SACRAMENTO -- A California county can resume suing the manufacturers of lead paint while retaining private attorneys on contingency to represent it. For now.

The California Appeals Court for the 6th appellate district this week ruled, in County of Santa Clara v. Superior Court of Santa Clara Country (docket#HO31540), that a lower court interpretation of a previous case was flawed.

The opinion overturned a Superior Court decision a year ago that prevented public entities from paying contingency fees to outside attorneys in the lawsuits. Judge Jack Komar's ruling appeared to have put the brakes on further action, LNL reported at the time.

But this week's appellate court ruling has given the county and some of its municipalities new life to proceed. Plaintiffs are seeking damages and remediation payouts from manufacturers of harmful lead paint, including Sherwin-Williams.

Authoring Judge Patricia Bamattre-Manoukian wrote that the case at issue "does not bar the public entity plaintiffs in this case from retaining private counsel under their current contingency fee agreements."

But the case will not likely end there. Bamattre-Manoukian concluded that the issue of contigency-fee payments in public-nuisance lawsuits "is of great public significance."

Consquently, she wrote, "I would respectfully invite the California Supreme Court to review this issue and to provide guidance to the courts and public entities in this important and developing area of the law."