Security Pacific National Bank v. City of San Diego

19 Cal. App. 3d 421, 97 Cal. Rptr. 61, 1971 Cal. App. LEXIS 1295
CourtCalifornia Court of Appeal
DecidedAugust 20, 1971
DocketCiv. No. 10386
StatusPublished
Cited by1 cases

This text of 19 Cal. App. 3d 421 (Security Pacific National Bank v. City of San Diego) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering California Court of Appeal primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Security Pacific National Bank v. City of San Diego, 19 Cal. App. 3d 421, 97 Cal. Rptr. 61, 1971 Cal. App. LEXIS 1295 (Cal. Ct. App. 1971).

Opinion

Opinion

WHELAN, J.

Security Pacific National Bank, as executor of the estate of Florence Edna Blunt, deceased, and Joe Blunt (plaintiffs) appeal from a judgment in favor of City of San Diego (City) in an action seeking, by way of declaratory relief, a determination of the rights of the parties in a parcel of land which is owned in fee by plaintiffs but flooded with impounded water used by City as part of its water system.

The property (hereinafter referred to as plaintiffs’ land), which is the [423]*423subject of the litigation consists of that portion of lots 67 and 68 of Rancho Mission in San Diego which lies below the 100-foot contour line of what is now Murray Reservoir, formerly known as La Mesa Reservoir. Both portions together equal approximately 102.6 acres.

Plaintiffs’ predecessor in interest, the Junípero (incorrectly referred to as “Junipierro”) Land and Water Company, entered into an agreement on May 14, 1887 (the 1887 agreement) under the terms of which San Diego Flume Company (Flume Company) granted to Junípero an option to a perpetual supply of all water needed for domestic use on and irrigation of Junipero’s land, including lots 67 and 68; limited, however, to a certain measurable amount of water for each 15 acres, and at a fixed price. Junipero’s land for which a water supply was contracted was something over four full sections. The water was to be taken from a flume or reservoir, both of which were to be built by Flume Company. Junípero was also granted the right to use power derived from the water flow in the flume in order to pump the water onto Junipero’s land. Additionally, the agreement provided:

“And [Junípero] in consideration of the premises, does hereby grant to [Flume Company], the right of way for the aqueduct and flume which [Flume Company] shall construct across [Junipero’s land] or any part of the same; also as much of said lands for purposes of a dam and reservoir and the flooding to be occasioned thereby as [Flume Company] shall cover with such dam when completed and submerge under the water to be contained in such reservoir, provided that such dam (which with the said reservoir shall be contracted in the north branch of Chappel Canon in said tracts sixty seven and sixty eight) shall not exceed one hundred feet in height; and [Junípero] also grants to [Flume Company] the right to divert from the San Diego River above El Cajon the portion of the water of said River, apportioning to the tracts of lands aforesaid . . .”

After execution of the 1887 agreement, Flume Company created a water system by constructing an earthen dam in the north branch of Chappel Canon. Also constructed was a diverting dam below the confluence, of the San Diego River and Boulder Creek, which point is east of Lakeside near the Capitan Grande Indian Reservation. From that point water was transported through a wooden flume to the Eucalyptus Reservoir just east of La Mesa. From Eucalyptus Reservoir the water was transported through an open ditch to the earthen dam in Chappel Canon, thus forming Murray Reservoir. The San Diego River was then the sole source of water flowing into the reservoir and the dam and reservoir were an integral part of the Flume Company water system.

The right created by the 1887 agreement was transferred in 1910 by [424]*424Flume Company to James A. Murray (Murray) along with all other property owned as a part of the water system; concurrently Murray sold a one-sixth interest in the water system to Ed Fletcher, who with Murray operated the system as a partnership under the name Cuyamaca Water Company (Cuyamaca). The deed of June 1, 1910, from Flume Company to Murray included in the property conveyed a 24-inch pipeline laid about 1896, connecting the La Mesa Reservoir and a 20-inch pipeline leading to the City of San Diego, the point of connection being about three miles west of the reservoir.

In 1918 Cuyamaca completed a 100-foot-high concrete dam to replace the earlier earthen dam at a point downstream therefrom submerging the old dam and capable of flooding plaintiffs’ lands to the 100-foot contour line. The. new dam was, and the old dam may have been, on lot 19 owned by Cuyamaca. The open ditch conduit delivered its water to the reservoir at a point on Cuyamaca’s property held in fee. A 1921 map of the Cuyamaca system showed that, as a part of the system, from the Eucalyptus Reservoir there was a pipeline that led to a reservoir in University Heights in the City of San Diego, and that pipeline was joined by one leading from Murray Reservoir.

In 1925 Murray and Fletcher completed a sale of Cuyamaca’s assets, except for certain of the assets hereafter mentioned, to La Mesa, Lemon Grove and Spring Valley Irrigation District (District), which subsequently changed its.name to Helix Irrigation District (District), as it is at present.

We take judicial notice from the published decision of San Diego v. La Mesa etc. Irr. Dist., 109 Cal.App. 280 [292 P. 1082], that when Cuyamaca sold to District its distribution system within the boundaries of La Mesa, Lemon Grove and Spring Valley and the real property and facilities necessary therefor, Cuyamaca retained that part of its distribution system which was used to supply water to the City of East San Diego, Normal Heights' and a part of Kensington Heights, with an agreement that District should sell and supply to Cuyamaca one million gallons of water per day for such purposes; that those areas thereafter were incorporated within City; that Cuyamaca leased that limited distribution system to City with an option to buy together with its right to receive the one million gallons daily from District; and City undertook to and did supply water to the users within the areas mentioned; that the one million gallons daily was not water surplus to the needs of the users within District, but was water dedicated to an equally public purpose.

Meanwhile, City had established its prior and paramount right to the waters of the San Diego River and its tributaries for the use of its inhabi[425]*425tants to the extent needed as against Cuyamaca and District (City of San Diego v. Cuyamaca Water Co., 209 Cal. 105 [287 P. 475] [decided March 21, 1930]). The Supreme Court, in declaring the prior and paramount rights of City, declared, at page 130: “[T]he pueblo rights, and hence the rights of its successor, the City of San Diego, to whatever of the waters of the San Diego River were from time to time required for the needs of the pueblo and of the city and of the inhabitants of each, were rights which were essentially ‘governmental’ in character, as much so in fact as were the rights of the ancient pueblo and modern city to the public squares or streets, and that the term ‘proprietary,’ as employed with reference to certain commercialized uses made by municipalities and other public bodies, of water, light and power, for example, has no application to the fundamental rights of the plaintiff herein to its ownership of its foregoing classes of property dedicated and devoted to public uses.”

About 1935 City completed construction of El Capitan Dam on the San Diego River downstream from the diverting dam below the confluence of Boulder Creek with the San Diego River contemplated by the 1887 agreement and thereafter constructed.

Preparatory to the construction of El Capitan Dam, City was successful in condemning as a part of the dam site the lands formerly owned by Cuyamaca and sold by it to District, and described in the contract between the two latter as El Capitan Reservoir Site.

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Cite This Page — Counsel Stack

Bluebook (online)
19 Cal. App. 3d 421, 97 Cal. Rptr. 61, 1971 Cal. App. LEXIS 1295, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/security-pacific-national-bank-v-city-of-san-diego-calctapp-1971.