 C.F.R. Part 312, Subpart I ..................................................................................... 27

5 C.F.R. §§ 315.804-806 ............................................................................................... 14

5 C.F.R. §§ 351.801-803 ............................................................................................... 14

iv

Other Authorities

Bridget A. Fahey,

Coordinated Rulemaking and Cooperative Federalism’s

Administrative Law, 132 Yale L.J. 1320 (2023) ................................................ 8

Bridget A. Fahey,

Data Federalism, 135 Harv. L. Rev. 1007 (2022) .............................................. 8

Executive Order 13,100 of August 25, 1998, 63 Fed. Reg. 45,661 (Aug. 25, 1998)

(“President’s Council on Food Safety”) ............................................................. 11

The Federalist No. 39 (James Madison) (Clinton Rossiter ed., 1961).......................... 6

The Federalist No. 43 (James Madison) (Clinton Rossiter ed., 1961).......................... 7

The Federalist No. 45 (James Madison) (Clinton Rossiter ed., 1961).......................... 7

The Federalist No. 51 (James Madison) (Clinton Rossiter ed., 1961).......................... 6

v

INTEREST OF AMICI CURIAE 1

The work of government is the work of government employees. At its core,

government works to protect and serve the public. Yet governments cannot work

effectively when their workforces are cut so dramatically and abruptly that public

facilities are shuttered, emails go unanswered, and calls for assistance languish in

unmonitored voicemail systems. That is why the widescale terminations at issue in

this case—which Respondents have shown were systemically unlawful—do not

simply present a concern for terminated federal employees, the federal staff left

behind to pick up the pieces, or the individual agencies where staff is cut. The

terminations pose risks and harms to the health and safety—and, in concrete ways,

the literal lives—of the American people. By constitutional design, in myriad

congressional enactments, and through day-to-day practice, all layers of

government work in tandem and reliance on one another to provide the services

that local governments furnish directly to their residents in the forms of emergency

management, public safety, healthcare, and disease prevention, among others. So

the abrupt hobbling of federal agencies prevents local governments from serving the

public with which they interact every single day. Amici, local governments and

officials from across the country, experience this reality first-hand.

Local government staff who operate all sorts of programs—from emergency

planning and response, to infrastructure repair and environmental protection, to

1 No counsel for a party authored this brief in whole or in part, and no person or entity other than

Amici or their counsel made a monetary contribution intended to fund the preparation or submission

of this brief.

1

public health, and beyond—depend on their federal (and state) counterparts to pick

up the phone, reply to emails, attend meetings, and simply collaborate on shared

work. Local government staff must also confront and mitigate the harms that

result when federal agencies lose the staff they need to conduct food-safety

inspections, respond to urgent requests for federally controlled medications,

participate in safety drills ahead of major events, and disseminate weather reports.

This is why, when Applicants Office of Personnel Management (OPM) and Charles

Ezell ordered agencies across the federal government to conduct abrupt and

overbroad terminations en masse, it dramatically heightened the risk of serious and

irreparable harms to the American people themselves.

Amici represent counties and cities—the level of government closest to the

people and most directly responsible for their well-being. Amici are uniquely

exposed to the ways Applicants’ wholesale dismantling of one level of government

will prevent all levels of government from functioning effectively to keep water safe

to drink, food safe to eat, residents from getting sick and dying, and communities

from collapsing after devastating fires, floods, or attacks. Amici’s experiences

illuminate the breadth, depth, and imminence of the threat Applicants’ actions pose

to the American people. 2

SUMMARY OF ARGUMENT

The Constitution presumes and requires that governance by and for the

American people is carried out by multiple layers of government. Each has

2 There are 30 Amici comprising 20 local governments and 10 local government officials, all of whom

are listed in Appendix A, and most of whom filed amicus briefs in the proceedings below.

2

capacity, expertise, and power within its own realm, and each acts in concert and

reliance on the effectiveness, partnership, support, and limits of the others. The

result is a constitutional ecology in which local, state, and federal governments

regularly interact with one another to share resources and information; develop,

approve, and carry out plans, approvals, and agreements; respond to emergencies;

and otherwise advance the common good. By design and in day-to-day practice, this

body of work—and the interrelationships and mutually agreeable cooperation on

which it depends—ultimately serves to protect and advance the health, safety,

welfare, and liberty of the public. As the layer of government closest to the people,

local governments have the vantage point to see how these interrelationships

directly serve the American public. Because of that perspective, local governments

like Amici are also uniquely well positioned to explain why mass disruption and

dismantling of federal agencies harm the public by making it much more difficult to

serve and protect the people.

Like all ecologies, this system of inter-related governance contemplates that

each layer of government makes its own choices about its operations—including by

exercising its own authority, within lawful bounds, over employment matters. But

as Respondents showed below, OPM and Ezell exceeded those bounds by directing

agencies to terminate probationary employees en masse. This has devastated the

workforces and capacities of the dozens of federal agencies on which local and state

governments rely. The laws thus violated establish that federal agencies must

exercise their employment authority in deliberate and careful ways—and, critically,

3

that they do so with due regard for the consequences their staffing choices have on

state and local governments. As these laws establish the rights of federal

employees themselves, they also protect the American people. When the federal

government destabilizes and dismantles its own agencies—and especially when it

does so abruptly, without careful planning and adequate notice—it prevents local

and state governments from implementing programs and taking actions to protect

and serve their residents.

This is not simply theoretical. Amici’s experiences demonstrate the

extraordinarily wide range of ways in which local governments interact with and

rely on federal agencies in order to meet their duty to safeguard residents’ health

and safety, just as the limited reach of the federal government requires federal

agencies to work with local governments. As a result, prompt and time-sensitive

interactions between local and federal staff are critical in matters as diverse as

treating rare, infectious, or emergent diseases; protecting the public from hazardous

materials; preparing for, responding to, and helping residents recover from floods,

wildfires, natural disasters, and massive public-safety events; and preventing and

reducing addressing homelessness. The fundamental, century-and-a-half-long

premise underpinning this interdependence is that as the federal government has

gathered the resources and built the infrastructure to shape American society and

support the American people, it has committed to operating its institutions in

predictable ways that collaborate with and support—and, at a bare minimum, do

not undercut—state and local government protection of their residents.

