Harrington v. City of Tulsa

1934 OK 711, 39 P.2d 120, 170 Okla. 20, 1934 Okla. LEXIS 661
CourtSupreme Court of Oklahoma
DecidedDecember 11, 1934
Docket23648
StatusPublished
Cited by23 cases

This text of 1934 OK 711 (Harrington v. City of Tulsa) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Oklahoma primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Harrington v. City of Tulsa, 1934 OK 711, 39 P.2d 120, 170 Okla. 20, 1934 Okla. LEXIS 661 (Okla. 1934).

Opinion

SWINDALL,' J.

This action was brought by the plaintiffs in error, as plaintiffs below, to enjoin the city of Tulsa, the defendant in error, defendant below, and its officers, agents, and employees, from levying a tax or special assessment against the several properties of the plaintiffs for widening the paving on Eleventh street in improvement district No.. 1089, and to enjoin the city and its officers from various other acts in connection with the improvement of such street. At the close of plaintiffs’ evidence, defendant interposed a demurrer, which wag by the *21 court sustained, an injunction was denied, and plaintiffs were adjudged to pay the costs. From that judgment plaintiffs appeal to this court.

It appears from the record that at an election held for that purpose on February 4, 1930, the city of Tulsa was authorized to incur indebtedness by issuing bonds in the sum of $1,150,000 “to provide funds for the purpose of purchasing and acquiring real property only to be used in widening of arterial streets and highways in said city and improving street intersections therein.” With funds so provided the city purchased or condemned a 20-foot strip off of the property of plaintiffs and of other property owners for the purpose of widening Eleventh street from the center line of Houston avenue to the west line of lot 4, block 4, Norvell Park addition in said city, and thereafter, in accordance with the provisions of the Tulsa city charter, created street improvement district No. 1089, which includes that part of Eleventh street adjacent to and on which plaintiffs’ property abuts, and were proceeding by such means and in such manner as appeared appropriate to officers and representatives of the defendant city to cause the paving in such improvement district No. 1089 to be widened, and to levy special assessments against the abutting property to provide payment for such improvement, when plaintiffs brought this action. The 20-foot strip was paid for from the bond issue above referred to, and no part of the cost thereof was to be paid from the special assessments against plaintiffs’ property, but only the cost of widening the pavement was to be paid from the special assessment.

Plaintiffs, in their brief, group the questions raised under three propositions, as follows :

“(A) May a municipal corporation of Oklahoma, regardless of the manner of organization, that is to say, under general laws, or freeholder’s charter, assess the entire or any part of the costs of a municipal rather than local improvement against abutting and adjacent property, the primary object of such improvement to provide greater vehicular traffic facilities upon an arterial highway in and through the city of Tulsa, said highway being marked as U. S. Highway 66 and State Highway 75, especially where it becomes necessary to acquire by condemnation of otherwise twenty (20) feet additional to the width of said highway as per the recorded plat thereof, and not offend section seven (7), article two (2), of the Constitution of Oklahoma and/or the Fourteenth Amendment to the Constitution of the United States?
“(B) That the mayor and commissioners of the city of Tulsa had no legal right, power, or authority to condemn private property for the purpose of widening a street beyond the width provided for in the recorded dedication of such street under the charter provisions of said city, and inasmuch as chapter 350 of the Session Laws of Oklahoma 1929, pertaining to the manner and method of acquiring additional land for the purpose of widening existing streets in the city of Tulsa, was wholly ignored by said mayor and commissioners in carrying into effect said major street plan, the purported assessment by said officials levied against the property of the Protestants in said so-called street improvement district ' No. 1089 was and is illegal, null, and void, and casts a cloud upon title of protestants, which should be removed and said proceeding enjoined.
“(C) The right of protest by the citizen is provided for by charter provisions of the city of Tulsa, and is prerequisite to further inquiry into adverse action of its mayor and commissioners thereon. May such officials, therefore, wholly ignore such protest and make a legal, lawful levy or assessment of the cost of a municipal improvement against 'abutting and property adjacent thereto especially where four (4) installments of a previous assessment for grading, guttering, curbing and paving against said abutting property have not matured, and two (2) installments of a previous assessment against adjacent property have not matured. In other words, a double assessment against identical property, this, too, iu the face of ' the fact that the city of Tulsa is the owner • in fee simple of the property to be so improved ?”

Propositions (A) and (B) are presented together in argument in plaintiffs’ brief, and .the theory is advanced that improvement sought to be made in street improvement district No. 1089 is not a local improvement, but a general public or municipal improvement for the benefit of the municipality at large rather than for the benefit of the property and the owners thereof in the .street improvement district. We might say at the outset that plaintiffs’ proposition (B) does not refer to any matter which is under the record subject to review by ibis court in this proceeding. Plaintiffs apparently confuse the issues in this case with the issues in one or more condemnation suits, which it appears the city brought to acquire title to the 20-foot strip off lots abutting thereon in order to widen the street. One such condemnation suit is mentioned in the testimony as still pending at that time, but we *22 cannot herein take cognizance of the right or powers of the parties therein, or the regularity of such proceeding, as it appears affirmatively in the record that no part of the purchase price of said 20-foot strip or the cost of acquiring same is included in the assessments, the levying of which plaintiffs seek to enjoin. So far as this record is concerned, it merely incidentally appears that said '20-foot strip has been acquired by the city and become a part of Eleventh street, subject to improvement the same as any other street or part thereof.

Plaintiffs make no mention of section 7, article 10, of the Constitution of the state of Oklahoma, but we note that same is as follows:

“The Legislature may authorize county and municipal corporations to levy and collect assessments for local improvements upon property benefited thereby, homesteads included, without regard to a cash valuation.”

In the case of Gilfillan v. City of Bartlesville, 46 Okla. 428, 148 P. 1012, wherein parties sought to make a distinction between “improvements” and “repairs,” this court in the body of the opinion said:

“* * * The term ‘local improvements,’ as used in our Constitution, includes all and must be limited to such improvements as are, in,, fact, or are determined in the proper exercise of legislative discretion to be special and peculiarly beneficial to the property affected and thus to its owners, as contra-distinguished from such as are only beneficial to property in general or to tbe general public, and which may be made a charge upon such property without violating the Fourteenth Amendment to the federal Constitution.”

In the ease of Bragdon v. City of Muskogee et al., 133 Okla.

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Bluebook (online)
1934 OK 711, 39 P.2d 120, 170 Okla. 20, 1934 Okla. LEXIS 661, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/harrington-v-city-of-tulsa-okla-1934.