Public Utility District No. 1 v. Town of Newport

228 P.2d 766, 38 Wash. 2d 221, 1951 Wash. LEXIS 422
CourtWashington Supreme Court
DecidedMarch 10, 1951
Docket31558
StatusPublished
Cited by19 cases

This text of 228 P.2d 766 (Public Utility District No. 1 v. Town of Newport) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Washington Supreme Court primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Public Utility District No. 1 v. Town of Newport, 228 P.2d 766, 38 Wash. 2d 221, 1951 Wash. LEXIS 422 (Wash. 1951).

Opinions

Donworth, J.

— The town of Newport is a fourth class municipality located within the territorial limits of public utility district No. 1 of Pend Oreille county, which owns and operates an electrical distribution system serving residents of the town and also residents of the district residing outside of the town.

On July 6, 1949, the town council enacted ordinance No. 306, which adopted a plan and system for the construction and/or purchase of an electrical supply and distribution system for the town of Newport at an estimated cost of two hundred thousand dollars, payable in revenue bonds. The ordinance declared an emergency and requested the county auditor to call a special election to be held August 30, 1949, for the purpose of submitting this proposition to the qualified voters of the town for their ratification or rejection. At this election, 334 voters out of 800 registered voters cast their ballots. The result was 193 votes in favor of the proposal and 141 against it.

The plaintiffs are, respectively, the public utility district, a customer thereof who is a resident of the town of Newport, and another customer who resides in the district outside of the town. They instituted this action against the town, its mayor, and its councilmen November 10, 1949, to enjoin the defendants from issuing and selling the proposed revenue bonds and from carrying out the provisions of ordinance No. 306. They also prayed for a declaratory judgment and for general equitable relief.

By stipulation of the parties, a temporary injunction was issued for the purpose of maintaining the status quo until the case could be tried on its merits.

At the trial, plaintiffs made three principal contentions:

(a) That the election of August 30, 1949, was invalid because ordinance No. 306 was not effective until its publication on August 18, 1949, and, therefore, the notice of .the closing of the registration books on July 30,1949, against [223]*223original registrations given by the county auditor was an act performed without' any authority.

(b) That the town was estopped from “seceding” from the public utility district after the district had issued its bonds based on the revenues produced by its system, eighty per cent of which came from customers residing in the town. (Plaintiffs offered to prove that it had outstanding an issue of revenue bonds in the principal amount of three hundred and twenty-five thousand dollars, and at least forty per cent of its revenues would be lost if the town were permitted to operate a competing distribution system. This offer of proof was rejected by the trial court.)

(c) That two municipal corporations may not exercise the same powers in the same área at the same time, and that, since the district had pre-empted the field by operating its distribution system, the town was precluded from operating a duplicating system within its limits.

At the close of the plaintiff’s evidence, the trial court sustained the defendants’ challenge to the sufficiency thereof in an oral decision in which it held that the election of August 30, 1949, was valid, saying:

“The plaintiffs complain that the election held in the Town of Newport on the 30th day of August, 1949, by which the voters approved the general plan and purpose of the proposed bond issue, was void and of no effect, because, as they allege, the notice of the closing of the registration books was not given for the time required by law, nor was the notice of accepting transfers from one precinct to another given for a sufficient length of time; that the failure, if any, of the officers of the Town of Newport to follow the statute with reference to the registration of voters and the transfer from one precinct to another, or from one ward to another, was an irregularity.
“The rule in such cases is that such an irregularity does not render the election void in the absence of a showing that the result would have been different if the officers had followed the law as contended for by the plaintiffs, and the voters had been permitted to register or transfer their registrations for the period contended for by the plaintiffs. I am of the opinion that the election held in the Town of Newport on the 30th day of August, 1949, was a valid election.”-

[224]*224The decision then discussed in detail contentions (b) and (c) and concluded that there was no statute prohibiting the town, under the facts of this case, from operating a competing distribution system.

The trial court on the same day entered its judgment (containing certain findings and conclusions) dismissing the action and setting aside the restraining order theretofore issued.

Plaintiffs have appealed from this judgment, and upon their motion the trial court fixed the amount of their supersedeas bond at three thousand dollars. This bond was filed in the cause, the result being that the temporary injunction remains in effect pending the appeal.

Appellants have assigned as error the following acts of the trial court:

“1. The court erred in its Conclusion No. 1 declaring valid the special election and the resolution adopted for the sale of $200,000 in revenue bonds.
“2. The court erred in refusing to admit evidence by the plaintiffs to show the amount of the revenue bond issue by the District, the damage which another electrical distribution system in the same area would cause to the District, to the people of Newport, to the customers of the District and to the taxpayers of Pend Oreille county.
“3. The court erred in its Conclusion No. 3 and in dismissing the complaint, setting aside the temporary injunction, and refusing to grant a permanent injunction.”

Turning first to a consideration of the second assignment, appellants argue that the trial court acted according to “harsh” statutory provisions of law without regard to the equitable factors which a court of equity should consider. As we view it, the trial court properly construed the statutes involved and declined to receive evidence as to the alleged damages which the district and its bondholders would sustain from tljp operation of a competing electrical distribution system in the town, and properly denied appellants’ offers of proof as to the disadvantages arising from this situation.

The problem is one of statutory construction. We have examined the act adopted by the people in 1930 (Rem. [225]*225Rev. Stat., § 11605 [P.P.C. § 833-1] et seq.) authorizing the establishment of public utility districts, as subsequently amended by the legislature. In the light of that act, we have also read Rem. Rev. Stat., § 9488 et seq., originally enacted in 1909, authorizing municipalities to acquire and operate certain utilities. In our opinion, these two statutes are not in conflict as applied to the facts here involved.

Appellants call our attention to the following provision of the public utility district act found in Rem. Rev. Stat., § 11615:

“When this act comes in conflict with any provision, limitation or restriction in any other law, this act shall govern and control.”

This language is immediately followed by § 11616, reading as follows:

“This act shall not be deemed or construed to repeal or affect any existing act, or any part thereof,

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Public Utility District No. 1 v. Town of Newport
228 P.2d 766 (Washington Supreme Court, 1951)

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Bluebook (online)
228 P.2d 766, 38 Wash. 2d 221, 1951 Wash. LEXIS 422, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/public-utility-district-no-1-v-town-of-newport-wash-1951.