4

This interaction in service of the common, public good is the daily work of

government—and, therefore, of government employees. This is precisely why

OPM’s attempt to abruptly demolish the federal workforce at so many different

agencies all at once poses such serious, imminent, and often irreparable harms to

the American people.

ARGUMENT

I.

Close and Ongoing Collaboration and Interdependence Among Local,

State, and Federal Officials Have Longstanding Constitutional and

Statutory Bases

Constitutional text and practice establish “the compound republic of

America,” through which multilayered governance operates coherently for the

health, safety, well-being, and liberty of the people whom government serves. The

Federalist No. 51, at 323 (James Madison) (Clinton Rossiter ed., 1961); see also The

Federalist No. 39, at 244-45 (James Madison). These layers each have their own

expertise, strengths, capacities, roles, and limitations, which they leverage for the

benefit of the American people by working together, not in silos. The resulting

ecosystem is a complex and multidimensional relationship among localities, states,

and the federal government that is carried out every day by the employees through

whom governments do their work. Congress has recognized and facilitated this

ecosystem in a vast array of contexts, including through the laws governing federal

employment that Applicants have disregarded.

A.

Federal, State, and Local Personnel Effectuate Constitutional

Federalism Through Robust Interaction on Matters Essential

to the Public Good.

As the unit of government closest to the people, localities are the front line for

5

carrying out the fundamental province of government: to protect “the lives, limbs,

health, comfort, and quiet of all persons,” Medtronic, Inc. v. Lohr, 518 U.S. 470, 475

(1996) (internal quotation marks and citation omitted), and to act broadly “for the

public good,” Bond v. United States, 572 U.S. 844, 854 (2014). The Constitution

recognizes the critical role of local governance by establishing a “federal structure

[that] allows local policies ‘more sensitive to the diverse needs of a heterogeneous

society.’” Bond v. United States, 564 U.S. 211, 221 (2011) (citation omitted); see also

The Federalist No. 43, at 272-73 (James Madison); The Federalist No. 45, at 289

(James Madison); cf. Nat’l League of Cities v. Usery, 426 U.S. 833, 851 (1976)

(recognizing constitutional importance of local control in “such areas as fire

prevention, police protection, sanitation, public health, and parks and recreation”),

overruled on other grounds by Garcia v. San Antonio Metro. Transit Auth., 469 U.S.

528 (1985).

Our constitutional structure recognizes and protects the role of states and

local governments in preserving the well-being of the American people. NFIB v.

Sebelius, 567 U.S. 519, 535-36 (2012) (“the vital functions of modern government”

are grounded in the “police power” exercised by state and local governments). In

some instances, it preserves that role by emphasizing the federal government’s

limited and enumerated powers. E.g., Bond, 572 U.S. at 854. For example, the

Constitution’s prohibition on commandeering limits the federal government’s ability

to require non-voluntary cooperation from states and local governments. Printz v.

United States, 521 U.S. 898, 918-20 (1997); New York v. United States, 505 U.S. 144,

6

161-66 (1992); see also Health & Hosp. Corp. of Marion Cnty. v. Talevski, 599 U.S.

166, 203 n.6 (2023) (Thomas, J., dissenting) (noting that “[t]he anticommandeering

doctrine protects ‘political subdivisions’ of States against federal cooptation, as well

as the States themselves”).

In many instances, however, governments at multiple levels protect the

public health and welfare by interacting and working with one another on shared

initiatives. See generally Bridget A. Fahey, Coordinated Rulemaking and

Cooperative Federalism’s Administrative Law, 132 Yale L.J. 1320 (2023); Bridget A.

Fahey, Data Federalism, 135 Harv. L. Rev. 1007, 1074-79 (2022). As described

below, Congress has passed myriad laws that recognize and facilitate

interrelationships among local, state, and federal governments. Congress has also

established structures that all but guarantee that state and local governments will

experience and need to address the harmful externalities that arise when federal

agencies lose capacity to conduct their own work.

Some kinds of congressionally sanctioned interactions fall within the rubric of

“cooperative federalism.” In this model, a statutory or regulatory scheme

contemplates formalized interactions among levels of government to establish and

implement state-specific rules for federal programs within defined parameters. See

Fahey, Coordinated Rulemaking, 132 Yale L.J. at 1326, 1333-43. Medicaid is the

paramount example, both because its funding accounts for a large percentage of

state and local budgets and because it has such a direct and visible connection to

the health and lives of millions of people. See, e.g., Wisconsin Dep’t of Health &

7

Fam. Servs. v. Blumer, 534 U.S. 473, 495 (2002). But it is far from the only one.

Many programs deploy this framework, stretching back to at least the turn of the

century. See, e.g., Atl. Richfield Co. v. Christian, 590 U.S. 1, 24 (2020) (recognizing

CERCLA as an example of cooperative federalism); California v. United States, 438

U.S. 645, 650-51 (1978) (same for Reclamation Act of 1902); Hodel v. Virginia

Surface Min. & Recl. Ass’n, Inc., 452 U.S. 264, 289 (1981) (same for Surface Mining

Act), overruled on other grounds by Garcia, 469 U.S. 528; King v. Smith, 392 U.S.

309, 316 (1968) (same for Aid to Families with Dependent Children program).

But Congress and federal agencies also recognize and structure interactions

among local, state, and federal public employees in other circumstances, too. In

fact, Congress has made clear that federal willingness to collaborate, consult, and

interact with participating local and state governments is a matter of governmentwide importance: it enacted the Unfunded Mandates Reform Act of 1995 “to

strengthen the partnership between the Federal Government and State, local, and

tribal governments,” 2 U.S.C. § 1501(1), which it does by requiring agencies to

invite and consider “meaningful and timely input” on regulatory proposals from the

“elected officers of State, local, and tribal governments” or their designees, id.

§ 1534(a).

