City of Miami v. Girtman

104 So. 2d 62
CourtDistrict Court of Appeal of Florida
DecidedJune 12, 1958
Docket57-191
StatusPublished
Cited by7 cases

This text of 104 So. 2d 62 (City of Miami v. Girtman) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering District Court of Appeal of Florida primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
City of Miami v. Girtman, 104 So. 2d 62 (Fla. Ct. App. 1958).

Opinion

104 So.2d 62 (1958)

CITY OF MIAMI, a municipal corporation, Dade County, Florida, and Randall N. Christmas, as Mayor of the City of Miami and as a member of the City Commission; George DuBreuil, James HIGH, Otis Shivers, B.E. Hearn, composing and as members of the City Commission of the City of Miami, Dade County, Florida, a municipal corporation, and Arthur Darlow, as Director of the Department of Engineering, City of Miami, a municipal corporation, Dade County, Florida, Appellants,
v.
John Charles GIRTMAN, Ralph M. Girtman, Katherine Girtman Johnson, Zelma E. Schmid, George H. Girtman, individually and George H. Girtman, d/b/a Flagler Parking Service, Appellees.

No. 57-191.

District Court of Appeal of Florida. Third District.

June 12, 1958.
Rehearing Denied July 16, 1958.

*64 George S. Okell, Sr., and John H. Smith, Miami, for appellants.

John E. Cicero and Charles Girtman, Miami, for appellees.

CARROLL, CHAS., Chief Judge.

This is an appeal from a summary final decree entered against appellants, who were defendants in the circuit court. The plaintiffs in the suit were the owners of property on which they operated a parking lot in downtown Miami. The defendants were the City of Miami, its mayor, the city commissioners and the city engineer.

The cause was heard by the trial court on plaintiffs' motion for summary final decree, on the pleadings consisting of the complaint and defendants' motion to dismiss and answer, without supporting affidavits (other than an affidavit to show non-violation of the fictitious name law), and without evidence other than that which was disclosed through certain exhibits to the pleadings.

It appeared therefrom that plaintiffs were owners of a parcel of land approximately 75 feet wide, extending through a block, with one end fronting on Flagler Street and at the other end fronting on Southwest First Street. On the Flagler Street end the property was located approximately 50 feet east of the city's Central Fire Station.

After removing a business building from the property in 1956, plaintiffs applied to the city on February 11, 1957, for permission to construct and use the property as a parking lot, and to so use it during an indefinite interval until they should again erect a building thereon. That application included an application to have ingress and egress for vehicular traffic in the operation of the parking lot both on Southwest First Street and onto Flagler Street. The application was heard and considered by the city commission of the City of Miami. The commission passed a resolution granting the permit for the parking lot, with ingress and egress on Southwest First Street only, and denying the application for ingress and egress on Flagler Street, because of traffic difficulties incident to the nearby fire station.

Acting on that permission, the plaintiffs constructed the parking lot and entered into business in March 1957. A month later, on April 12, plaintiffs reapplied for a permit for ingress and egress at the Flagler Street end of the parking lot. That application was made in the form of a letter addressed to the city engineer. The complaint alleged that he refused the application but the form or reason of his refusal was not shown on the record. He was empowered by an ordinance to approve applications for the location and construction of driveways prior to issuance of permits for construction of facilities requiring such driveways, and the validity of the ordinance giving him that authority was questioned in the trial court. We make no further comment relating to that ordinance because the plaintiffs' second application to the engineer was not appropriate under the ordinance since the facility for which the driveway was required had already been constructed, and because the same application as previously made through him had been considered by the city commission and denied by the commission in February, as a condition of issuing the permit for the parking lot.

The plaintiffs did not proceed to take the matter before the city commission, on that second application, but filed their suit for declaratory decree in which they challenged the ordinance under which the city engineer was authorized to approve applications, and in which they also challenged the action of the city in having denied to them their requested access to and use of the Flagler Street entrance for their parking lot business. The allegations of the complaint in this connection were general and were in part as follows:

"IV. Your petitioners allege, that the denial of said application imposed an illegal burden on the petitioners, is *65 an invasion of the property rights of the petitioners and is confiscation of the petitioners' property without due process of law, that the issuance of such a permit as applied for is a property right to which the petitioners are entitled, that said City of Miami Ordinance No. 5555 is unconstitutional as applied to the property of the petitioners in that it is unreasonable, arbitrary and confiscatory, and in that said ordinance is an ungoverned delegation of power and discretion by the legislative body of the City of Miami, that the defendants have unlawfully and arbitrarily discriminated against your petitioners in refusing to issue said permit; the actions of the defendants is illegal, unconstitutional, and void for that the denial of such a permit constitutes and amounts to an unreasonable taking of property without due process of law in violation and contravention of the constitutions of the United States and the State of Florida [U.S.Const. Amend. 14; F.S.A.Const. Declaration of Rights, § 12]."

The city relied on its showing, by attaching to its answer the resolution and excerpts from the minutes of the meeting of the city commission in February where the matter had been considered, that the city had by resolution granted the use of the parking lot with permission for vehicular ingress and egress only at the Southwest First Street end, and, in the exercise of its police power, had disapproved and denied the application to use the Flagler Street end of the property as an entrance and exit to the parking lot. As the basis for such denial, the resolution authorizing the parking lot contained the following:

"Whereas, it is detrimental to the health, safety, and welfare of the citizens of the City of Miami to permit ingress and egress to said lot from West Flagler Street as said entrance would interfere with the emergency fire-fighting apparatus egressed from Station I, located at West Flagler Street and Miami Court;"

The court in granting summary final decree ruled that the city had no power or authority to deny the plaintiffs the right to the use of the Flagler Street entrance for their parking lot business, and granted a peremptory order to the city and to the city officials to issue such a permit to the plaintiffs. Those provisions of the decree read as follows:

"3. All duly elected or duly appointed officers and officials of the City of Miami do not have the power or authority (under the City Charter or its Ordinances or Resolutions), to grant [sic], or deny, or withhold, any permit that would allow the plaintiffs ingress and egress (from parcel one as set forth in plaintiffs' complaint) on Flagler Street, for use of such premises for parking lot purposes.
"4. That the plaintiff Flagler Parking Service, has duly applied for a permit for ingress and egress from said parcel one on Flagler Street, and that the proper officials of the City of Miami are directed forthwith to issue said permit."

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Bluebook (online)
104 So. 2d 62, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/city-of-miami-v-girtman-fladistctapp-1958.