It seems the hangup would be that the bishop wasn’t incorporated in CA (although the parish had been), and would have to have official residence in a CA county to do so. Holding the property in a relgious trust wasn’t a problem: the parish incorporated in 1867, before the bishop was translated. The bishop as sole corporation, however, involved more, and the incorporation of the bishoprick had been accomplished by the Cession Treaty, in Federal, not CA, jurisdiction. It would be interesting to see how the problem was resolved, as the Cathedral property was acquired. Btw, the mention of an officer of the Alaska Commerical Company acting as Russian Vice Consul brings all the elements of the Fort Ross days together: the ACC was the commerical successor to the Russian American Company, whose Act of Consolidation and 1799 Charter bound it to support the Russian Mission, itself under the jurisdiction (by the Third RAC Charter) of the bishop of Sitka.

Btw, the issue of the Catehdral being outside of its entitled Diocese was not new: St. Innocent established the espiscopal line in America when he was consecrated bishop of Kamchatka, Kurile and the Aleutians, with his see in Sitka, which does not lie in Kamchatka, the Kurile nor the Aleutians. In fact, Sitka is amost as far from SF (1400 miles) as it is from the Aleutians (1100 miles).