Solicitude for local and state collaboration echoes throughout the United

States Code and in all manner of administrative actions and structures unrelated to

the formal model of cooperative federalism exemplified by Medicaid. The wide

breadth of examples underscores Congress’s awareness that effective governance

8

depends on interaction and mutually agreeable collaboration among the levels of

government. Congressional insistence on multilevel coordination is especially

pronounced in emergency preparedness and response. Examples include FCC

planning for deployment of modern 9-1-1 systems, 47 U.S.C. § 615; U.S. Geological

Survey work to identify, assess, and plan for potential landslide hazards, 43 U.S.C.

§§ 3101(8), 3102(b); the Department of Homeland Security’s work “to ensure

appropriate exchanges of information . . . relating to threats of terrorism,” 6 U.S.C.

§ 121(d)(8); EPA and FEMA’s creation of a tsunami hazard mitigation program, 33

U.S.C. § 3204(b); HHS’s national suicide and mental health hotlines, 42 U.S.C.

§§ 280g-18(c)(4), 290bb-36c(c)(3); USDA’s deployment of a team to address crises

like “threat[s] to human health from food-borne pathogens,” 7 U.S.C. § 7656(b)(6),

(d); FEMA’s responsibilities to develop operational plans, 6 U.S.C. § 753(b)(2), craft

“model standards and guidelines for credentialing critical infrastructure workers”

who respond to disasters, id. § 321k, ensure that every federal agency “emergency

response team[] . . . work[s] in coordination with State and local officials and onsite

personnel,” 42 U.S.C. § 5144(b)(3), and “coordinate the administration of relief”

after emergency declarations, id. § 5143(b), (c). Federal law’s invitation to

collaborate with local and state governments also runs through statutory schemes

concerning preparation and response to public health incidents, 3 problems with the

3 E.g., 42 U.S.C. § 247d-3a(g)(1) (HHS, when developing criteria to assess preparedness to respond to

public health emergencies); 42 U.S.C. § 300hh-10(b)(4) (HHS, “to ensure effective integration of

Federal public health and medical assets during a public health emergency” and to train for “allhazards medical and public health preparedness and response”).

9

food supply, 4 management of natural resources, 5 criminal justice, 6 and amelioration

of hardships faced by low-income people. 7

This framework lives not just in statute, but in the daily work of federal

employees and their state and local counterparts. Environmental agencies offer

several representative exemplars. The National Weather Service has a

multipronged system to coordinate with state and local governments. 8 It touts that

it “works closely” with state and local officials around emergency planning: among

other things, NWS “provides direct support to government decision makers and

safety officials,” “can reach locally into the communities by providing consistent

Impact-based Decision Support Services” to local emergency-management

personnel, and “work[s] hand-in-hand with” these personnel “to coordinate weather

impacts for major events that have an impact on public safety.” 9 NWS explains that

“[t]his teamwork is important, not just when emergencies happen, but also behind

the scenes to better plan for critical events.” 10

The EPA is another example. Congress established a Municipal Ombudsman

4 E.g., 7 U.S.C. § 8914(b)(2) (USDA, when developing and executing comprehensive strategic plans to

respond to diseases or pests of concern); 21 U.S.C. § 350f(b), (d)(3), (i)(2) (FDA, when addressing the

safety of the food supply); see also Executive Order 13,100 of August 25, 1998, 63 Fed. Reg. 45,661

(Aug. 25, 1998) (“President’s Council on Food Safety”) (establishing President’s Council on Food

Safety and requiring it to coordinate with state and local governments).

5 E.g., 16 U.S.C. § 551c-1(b) (USDA, to authorize prescribed burns on Forest Service land subject to

extreme fire danger level).

6 E.g., 34 U.S.C. § 60506(a) (Attorney General and other federal agency heads, on programs “relating

to the reentry of individuals returning from incarceration to the community”).

7 E.g., 12 U.S.C. § 4118 (HUD, regarding low-income housing relief).

8 NWS, Information for State and Local Governments, https://perma.cc/RU5P-7CVN.

9 NWS, Federal, State and Local Partners, https://perma.cc/P2ZS-2YYM.

10 Id.

Local and state personnel are “NWS Core partners.” 15 U.S.C. § 8521(d).

10

to provide “technical assistance to municipalities” concerning the Clean Water Act,

42 U.S.C. § 4370j(b), and EPA directs the Ombuds to serve more generally as a

“resource to assist municipalities in navigating EPA’s Clean Water Act programs.” 11

EPA staff, sometimes together with FEMA staff, interact with state and local

officials in other ways, too, on matters such as climate change12 and first-responder

and emergency-management trainings for radiological and nuclear-terrorism

emergencies, during which a unified command structure is often necessary to

ensure “close coordination with federal, state and local officials.” 13

In these and many other ways, Congress and federal agencies themselves

foster collaboration, interdependence, and mutually agreeable partnerships among

local, state, and federal officials. These partnerships are indispensable to the dayto-day life of “our federalism” under which local, state, and federal governments are

“joint participants in the governance of the Nation.” Alden v. Maine, 527 U.S. 706,

748 (1999).

B.

Federal Employment-Related Laws Recognize and Respect

Multilayered Governance and the Interrelationships Through

Which It Is Practiced.

The centrality and ubiquity of interactions and relationships among local,

state, and federal government employees is an essential backdrop against which to

11 EPA, Municipal Ombudsman, https://perma.cc/CS7D-8G6K.

Many agencies have offices of

external and intergovernmental affairs responsible for prioritizing collaboration with state and local

officials. E.g., 6 U.S.C. § 361 (establishing such office within DHS).

12 EPA, EPA Climate Resources for Local Governments, https://perma.cc/U6CE-P8J7.

13 EPA, EPA for State and Local Governments, https://perma.cc/SKG5-2UYD; EPA, PAG Manual:

Protection Action Guides and Planning Guidance for Radiological Incidents, at 73 (Jan. 2017), at

https://perma.cc/T75V-CJ5D.

