Crystal Hodgson joined Jones Mayer in 2015 and is based in the Firm’s Citrus Heights office. She serves as the city attorney for the City of Nevada City and deputy city attorney for many of the Firm’s other client cities, including Citrus Heights, Bishop, Clearlake, Colusa, and Fort Bragg. Ms. Hodgson exclusively specializes in municipal law and is experienced in drafting city ordinances and municipal code provisions, advising on zoning and land use issues, drafting and reviewing contracts, leases, licenses agreements, and other municipal agreements, and advising cities on the variety of laws affecting municipal entities such as the Public Records Act, the Brown Act, election law, and conflicts of interest laws. She has special expertise in the areas of land use and cannabis law.
Ms. Hodgson is a native Tennessean and received a bachelor of science degree in political science in 2001 from Belmont University in Nashville, Tennessee. She received her law degree from Chapman University School of Law in Orange, California, in 2004 and was admitted to the State Bar of California the same year. During law school, Ms. Hodgson was a member of the Moot Court Honor Board, served as associate managing editor of the Nexus Law Journal, and served as an extern to Justice Eileen C. Moore of the Fourth District Court of Appeal, Third Division, in Santa Ana, California. She received awards for top grades in constitutional law and legal research and writing, and she received the Chapman Award, a peer-selected award given to the student who best demonstrates honesty, integrity, and professionalism during her law school career.
Prior to joining the Firm, Ms. Hodgson served as in-house deputy city attorney for the City of Rocklin, California, from 2006 until 2011 and was a contract attorney with the firm of Meyers Nave in Sacramento, California, from 2014 to 2015.