Ecker v. Southwest Tampa Storm Sewer Drainage Dist.

75 F.2d 870, 1935 U.S. App. LEXIS 3086
CourtCourt of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit
DecidedFebruary 28, 1935
DocketNo. 7381
StatusPublished

This text of 75 F.2d 870 (Ecker v. Southwest Tampa Storm Sewer Drainage Dist.) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Ecker v. Southwest Tampa Storm Sewer Drainage Dist., 75 F.2d 870, 1935 U.S. App. LEXIS 3086 (5th Cir. 1935).

Opinion

HUTCHESON, Circuit Judge.

This appeal is like Krietmeyer’s 1 in two particulars. It is from a decree directing the application of tax funds-in the hands of a Florida drainage district receiver. It involves a controversy between holders of bonds of different issues. Here the similarity ends. On that appeal, the decree was reversed because it did not treat the funds in the receiver’s hands.as common to all the bonds. This decree must be reversed because it did. In the Krietmeyer Case there was only one “Plan of Reclamation”; in this case there were two, the original plan adopted at the meeting of August 1, 1924, the revised plan adopted at the meeting of November 25, 1925. In that case there was only one assessment of benefits, and it was based upon the “Plan of Reclamation.” In this case there were two, one upon “The Plan of • Reclamation”; one upon “The Amended Plan of Reclamation.” In that case the three bond issues involved were supported by tax levies upon portions of the benefits from ■ “The Plan of Reclamation.” In this case each of the two total tax'levies supporting the two issues was upon a different estimate of benefits. The tax for the first issue was upon the benefits first found, for the second issue, upon those found in the second commissioners’ report. In that case, the proceeds of all the issues were expended on “The Plan of Reclamation.” The proceeds of the first issue began it; those of the second and third issues completed it. In this case the proceeds of the two issues were expended on different plans; the proceeds of the first issue entirely on “The Plan of Reclamation,” those of the second issue on the “Amended” or “Revised Plan,” additional work not contemplated on the original plan. In that case nothing appeared but that the taxes and assessments levied were intended to provide a common fund for the payment of the district’s obligations, incurred in connection with “The Plan of Reclamation.” In this case the first total tax levied by the district, and the installments thereof, [871]*871were levied, apportioned, and pledged to the payment of the first issue, and the subsequent total levy and installments thereof were levied and pledged to the payment of the second issue. In that case neither in the petition of the receiver, nor in the proceedings had on it, was there any showing made that the moneys on hand had been collected other than by common levy for a common fund. In this case it affirmatively appears that the fund in the receiver’s hands was not derived from a common levy for a common purpose, but from separate levies upon separate benefit assessments, and for application to separate bond issues, and that a considerable portion, plaintiffs claim two-thirds of the moneys, in the hands of the receiver, was the result of taxes levied, collected, apportioned, and pledged for the payment of the first issue. It definitely appears, too, that the pro rata distribution of the moneys in accordance with the decree would result in the allotment of three-fourths of the total fund to the second issue. The facts are undisputed. Those material may be briefly stated.

On June 22, 1923, the circuit court of Hillsborough county, Fla., pursuant to the Florida drainage district laws, created the Interbay Drainage District, and it remained Interbay until 1927, when its name was changed to Southwest Tampa Storm Sewer Drainage District. On September 3, 1924, its board of supervisors adopted a plan, which became “The Plan of Reclamation.” On October 13, 1924, the report of commissioners, assessing benefits accruing to all lands in the district by reason of the execution of “The Plan of Reclamation” at $3,-412,222, was duly confirmed. On October 16, 1924, the board levied against the benefits assessed, a tax of $756,595.51, the amount found necessary to pay the cost of the completion of the works and improvements shown by “The Plan of Reclamation” plus 10 per cent, for emergencies. By further resolution it required that the tax should be apportioned and levied on each tract of land in the district in accordance with, and not in excess of, the benefits assessed. On February 6, 1925, the board, to make further and more definite provision as to the amount of taxes to be levied for and appropriated to the payment of the bonds and interest to accrue, resolved that “the taxes theretofore levied should be collected in annual instalments, the amounts to be certified for collection being set forth in a table, and that the amounts so certified each year should, when collected, be used for the purpose of paying the principal and interest of said bonds and for no other purpose.” The bonds were thereafter issued, the issue was validated, and plaintiffs and interveners now hold most of the issue. On October 19, 1925, the engineer of the district presented a revised plan of reclamation providing for “modification and changing of the plan of reclamation” by the addition of covered ditches and other improvements, “a regular city storm sewer project.” The plan was adopted by the board, and the circuit court petitioned to change and modify “The Plan of Reclamation,” in accordance with said “Revised Plan” did, on December 14, 1925, approve it. Thereafter, as had been done in connection with “The Plan of Reclamation,” commissioners assessed the benefits and damages to each piece and parcel of land embraced in the district, flowing from the “Revised Plan.” They found the aggregate amount of additional benefits, accruing to the property assessed in the report, from carrying out the “Revised Plan” to be $4,-186,181.40 and the estimated cost of carrying it out to be $2,361,830.40. This report having been confirmed by the circuit court, the board on June 1, 1926, levied a tax against these benefits of $2,361,830 plus 10 per cent., determined to issue bonds, estimated the interest which would accrue, increased the taxes to cover the interest, made provision for the levy each year of such taxes, and by resolution apportioned the levies for this issue so provided for, to the payment of that issue and to no other purpose. Interest coupons on both issues are in default, and some bonds are due though the district, through its board of supervisors, has heretofore annually determined, ordered and levied an installment of taxes sufficient to meet the maturing principal and interest of two issues, as called for by the two resolutions authorizing the two bond issues. For each of the years from 1924 to 1933 the defendant district has had prepared an annual Drainage Tax Book as required by law, in which there has been assessed against each parcel of land in the district affected a tax equivalent to the amount of the annual installment of taxes levied against it. There has been no segregation by the receiver to the issue for which it was levied and collected, of the taxes heretofore collected and in his hands for the payment of bonds, nor has he undertaken to determine what part of the taxes came from the levies on account of the first assessment, and what part from those on the second. The records,! [872]*872however, are such that this can be easily ascertained. There was a great delinquency in taxes through 1924 to 1933, but only an insignificant part of the 1924 and 1923 tax so collected from the first assessment alone, is delinquent". The large delinquencies have occurred since the second issue of bonds, and particularly since 1928.

Appellants, on these facts, say that the case is a simple one, not ruled by Krietmeyer’s appeal, or by those similar cases where more than one series of bonds has been issued by a district having full authority to issue bonds, and to collect taxes for all of the issues by one levy, applicable to all. Wesley Pape v. St. Lucie Inlet District (C. C.

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Bluebook (online)
75 F.2d 870, 1935 U.S. App. LEXIS 3086, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/ecker-v-southwest-tampa-storm-sewer-drainage-dist-ca5-1935.