11

understand three features of the way Congress has structured the federal

workforce. First, the hiring and firing power rests with agency heads, not in a

centralized office like OPM. 5 U.S.C. §§ 301, 3101. Second, even for probationary

employees, termination must be based on the agency’s good-faith and individualized

determination that the employee’s “work performance or conduct during this period

fails to demonstrate his fitness or his qualifications for continued employment.” 5

C.F.R. §§ 315.804-806; 5 U.S.C. § 2301(b)(2), (6). And third, where terminations are

necessary to effectuate an agency’s reorganization, the agency must follow

procedures governing Reductions in Force (RIFs), including, for RIFs involving “a

significant number of employees,” giving advance notice to states and “the chief

elected official of such unit or each of such units of local government as may be

appropriate.” 5 U.S.C. § 3502(d); 5 C.F.R. §§ 351.801-803.

Consider first that employment decisions rest with agency heads. This

makes sense: Congress assigns to these positions ultimate responsibility and

accountability for the successful achievement of the agency’s mission. For instance,

Congress holds the Secretary of Veterans Affairs “responsible for the proper

execution and administration of all laws administered by the Department and for

the control, direction, and management of the Department.” 38 U.S.C. § 303. An

agency head acting with good-faith awareness of their duties would appreciate the

importance of hiring and retaining personnel dedicated to the agency and capable of

advancing its objectives; be able to develop agency-specific criteria to identify those

personnel; and understand that abruptly decimating the agency’s workforce

12

undercuts their own ability to achieve their agency’s mission—including, as

pertinent here, continuation of the agency’s relationships and interdependencies

with its local and state counterparts through which it fulfills statutory mandates

and otherwise conducts its work.

Together, the individualized, employee-specific assessments necessary to

terminate probationary employees and the advance notice of RIFs to employees and

state and local governments also protect the relationships between federal agencies

and their local and state counterparts. For agency employees responsible for

intergovernmental collaboration, the assessment must necessarily consider the

extent to which the employees engage in the collaborative interactions that statute,

policy, and job description demand. At the same time, the individualized nature of

the process prevents widespread and abrupt changes to an agency’s capacity. The

RIF regulations acknowledge and protect intergovernmental relationships during

major shifts in agency direction or approach: an agency must inform its local and

state partners well before it undertakes any significant reorganization precisely

because those changes affect local and state governments within the ecosystem, and

advance notice allows them to plan for an agency’s change in workforce.

*

*

*

Local governments—and, through them, the people themselves—rely on the

legal framework and the daily practice of interdependent collaboration.

Government workers give life and meaning to the agencies they staff and the

collaborations that support them. Local governments and officials like Amici have

13

an interest in the stability of the federal workforce and, therefore, in compliance

with the deliberative and considered path that Congress requires agencies to follow

to make employment decisions, reduce their workforces, and reorganize. It is

hardly surprising that Applicants’ actions to generate abrupt, widespread, and

chaotic workforce cuts simultaneously violate those laws and pose risks to local

governments and the people they serve.

II.

Local Governments and the People Themselves Depend on

Adequately Staffed Federal Agencies.

Amici’s experiences working with federal agency staff concretize and

illuminate the risks of Applicants’ actions. Because local and federal governments

are interdependent, the effects radiate outward from the affected agencies

themselves to the detriment of American health, safety, and welfare for which all

levels of government are responsible. To underscore that this can literally mean the

difference between life and death, Amici focus here primarily on public safety and

public health—but those are by no means the only matters in which dismantling

the federal workforce harms local governments and the people.

A.

Effective Preparedness and Response to Public Safety

Emergencies Demands Adequately Staffed Federal Agencies.

Amici operate law enforcement, criminal justice, and other public safety

agencies, employ first responders, and engage in public communications that place

them on the front lines of preparing for and responding to natural disasters and

other emergencies. This work requires heavy coordination and collaboration with

federal and state counterparts.

Take the Super Bowl. Every year a local jurisdiction hosts this massive

14

annual event. Santa Clara hosted Super Bowl L in 2016, and is preparing to host

Super Bowl LX and some World Cup games in 2026. Other local jurisdictions host

similar large-scale sporting events, such as the Indianapolis 500 and the Kentucky

Derby. These events are so large and concentrated, and present public-safety risks

of such magnitude, that DHS assigns them the highest available Special Event

Assessment Ratings and facilitates interagency coordination to prepare for them. 14

Congressional testimony from federal, state, and local public-safety officials

all underscore that no level of government can effectively manage the public safety

risks of such large events alone. Taking as a case study Super Bowl XLVIII, played

in February 2014 in East Rutherford, New Jersey, these officials all emphasized the

importance of collaboration. The federal coordinator testified that federal agencies

organized themselves into a Federal Cooperation Team with staff “drawn from the

local jurisdiction of the event to capitalize on” their “strong, local relationships.”

This was essential to overall safety preparations, because, as a state police official

noted, officials needed to “coordinate[] the activities of over 100 different Federal,

State, county, and local agencies” comprising “28 subcommittee working groups”

and “many disciplines.” This ultimately supported the work of a local fire

department, which, its chief explained, “prepared an overall operation and response

plan to strategically deploy assets throughout a coordinated response effort,”

including interagency training and drills, among other activities. 15 This intense

14 DHS, Fact Sheet, SEAR, https://perma.cc/GD7L-RDSH.

15 Mass Gathering Security: A Look at the Coordinated Approach to Super Bowl XLVIII in New

Jersey and Other Large-Scale Events: Field Hearing Before the Subcomm. on Emergency

15

and long-term interagency coordination was true and will again be true for Santa

Clara, 16 just as it was for New Orleans last month 17 and Las Vegas last year. 18

Without support and timely access to these federal personnel, local governments

cannot adequately prepare for, protect, and mitigate harm to their jurisdictions

during large-scale events.

Emergency management addresses much more than large, one-off sporting

events, and local emergency-management officials collaborate with federal

counterparts in a variety of ways to plan for and respond to emergencies. For Santa

Clara’s Office of Emergency Management, for instance, weather is always a critical

preparedness factor—both because weather itself can present emergent risks and

also because weather is a key part of the situational awareness essential for

emergency responders. 19 This is why OEM, like many other local emergencymanagement agencies, has long relied on the National Weather Service to

proactively provide real-time information about emergent threats, respond promptly

to requests for information and briefings for local officials, and, when necessary,

Preparedness, Response, and Comms., H.R. Rep. Serial No. 113-73 (June 23, 2014), at 7, 9-10, 12, 18

(testimony of DHS Special Agent in Charge Andrew McLees, New Jersey State Police Deputy

Superintendent Edward Cetnar, and City of Newark Fire Chief John G. Centanni),

https://perma.cc/HP3J-P3CS.

