My question involves business law in the state of: CALIFORNIA
Hi, we were informed that non-profits do not have to file DBA's with the County of Los Angeles. Only for-profits. Charities are allowed to operate under
other names w/o registering a DBA. So that is what we did.
We created a film festival as a fundraiser for our charity. We started festival in May 2009. No other festival had our name. (and still doesn't.)
Today someone emailed us asking us to "cease and desist" with using the name as they registered our festival name Oct. 2010 with the County.
They simply registered the name; that's it. Nothing else. Our festival only shows up online when you search for the festival name.
We have established the name online and off. They are trying to capitalize on our hard work. They have not even created their own festival.
We were told by the County that anyone can register the name, so they did not break the law; and that we followed the law and can continue to use the name.
But how do we protect ourselves from this individual? We don't want them to sabotage our festival. What do we do?
Thanks.
Patrice
PS We did go ahead and register a shortened name of the festival with the County just to keep it from anyone else.

