Harris v. City of Port Arthur

267 S.W. 349
CourtCourt of Appeals of Texas
DecidedOctober 24, 1924
DocketNo. 1155.
StatusPublished
Cited by4 cases

This text of 267 S.W. 349 (Harris v. City of Port Arthur) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Court of Appeals of Texas primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Harris v. City of Port Arthur, 267 S.W. 349 (Tex. Ct. App. 1924).

Opinion

WALKER, J.

This suit was instituted by appellant as a citizen and taxpayer of ap-pellee, the city of Port 'Arthur, to enjoin the sale of improvement bonds in the sum of $1,-036,500 issued by the city of Port Arthur and duly approved by the Attorney General’s department.. This appeal is from an order of. the trial court sustaining appellee’s general and special demurrers to appellant’s petition. While many attacks are made on the bonds by appellee in his petition of 82 pages, the following are the only grounds brought forward in his brief, as reflected by his assignments of error:

(1) The bonds were void because the city had attempted to annex the Model addition, without complying with its charter provi-, sions to the effect that “there must be a pel tition presented to the city commission containing a majority of the qualified taxpaying citizens residing in said territory or the signatures of 10O qualified taxpaying voters residing in the city.” (From first assignment of error.)

*350 (2) The annexation of the Model addition was void, because the ordinance calling the election for that purpose did not contain the caption provided by the charter. (From second assignment of error.)

(3) The order calling the election for the purpose of submitting to the qualified voters the question of whether or not the Model addition should be annexed to the city of Port Arthur and the order calling the election for the bonds in question were void because passed at special sessions of the commission, not called in compliance with charter provisions. (From third and sixth assignments of error.)

(4) The Model addition was never a part of the city of Port Arthur, because the city commission failed to comply with the charter provisions providing in annexation elections that “the result of such an election shall be declared by ordinance, and before property can become a part of the city by way of taxation there would have to be an ordinance passed declaring the said proposed annexed property to be a part of the city.” (From fourth assignment of error.)

(5) “That the court erred in sustaining a general demurrer and special exceptions to plaintiff’s petition because it is provided by chapter 2, section X of the Charter of the city of Port Arthur, that no ordinance, resolution or motion or action directly and specifically affecting the department presided over by any commissioner shall be passed or taken in the absence of such commissioner, and the plaintiff alleges that B. J. Wade, who presided over and had charge of the department of public property and improvement, which included the supervision of all public streets and public property, sewerage, and drainage, and that the ordinance calling for said bond election and submitting to the people the several questions contained in said ordinance directly affected his department, and that no session could be lawfully held without the said Wade’s presence and voting upon the questions that affected his department and that he was not present.” (Fifth assignment of error.)

(6) The order calling the bond election was void because it included the Model addition as taxable property of the city of Port Arthur when such addition was not, in fact, a part of the city. (From seventh assignment of error.)

(7) The ordinance calling the bond election was void because it did not contain the caption provided by the charter. (From eighth assignment of error.)

(8) The ordinance calling the bond election was rendered void and of no legal force and effect, because, after its submission to the people, and after the commission attempted to annex the Model addition, “there was a judgment rendered in the district court of Jefferson county, Tex., in which the defend-¿nts and each of them were enjoined' from collecting taxes upon any of the property of a large number of persons, and the plaintiff alleged in the court below that the said property which was exempt from taxation by reason of said judgment was of the most valuable of.all the taxable property within said newly annexed territory, and that by reason of the rendition of said judgment that the plaintiff and the other people residing within the city of Port Arthur had been subjected to a greater taxable burden than was otherwise contemplated by sáid ordinance calling for said election.” (From ninth assignment of error.)

(9)“That the court erred in sustaining a general demurrer and general exceptions thereto because the plaintiff alleged in the twenty-fifth paragraph of his petition that the city of Port Arthur had exceeded its authority to issue bonds for the reason that the bonded indebtedness of the city was approximately $3,000,000, and that, in order to create the sinking fund of 2 per cent, which is required by the city charter, and to pay the accrued interest on the bonded indebtedness of the city, the amount of the bonded indebtedness will far exceed and will be greater than 1 per cent, per annum of the taxable valuation of said property within the city.” (Tenth assignment of error.)

It does not appear very clearly from appellant’s allegations in what way the annexation of the Model addition would affect the bonds voted by the city of Port Arthur, as this addition constituted only a very small part of the taxable property of the city. But, giving appellant the benefit of all the intendments of his allegations, it may be inferred that the entire taxable value of the Model addition mustbeincluded in thecity tax rolls in order to prevent the bond issue from exceeding the limits of the city’s possible bonded indebtedness. If this is the proper construction of appellant’s allegations, then he is attempting in this suit to attack the annexation of the Model addition in a collateral proceeding, which cannot be done. It clearly appéars from his allegations that the city of Port Arthur attempted to comply with all its charter provisions in the annexation of the Model addition, received petitons for that purpose, called and canvassed- the return of the election held for that purpose, declared the result of the election, and annexed the territory by ordinance. After all this was -done, the city extended its jurisdiction over the annexed territory, and its citizens and officers, as well as the citizens of the annexed territory, recognized the Model addition as a part of the city. The jurisdiction of the city was recognized by all parties as extending to the extent of the election boundaries. In annexing the territory the' city of Port Arthur attempted to do nothing except what it was specifically authorized to do, and all things attempted by it were within the grant of authority given by its char *351 ter. No point is made that it acted beyond its jurisdiction in attempting the annexation, but only that it erred in attempting to exercise its jurisdiction.

On these facts appellant, as a private citizen -of Port Arthur, could not attack the validity of the attempted annexation in this collateral proceeding, but this could be done only in a.direct proceeding “brought for that purpose in the name of the state, or by some individual under the authority of the state, who has a special interest which is affected by the existence of the corporation.” Graham v. City of Greenville, 67 Tex. 69, 2 S. W. 742. See, also, Parker v. Harris County (Tex. Civ. App.) 148 S. W. 351; Gibbons v. Ross (Tex. Civ. App.) 167 S. W. 21; Cohen v. City of Houston (Tex. Civ. App.) 205 S. W. 757.

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Bluebook (online)
267 S.W. 349, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/harris-v-city-of-port-arthur-texapp-1924.