16 DHS, Secretary Johnson Highlights Super Bowl 50 Security Operations (Feb. 3, 2016),

https://perma.cc/J9KE-RPRB.

17 DHS, DHS Agencies Support Super Bowl LIX Security (Feb. 3, 2025), https://perma.cc/5U3U-

UW48.

18 DHS, DHS Works with NFL, Nevada, and Las Vegas Partners to Secure Super Bowl LVIII (Feb. 7,

2024) https://perma.cc/62JV-YEHR.

19 Cnty. of Santa Clara, Emergency Ops. Plan (Jan. 2022), at 8-9, 14-15, 79,

https://files.santaclaracounty.gov/exjcpb1566/migrated/2022%20EOP_County%20of%20Santa%20Cla

ra_01.20.2022%20Accessibility%20Check.pdf (recognizing potential for weather-related emergencies

and that “[c]urrent weather forecast” is essential to Daily Situation Awareness Update).

16

develop detailed spot weather reports for specific areas of concern—particularly

when assessing wildfires, floods, hazardous materials risks, search and rescue

operations, and other public-safety threats and severe weather events. 20 NWS staff

develop and disseminate this information by gathering data from satellites, radar,

and other systems, developing and operating computer modelling programs,

interpolating observers’ collected data and visual confirmation, synthesizing it all to

create “accurate outlooks, forecasts, and warnings,” continuously updating NWS’s

heavily trafficked website, and interfacing directly with emergency-management

and other officials at all levels of government. 21 OEM relies on the NWS employees

who produce these reports because NWS’s precise and specific predictions form the

platform for local first responders’ efforts to prevent fatalities, injuries, and

property-related loss and damage during and after emergencies. Local

governments’ emergency-response efforts will undoubtedly suffer if NWS lacks

sufficient knowledgeable employees to quickly develop the expert predictions and

analyses and then share them on a time-sensitive basis with local emergencymanagement officials. Media reports confirm that terminations at NWS due to

Applicants’ unlawful directives has undermined public safety across the country. 22

20 NWS, Instruction 10-401: Fire Weather Services Product Specification, at 10-15 (Apr. 15, 2024),

https://perma.cc/Z6YB-ZD53; Nat’l Wildfire Coordinating Group, Types of Fire Weather Forecasts

(Jan. 7, 2025), https://perma.cc/4NLW-USH5.

21 NWS, Who We Are (Feb. 1, 2010), https://perma.cc/R6FH-YEX8.

22 E. Bush, One sent tsunami alerts. Another flew with ‘hurricane hunters.’ Both were just fired from

NOAA., NBC News (Mar. 4, 2025), https://perma.cc/3QA9-HACX (noting termination of employee

responsible for sending tsunami alerts and contacting local emergency managers); A. Graff & C.

Baker, Cuts to National Weather Service Leave Forecasters Reeling, N.Y. Times (Mar. 1, 2025),

https://www.nytimes.com/2025/03/01/weather/national-weather-serivce-cuts-trump-impact.html; B.

17

FEMA is also a critical partner for effective disaster response and recovery.

FEMA’s employees provide local governments, communities, and individuals

critical, time-sensitive operational support during and after natural disasters like

hurricanes, floods, tornadoes, and wildfires, as well as emergencies like mass

shootings and terrorist attacks. Over the last four years, FEMA’s workforce has

responded to 278 disasters nationwide by providing water, meals, generators, loans,

grants, and other labor-intensive support to local governments and residents. 23

FEMA’s extensive experience supports its recognition in its “Post-Disaster Guide for

Local Officials” that “[s]uccessful recovery requires accessing a full range of federal,

state, local, tribal, territorial, private, and non-governmental resources.” 24

For instance, FEMA employees provided localized, on-the-ground support

during and after the SCU Lightning Complex wildfires that scorched Santa Clara

County in 2020. In coordination with Santa Clara’s OEM, FEMA quickly built,

opened, and operated a Mobile Registration Intake Center to support residents. 25

To do so, FEMA staff retrieved, supplied, and drove mobile homes and other

vehicles to the affected area, built infrastructure, and then staffed the center with

employees knowledgeable about the processes and requirements for residents to get

Berwyn & L. Dalban, Experts Say Attempted Mass Firing of NOAA Workers May be Illegal and

Threatens Public Safety, Inside Climate News (Feb. 28, 2025), https://perma.cc/598U-DM3N.

23 FEMA, FEMA Four Years in Review (Jan. 17, 2025), https://www.fema.gov/press-

release/20250121/fema-four-years-review, archived at Wayback Machine,

https://web.archive.org/web/20250207163643/https://www.fema.gov/press-release/20250121/femafour-years-review#expand (captured Feb. 7, 2025).

24 FEMA, Achieving Equitable Recovery: A Post-Disaster Guide for Local Officials, at 2 (Jan. 2023),

https://perma.cc/9QAV-FXRU.

25 FEMA, Mobile Registration Intake Center Open in Santa Clara County (Oct. 16, 2020),

https://perma.cc/393B-KPJ6.

18

low-interest loans and other assistance. FEMA’s work complemented local officials’

disaster-response work and efforts to anticipate and mitigate the harms of future

fires. 26 FEMA staff provided similar support after severe storms and flooding in

Winter 2022-2023, opening and staffing labor-intensive disaster recovery centers up

and down the state. 27 Given the heavy workload necessary for this kind of

assistance, and that FEMA was already understaffed, it is a near certainty that

mass terminations at FEMA will diminish disaster-recovery effectiveness and

increase risks of dislocation, financial and physical harm, and even death for

disaster victims. 28

Wildfire safety and management is another case in point. The U.S. Forest

Service, which manages the National Forest System, coordinates extensively with

state and local governments when managing national wildland and conducting

prescribed burns. 29 These efforts are critical to public safety not only within

national forests, but also in neighboring cities and counties. The City of San Diego

learned that lesson first-hand when a wildfire that started in the Cleveland

National Forest in 2003 spread outward, killing more than a dozen people,

26 See, e.g., Cnty. of Santa Clara Dep’t of Planning & Development, SCU Lightning Complex Fire

recovery and rebuild, https://plandev.santaclaracounty.gov/programs-and-studies/planningstudies/scu-lightning-complex-fire-recovery-and-rebuild.

