Home/Supreme Court of Louisiana/Louisiana Power & Light Co. v. Lasseigne

Louisiana Power & Light Co. v. Lasseigne

241 So. 2d 494, 257 La. 72, 1970 La. LEXIS 4067
CourtSupreme Court of Louisiana
DecidedJanuary 20, 1970
DocketNos. 49847, 49851
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 241 So. 2d 494 (Louisiana Power & Light Co. v. Lasseigne) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Supreme Court of Louisiana primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Louisiana Power & Light Co. v. Lasseigne, 241 So. 2d 494, 257 La. 72, 1970 La. LEXIS 4067 (La. 1970).

Opinion

BARHAM, Justice.

Plaintiff, a public utility with expropriating authority tinder R.S. 19:2(9), filed these expropriation suits, which were consolidated for trial, for appeal, and for argument before us, seeking to obtain a 100-foot servitude across these defendants’ lands and offering to abandon another 100-foot servitude across a different portion of their lands and to pay an additional amount for just compensation. The trial court granted the new servitude upon release and extinguishment by plaintiff of the existing servitude, reserved to defendants the right to claim damages which might be incurred by reason of the coexistence of the two' servitudes during relocation, made an award of certain amounts in two of the cases as just compensation “in lieu of the Court’s awarding severance damages”, and in the other suit allowed both just compensation and severance damage. The Court of Appeal granted severance damage and just compensation to defendants in all three suits and increased all awards. 220 So.2d 475. We "granted writs on the" application of both plaintiff and defendants.

The plaintiff attacks the Court of Appeal awards of severance damages. "Defendants urge that plaintiff' failed to prove the public purpose, need, and necessity required for expropriation, that its exercise of the power of~ expropriation was only to further a private agreement between plaintiff and, a large corporate landowner for their mutual advantage, and that such use constituted an abuse of that power. It is also argued by defendants that the proceedings originating in - an attempt to swap servitudes were a denial of due process. Finally, in the .alternative, they ■ argue that the awards made by the Court of "Appeal- were inadequate.

The Court of Appeal cusorily passed upon the first two contentions of these defendants, relying "upon its decision in Louisiana Power & Light -Company v. Lasseigne, 220 So.2d 462, which involved other properties and other parties at another location. However, since that record was made a- part of the suits involving these parties and is attached by reference, we "must consider the evidence in both for the" purpose of'this decision.

At the time Louisiana Power & Light Company, hereafter referred to as L. P. & L., filed this suit, it had a 100-foot right of way across the properties of the defendants upon which it maintained a 115-KV transmission line "suspended on wooden H-frames. The existing servitude rail’ straight from Sorrento to Lutcher, where it angled. From just east of-the Lutcher "substation it continued in’, a straight .line -to a [75]*75point approximately 250 feet from the western boundary of a parcel of land belonging to one of the defendants, where it again angled. It then resumed its straight course through these defendants’ lands and other properties for several more miles to Little Gypsy, a large generating plant. The servitude generally followed the Airline Highway (U.S. 61) except that it did not deviate for the curves in the highway. The 10- to 15-mile stretch of transmission line between the Lutcher substation and defendants’ properties deviated from its straight course only once, at the western boundary of LaPlace Plantation a few hundred yards’ distance from the subject properties. That deviation, according to plaintiff’s witnesses, was necessary because the relatively short wooden H-frames then in use would not suspend the line sufficiently in height over Airline Highway without zigzagging where the line crossed that highway.

To establish public necessity and purpose plaintiff relies principally upon its need to prepare for the anticipated future requirements for increased electrical power in this general area because of projected industrial, commercial, and residential growth. It allegedly envisioned an eventual conversion of the entire 115-KV line from Little Gypsy to Sorrento to a 230-KV line. It urges that to make this change-over for future needs and to straighten the line— that is, the zigzag — required for suspension of the line over Airline Highway, there was public need and purpose to be served in acquiring the new servitude.

L. P. & L. offered three witnesses, Mr. Morris Steiner, operating superintendent; Mr. George P. Marse, land agent, and Mr. E. A. Rodrigue, senior vice-president of the company, in its attempt to prove the public purpose of its proposed expropriation. From this testimony the following facts appear.1 About 1956 plaintiff began to plan in a general way to construct a 230-KV line from the Little Gypsy plant to Sorrento, which would actually be a reconstruction of the existing 115-KV line between those same two points. Coincidentally in the same year Godchaux, Inc., became Gulf States Land & Industries, Inc., hereafter called Gulf States, and the assets of the former corporation, including Belle Point and LaPlace plantations, were transferred to Gulf States. Again by coincidence in the same year Gulf States granted an option to Dupont, Inc., for the purchase of a portion of the Belle Point Plantation. According to the testimony of Gulf States’ vice-president, Mr. Cain, this “was the trigger that set off the need for a master plan” for the two plantations. According [77]*77to Mr. Marse’s testimony and other evidence, L. P. & L. and Dupont had made arrangements originally in regard to power needs and changes of location of the power line across the Belle Point Plantation so that Dupont, if it exercised its option, could fully utilize the land and he given proper electrical service for a proposed industrial plant. Since Dupont was acting at that time under the option to purchase part of Belle Point from Gulf States, it was to the benefit and advantage of Gulf States as well as of L. P. & L. and Dupont that power be made available and lines relocated where needed by the proposed Dupont industry.

Mr. Cain testified that L. P. & L. “contacted us with regard to the right of way to be changed at Bell Point”. He went on to say that in conjunction with the relocation on Belle Point, Gulf States, which owned the large LaPlace Plantation, realized the advantage of developing this plantation into a residential and commercial area because of the expected influx of population which might be attracted by Dupont, and it instigated these further changes with L. P. & L. on LaPlace Plantation in order to benefit its own development of the property. Although the deed of acquisition is not in the record, Mr. Cain testified that when Gulf States was contacted in regard to relocating the servitude at Belle Point along the railroad, L. P. & L. also wanted a substation (transformer and distribution unit) site and a utility corridor leading up to the Airline Highway. He also testified that L. P. & L. informed him that these requirements were based upon needs and desires of Dupont for maximum utility of land and for power supply as expressed in conversations between L. P. & L. and Dupont.

In line with all of these circumstances, on June 19, 1958, L. P. & L. and Gulf States entered into a servitude deed. The instrument is divided into three grants. We include a map with letter designations for better understanding of the different locations referred to. The first grant, “R/W No. 1”, gave a 100-foot servitude adjacent to the Louisiana and Arkansas Railroad from the east boundary of La-Place Plantation to the west boundary of that plantation (A to B on the map). “R/W No.

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Related

Louisiana Power & Light Company v. Lasseigne
240 So. 2d 707 (Supreme Court of Louisiana, 1970)

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Bluebook (online)
241 So. 2d 494, 257 La. 72, 1970 La. LEXIS 4067, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/louisiana-power-light-co-v-lasseigne-la-1970.