Town of Poughkeepsie v. Espie

41 A.D.3d 701, 840 N.Y.S.2d 600
CourtAppellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York
DecidedJune 19, 2007
StatusPublished
Cited by26 cases

This text of 41 A.D.3d 701 (Town of Poughkeepsie v. Espie) is published on Counsel Stack Legal Research, covering Appellate Division of the Supreme Court of the State of New York primary law. Counsel Stack provides free access to over 12 million legal documents including statutes, case law, regulations, and constitutions.

Bluebook
Town of Poughkeepsie v. Espie, 41 A.D.3d 701, 840 N.Y.S.2d 600 (N.Y. Ct. App. 2007).

Opinion

[702]*702In an action to recover damages for violation of General Municipal Law § 103, fraud, and breach of contract, the defendants appeal, as limited by their brief, from so much of an order of the Supreme Court, Dutchess County (Pagones, J.), dated July 12, 2006, as denied those branches of their motion which were pursuant to CPLR 3211 (a) (5) and (7) to dismiss the complaint as time-barred, or in the alternative, to dismiss the causes of action alleging a violation of General Municipal Law § 103 and fraud for failure to state a cause of action, and to dismiss the breach of contract cause of action as barred by the statute of frauds.

Ordered that the order is modified, on the law, by deleting the provision thereof denying that branch of the motion which was pursuant to CPLR 3211 (a) (5) to dismiss the causes of action alleging a violation of General Municipal Law § 103 and fraud as time-barred, and substituting therefor a provision granting that branch of the motion; as so modified, the order is affirmed insofar as appealed from, without costs or disbursements.

On September 4, 2002 the Town of Poughkeepsie commenced an action in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (hereinafter the federal action) against, among others, Thomas Espié and Betty Espié alleging, among other things, a violation of the competitive bidding requirements of General Municipal Law § 103, common-law fraud, and breach of contract in connection with a contract for the purchase of, and renovations for, a warehouse owned by the Espies. The Town intended to use the warehouse as a new police and court facility.

In both the federal action and the instant action, the Town alleged that the Espies and others engaged in a scheme to defraud the Town of money by securing the payment of bribes in order to garner support in steering the Town to agree to lease the Espies’ warehouse as the police and court facility, with an option to purchase the property, and to engage the Espies to renovate the property.

[703]*703On March 15, 1995 the Town Board of the Town of Poughkeepsie (hereinafter the Town Board) authorized the execution of a lease for the warehouse, including improvements, and an option to purchase the warehouse for the sum of $5,350,000. The lease was executed on April 20, 1995. The monthly rental fee was set in the sum of $48,750, commencing on May 1, 1995, and continuing for a term of 15 years. The lease included a rider assigning an apparently oral contract to renovate the warehouse (hereinafter the renovation agreement) to the Espies, and setting forth the terms under which the Espies would undertake the renovation project. The Town alleged in both the federal action and the instant action that the renovation agreement should have been let out for competitive bidding pursuant to General Municipal Law § 103, and that the Espies participated in a scheme to structure the lease to circumvent the competitive bidding requirements.

The lease provided that it would terminate when the Espies conveyed title to the warehouse to the Town, which would occur upon the Town’s exercise of an option to purchase the warehouse contained in the lease. On May 30, 1995 the Town executed a purchase and sale agreement, thus enabling it to exercise the option to purchase the warehouse for the sum of $5,350,000. At some point after accepting the assignment of the renovation agreement, the defendants hired the contractor Roy C. Knapp & Sons, which commenced renovations on the warehouse.

On July 17, 1996 the Town Board adopted a resolution authorizing the execution of an amended lease agreement. The amended lease agreement increased the monthly rental fee to the sum of $80,000, extended the term of the lease to 20 years, and increased the purchase price of the property from the sum of $5,350,000 to the sum of $6,950,000. The amended lease agreement was executed on July 18, 1996.

The Town alleged that the Espies represented that the increase was necessary for unexpected renovation needs, including heating, ventilation, conversion of a pole barn on the property into an automobile maintenance center, installation of a more extensive telecommunications system than the extant system, and the purchase of an emergency power backup system. The Town alleged that these representations were false when made and made with the intent to defraud the Town of money.

The Town alleged that, upon completion of the renovations to the warehouse, it immediately exercised the option to purchase. The parties closed on the sale of the warehouse on September 18, 1996.

[704]*704On January 27, 2006 the United States District Court (Brieant, U.S.D.J.), after revisiting its prior holdings in connection with the Espies’ motion to dismiss the federal complaint (see Town of Poughkeepsie v Espie, 402 F Supp 2d 443, 445 [2005]), dismissed, without prejudice, the Town’s claims for relief alleging a violation of General Municipal Law § 103, fraud, and breach of contract, so that they could be recommenced in state court. Thereafter, within six months after dismissal of the federal action, and on or about March 9, 2006, the Town commenced the instant action against the Espies in the Supreme Court, Dutchess County, asserting the same three causes of action as had been alleged in the federal action (see CPLR 205 [a]). The Supreme Court denied in its entirety the Espies’ motion to dismiss the complaint.

The Supreme Court erred in denying that branch of Espies’ motion which was to dismiss, as time-barred, the first cause of action predicated on a violation of General Municipal Law § 103. Neither the statute nor case law provides a limitations period governing a competitive bidding violation cause of action asserted by a municipality against a vendor in connection with the award of a public works contract. Therefore, “it is necessary to examine the substance of that action to identify the relationship out of which the claim arises and the relief sought” (Solnick v Whalen, 49 NY2d 224, 229 [1980]; see Hartnett v New York City Tr. Auth., 86 NY2d 438, 443-444 [1995]). The substance of the claim involves both common-law breach of contract and fraud principles. The Town seeks to recover damages because the renovation agreement allegedly was not awarded to the lowest bidder, and the Espies allegedly participated in a fraudulent scheme to structure a sham lease with an option to purchase in order to accomplish this result (see Albion Indus. Ctr. v Town of Albion, 62 AD2d 478, 482-483 [1978]). Accordingly, the six-year catch-all limitations period of CPLR 213 governs this claim (see CPLR 213 [1]; see generally National States Elec. Corp. v City of New York, 225 AD2d 745, 747 [1996]).

In applying this limitations period, we conclude that the competitive bidding violation cause of action accrued on April 20, 1995 when the renovation project was assigned to the Espies as part of the lease agreement. “A cause of action accrues, for the purpose of measuring the period of limitations, ‘when all of the facts necessary to the cause of action have occurred so that the party would be entitled to obtain relief in court’ ” (Matter of Motor Veh. Acc. Indem. Corp. v Aetna Cas. & Sur. Co., 89 NY2d 214, 221 [1996], quoting Aetna Life & Cas. Co. v Nelson, 67 NY2d 169, 175 [1986]).

[705]

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Bluebook (online)
41 A.D.3d 701, 840 N.Y.S.2d 600, Counsel Stack Legal Research, https://law.counselstack.com/opinion/town-of-poughkeepsie-v-espie-nyappdiv-2007.