27 See, e.g., FEMA, Three Disaster Recovery Centers Open in Santa Cruz County (Feb. 16, 2023),

https://perma.cc/5TLZ-9MWM; FEMA, Disaster Recovery Center Opens in Merced County (Jan. 18,

2023), https://perma.cc/WJ27-6FNE.

28 L. Sommer, What the firings at FEMA could mean for the next hurricane or wildfire, NPR (Feb. 21,

2025), https://perma.cc/KV4V-LYXX (current and former FEMA employees expect that probationary

employee terminations are “likely to hinder FEMA’s ability to respond to disasters”).

29 16 U.S.C. § 551c-1(b); Nat’l Wildfire Coordinating Group, About Us, https://perma.cc/M9ZW-JHB7;

Dep’t of Interior, Behind the Scenes: Who is Responsible for Wildfire, https://perma.cc/F749-9AFA;

U.S. Forest Serv. Wildland Fire, https://www.fs.usda.gov/managing-land/fire.

19

consuming hundreds of thousands of acres, and causing losses of $200 million in the

city alone. 30 Because inadequate Forest Service staffing can preclude or undermine

effective wildland management, en masse cuts within that agency place neighboring

people and lands in direct and potentially immediate jeopardy of wildfires, flooding,

and other natural hazards whose ravages local governments are directly

accountable for addressing. OPM-driven terminations of staff at the Forest Service

(and of secondary firefighters at the National Park Service) also mean fewer

mutual-aid resources available for local jurisdictions and greater demands on local

firefighters to help fight fires on federal land. This is already happening across the

country, including while affected Forest Service and Park Service staff have been

fighting wildfires from Louisiana to Los Angeles. 31 Marin County faces these risks

directly, since it relies on federal agency partners to maintain forest health and

prevent wildfires, manage invasive species, monitor and track wildlife, and prevent

illegal use of trails on public lands.

B.

Dismantling Federal Agencies Will Undermine and Stymie

Local Public Health Agency Efforts, With Devastating Effects

on Public Health.

Many local governments operate public health programs that monitor and

address the spread of infectious diseases and other matters of community-wide

health concern. There is a substantial federal public-health infrastructure that

30 City of San Diego, 2003 - Cedar Fire, https://perma.cc/GD7L-RDSH; FEMA, The California Fires

Coordination Group: A Report to the Secretary of Homeland Security, at 15 (Feb. 13, 2004),

https://perma.cc/KNA5-8B4C.

31 H. Bassler, Mass firings strain US wildland firefighters, Wildfire Today (Mar. 6, 2025),

https://perma.cc/3YZ6-V6L9; B. Hutchinson, Fired US Forest Service and National Park Service

workers say cuts will be felt on fire lines, ABC News (Feb. 21, 2025), https://perma.cc/25CU-34VH.

20

federal law overlays and makes essential to these efforts, so adequate federal

staffing—especially at the CDC, FDA, and other components of HHS—is essential

to local governments’ ability to treat residents and safeguard community health.

Local health departments and emergency-management offices rely on these

federal employees to quickly deliver medicine during public health emergencies.

Consider the Strategic National Stockpile, which stores large quantities of medicine

and supplies for deployment in response to terrorist attacks, disease outbreaks,

earthquakes, and other emergencies that would exhaust local supplies. HHS’s

Administration for Strategic Preparedness and Response (ASPR) staffs the office

responsible for the stockpile “24 hours a day, 7 days a week, and 365 days a year.” 32

A local public health official who needs “emergency medical countermeasures”

submits a request to “ASPR watch officers,” who then coordinate immediately with

federal officials and confer “with all involved parties” as soon as possible, often

within minutes. 33 After they approve the request, ASPR staff work to make the

medication available as quickly as possible. Federal workers’ prompt, indeed

immediate, response is necessary because the issues they address may be urgent

and life-threatening—“especially for Category A threats like anthrax or smallpox

that require rapid response.” 34 But abrupt terminations at ASPR cast serious doubt

32 HHS ASPR, Requesting SNS Assets, https://aspr.hhs.gov/SNS/Pages/Requesting-SNS-Assets.aspx.

33 Id.; HHS ASPR, Products: Strategic National Stockpile,

https://aspr.hhs.gov/SNS/Pages/Products.aspx.

34 ASPR, Requesting SNS Assets, supra note 32.

21

on HHS’s ability to respond effectively to stockpile requests. 35 Similar programs,

dynamics, and risks exist for CDC’s Drug Service and FDA’s Expanded Access

programs, which both require federal employees to respond immediately to local

public-health officials’ and healthcare providers’ requests for federally controlled

medications that are not generally available but are essential to treat contagious

diseases and threats such as anthrax, botulism, smallpox, and mpox. 36 Cuts to FDA

and CDC staff are likely to diminish those agencies’ ability to respond as urgently to

these requests as medical and public-health circumstances require.

HHS workforce cuts pose further risks to public health. Local governments

that operate pharmacies depend on adequate staffing at the FDA to maintain the

FDA’s drug shortages list, which is the linchpin to authorize pharmacies to produce

their own compounded drugs as substitutes. 37 Without adequate staff to ensure

prompt updates to that list, local compounding pharmacies cannot make the drugs

necessary to treat their patients. And for individuals flying into their jurisdictions,

local health departments rely on real-time information exchanges with CDC staff to

35 A. Tin, Thousands of probationary federal health agency workers fired by letter this weekend. Here’s

what it said., CBS News (Feb. 15, 2025), https://www.cbsnews.com/news/thousands-of-probationaryfederal-health-agency-workers-fired-by-letter-this-weekend; A. Cancryn et al., Mass firings continue

across nation’s health agencies, NPR (Feb. 16, 2025), https://www.politico.com/news/2025/02/16/massfirings-health-agencies-00204570 (noting terminations at ASPR); see also R. Pradhan, CDC firings

undermine public health work far beyond Washington, CNN (Mar. 4, 2025), https://perma.cc/D83LBFES (local public health departments across the country rely on terminated CDC employees).

36 FDA, Expanded Access to Investigational Drugs for Treatment Use—Questions and Answers:

Guidance for Industry (Oct. 2017), https://www.fda.gov/media/85675/download; FDA, Expanded

Access (Jun. 1, 2016), https://www.fda.gov/news-events/public-health-focus/expanded-access; CDC,

CDC Drug Service, https://perma.cc/X4MC-C2V2; CDC, Our Formulary, https://perma.cc/EMM47PN4; see generally 21 C.F.R. Part 312, Subpart I (expanded access regulations).

37 FDA, Compounding when Drugs are on FDA’s Drug Shortages List (Dec. 18, 2024),

https://www.fda.gov/drugs/human-drug-compounding/compounding-when-drugs-are-fdas-drugshortages-list.

22

learn of and prepare quarantine and other appropriate measures. Likewise, for sick

and exposed individuals who intend to fly into or out of their jurisdictions and who

could thereby expose additional individuals, local health departments also partner

with the CDC to elevate issues quickly and get individuals added to the federal Do

Not Board list for air travel and the federal Public Health Lookout for travel

through a port of entry by land, sea, or air. 38 For example, Santa Clara’s Public

Health Department worked with the CDC in 2024 to add a resident with infectious

tuberculosis to the federal Do Not Board list after the resident refused to comply

with his treatment regimen and threatened to board an international flight. 39

The CDC also operates a Laboratory Response Network that comprises public

health laboratories run by state and local governments, the CDC, other federal

agencies, and other partners. These laboratories form a national network capable of

responding to bioterrorism, chemical terrorism, emerging infectious diseases, and

other public-health emergencies by ensuring rapid testing, notifications, and

response coordination among local, state, and federal partners. 40 In the early days

of the COVID-19 pandemic, state and local health departments and healthcare

providers had no other option than to send samples to the CDC to confirm whether

a patient had COVID-19. While that is no longer true for COVID-19, it could be for

38 See CDC, Travel Restrictions to Prevent the Spread of Contagious Disease, https://perma.cc/HJ53-

3PRC; CDC, Protecting Travelers’ Health from Airport to Community: Investigating Contagious

Diseases on Flights (May 15, 2024), https://perma.cc/DCV9-EMHN.

39 See generally CDC, Improving the CDC Quarantine Station Network’s Response to Emerging

Threats, at 155-56 (2022), https://perma.cc/9JXD-DEXE (“collaborations with various [state,

territorial, local, and tribal] partners are critical in preventing onward transmission of infectious

diseases.”).

40 CDC, About The Laboratory Response Network (Oct. 17, 2024), https://perma.cc/HJ53-3PRC.

23

new and emergent infectious diseases. Local health departments also rely on CDC

staff to share information about emerging infectious diseases and other public

health threats, like mpox; 41 coordination among states to respond to specific cases;

guidance on unusual cases; and development of vaccine recommendations.

Local governments also bear the brunt when federal agency staffs are cut

abruptly and dramatically. Food safety typifies this point. While local health

departments are responsible for inspecting food facilities, investigating foodborne

illnesses, and preventing the spread of communicable diseases, the safety of the

nation’s food supply ultimately rests with the FDA and USDA. Local health

authorities can, and do, monitor and communicate with the public about the spread

of emergent diseases, like the Winter 2025 emergence of Avian Influenza A (H5N1),

but the FDA maintains responsibility for ensuring the safety of the milk, dairy

products, and animal feed supply and the USDA’s Food Safety Inspection Service

has exclusive jurisdiction over disease and contamination prevention for almost the

entirety of the nation’s meat supply. 42 Yet USDA’s inspection ranks are already

stretched too thin for effective regulation and enforcement; 43 further cuts would

spell disaster for local public-health officials and hospital systems responsible for

41 CDC, National Notifiable Diseases Surveillance System, https://perma.cc/A62Q-QGXQ; CDC, How

We Conduct Case Surveillance, https://perma.cc/3NNZ-LJ4Q; CDC, Collaborating Office for Medical

Examiners and Coroners, https://perma.cc/8RUD-NCHF.

42 FDA, Investigation of Avian Influenza A (H5N1) Virus in Dairy Cattle (Mar. 14, 2025),

https://www.fda.gov/food/alerts-advisories-safety-information/investigation-avian-influenza-h5n1virus-dairy-cattle; USDA, National Agricultural Statistics Service,

https://usda.library.cornell.edu/concern/publications/r207tp32d.

43 E.g., Hr’g Before Senate Committee on Ag., Nutrition, and Forestry, 118th Cong (Mar. 16, 2023),

at 51 (testimony of Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack), https://perma.cc/3BZX-9TMD.

24

treating to people sickened by foodborne illnesses. 44

*

*

*

These are just some of the myriad ways that local governments and officials

nationwide fulfill their duties to protect and serve their residents through

interactions, relationships, voluntary cooperation, and interdependency with the

federal employees who staff and operate administrative agencies charged with a

wide range of activities that promote the public good.

CONCLUSION

Governance—the work of government employees—maintains its validity

when it advances the common good: when it protects and uplifts people precisely

when they would otherwise be left to suffer alone the tragedy of the commons, the

pains of market failures, and the costs of unchecked externalities. Applicants’

actions to dismantle federal agency workforces undermines this fundamental office

of governance. Amici’s experiences demonstrate that the harm wrought by

Applicants’ unlawful actions to abruptly and broadly decimate the federal workforce

extends far beyond the directly affected agencies and into the daily lives of the

American people. As the front line of American governance, local governments and

officials know firsthand just how widespread, devastating, and imminent those

harms are for the lives, limbs, health, comfort, and quiet of all persons they serve.

For these reasons, the Court should not stay the district court’s preliminary

injunction.

44 See U.S. GAO, GAO-25-107613, Food Safety: USDA Should Take Additional Actions to Strengthen

Oversight of Meat and Poultry (Jan. 2025), https://perma.cc/78EV-QT8S.

25

April 3, 2025

Respectfully submitted.

TONY LOPRESTI

County Counsel

KAVITA NARAYAN

MEREDITH A. JOHNSON

RAPHAEL N. RAJENDRA

Counsel of Record

JENNY S. LAM

STEFANIE L. WILSON

OFFICE OF THE COUNTY COUNSEL

COUNTY OF SANTA CLARA

70 West Hedding Street

East Wing, 9th Floor

San Jose, California 95110

(408) 299-5900

Raphael.Rajendra@cco.sccgov.org

Counsel for Amicus Curiae

County of Santa Clara, Calif.

Additional counsel listed on following pages

26

ADDITIONAL COUNSEL

DAVID CHIU

City Attorney

City Hall Room 234

One Dr. Carlton B. Goodlett Pl.

San Francisco, CA 94102

Counsel for the City and County of San Francisco, Calif.

MARY B. RICHARDSON-LOWRY

Corporation Counsel

121 North LaSalle Street, Suite 600

Chicago, Illinois 60602

Counsel for the City of Chicago, Ill.

ZACH KLEIN

Columbus City Attorney

77 N. Front Street, 4th Floor

Columbus, OH 43215

Counsel for the City of Columbus, Ohio

KRISTYN ANDERSON

City Attorney

350 S. Fifth Street

Minneapolis, MN 55415

Counsel for the City of Minneapolis, Minn.

MURIEL GOODE-TRUFANT

Corporation Counsel

100 Church Street

New York, New York 10007

Counsel for the City of New York, New York

ROSALYN GUY-MCCORKLE

Allegheny County Solicitor

445 Fort Pitt Boulevard, Suite 300

Pittsburgh, PA 15219

Attorney for Allegheny County, Pa.

27

KRYSIA KUBIAK

City Solicitor and Chief Legal Officer

414 Grant Street

Pittsburgh, PA 15219

Counsel for the City of Pittsburgh, Pa.

BRIAN J. ALOIA

Corporation Counsel

94 Washington Street

Hoboken, NJ 07030

Counsel for the City of Hoboken, New Jersey

HEATHER FERBERT

City Attorney

1200 Third Ave., Suite 1620

San Diego, CA 92101

Counsel for the City of San Diego, Calif.

DOUGLAS T. SLOAN

City Attorney

1685 Main Street, Room 310

Santa Monica, CA 90401

Counsel for the City of Santa Monica, Calif.

MICHAEL R. HAAS

City Attorney

210 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., Room 401

Madison, WI 53703

Attorney for the City of Madison, Wisconsin

MIKE RANKIN

City Attorney

P.O. Box 27210

Tucson, AZ 85726-7210

Counsel for the City of Tucson, Ariz.

28

CHRISTIAN D. MENEFEE

Harris County Attorney

JONATHAN G. C. FOMBONNE

Deputy County Attorney & First Assistant

TIFFANY S. BINGHAM

Managing Counsel

Office of the Harris County Attorney

1019 Congress, 15th Floor

Houston, Texas 77002

Counsel for Harris County, Tex.

LEESA MANION

Prosecuting Attorney

King County Prosecuting Attorney’s Office

516 3rd Avenue

Seattle, WA 98104

Counsel for King County, Wash.

BRIAN E. WASHINGTON

County Counsel

3501 Civic Center Drive, Rm 275

San Rafael, CA 94903

Counsel for the County of Marin, Calif.

WALLACE W. DIETZ

Director of Law

108 Historic Metropolitan Courthouse

1 Public Square

P.O. Box 196300

Nashville, TN 37219-6300

Counsel for the Metropolitan Government of Nashville & Davidson County, Tenn.

JOHN P. MARKOVS

Montgomery County Attorney

101 Monroe Street, 3rd Floor

Rockville, MD 20850

Counsel for Montgomery County, Md.

29

ALAN SEEWALD

City Solicitor

One Roundhouse Plaza, Suite 304

Northampton, MA 01060

Counsel for the City of Northampton, Mass.

DOUGLAS T. SLOAN

City Attorney

1685 Main Street, Room 310

Santa Monica, CA 90401

Attorney for the City of Santa Monica, Calif.

DONNA R. ZIEGLER

County Counsel

1221 Oak Street, Suite 450

Oakland, California 94612

Attorney for the County of Alameda, Calif.

30

APPENDIX

i

TABLE OF APPENDICES

Appendix A – List of Amici Curiae ............................................................................. 1a

i

APPENDIX A – LIST OF AMICI CURIAE

Local Governments

County of Santa Clara, Calif.

Allegheny County, Pa.

County of Alameda, Calif.

City of Chicago, Ill.

City of Columbus, Ohio

Harris County, Tex.

City of Hoboken, New Jersey

King County, Wash.

City of Madison, Wisc.

County of Marin, Calif.

City of Minneapolis, Minn.

Montgomery County, Md.

The Metropolitan Government of Nashville & Davidson County, Tenn.

City of New York, New York

City of Northampton, Mass.

City of Pittsburgh, Pa.

City of San Diego, Calif.

City and County of San Francisco, Calif.

1a

City of Santa Monica, Calif.

City of Tucson, Ariz.

Local Government Leaders

Ravinder Bhalla

Mayor, City of Hoboken, New Jersey

Michael Chameides

Supervisor, Columbia County, New York

John I. Clark

Mayor, Town of Ridgway, Colo.

Diane M. Ellis-Marseglia, LCSW

Commissioner & Vice-Chair, County of Bucks, Pa.

Ed Gainey

Mayor, City of Pittsburgh, Pa.

Robert J. Harvie, Jr.

Commissioner & Chair, County of Bucks, Pa.

Ryan Mello

County Executive, Pierce County, Wash.

Christian D. Menefee

County Attorney, Harris County, Tex.

Ryan Richardson

City Attorney, City of Oakland, Calif.

Eli Savit

Prosecuting Attorney, Washtenaw County, Mich.

2a