Bannum, Inc. v. City of Fort Lauderdale, Fla., 97-4901

• Decision Date: 05 October 1998
• Docket Number: No. 97-4901,97-4901
• Citation: 157 F.3d 819
• Parties: 12 Fla. L. Weekly Fed. C 144 BANNUM, INC., Bannum Properties, Inc., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. CITY OF FORT LAUDERDALE, FLORIDA, Defendant-Appellee.
• Court: U.S. Court of Appeals — Eleventh Circuit

Page 819

157 F.3d 819

12 Fla. L. Weekly Fed. C 144

BANNUM, INC., Bannum Properties, Inc., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. CITY OF FORT LAUDERDALE, FLORIDA, Defendant-Appellee.

No. 97-4901.

United States Court of Appeals,

Eleventh Circuit.

Oct. 5, 1998.

Thomas H. McGowan, Rahdert, Anderson, McGowan & Steele, P.A., St. Petersburg, FL, for Plaintiffs-Appellants.

Robert H. Schwartz, Adorno & Zeder, P.A., Fort Lauderdale, FL, for Defendant-Appellee.

Appeal from the United States District Court for the Southern District of Florida.

Before HATCHETT, Chief Judge, BLACK, Circuit Judge, and KRAVITCH, Senior Circuit Judge.

HATCHETT, Chief Judge:

Appellants Bannum, Inc. and Bannum Properties, Inc. filed this action pursuant to 42 U.S.C. § 1983 against appellee, the City of Fort Lauderdale, Florida (the City), alleging equal protection and due process violations in connection with the City's enactment and enforcement of a zoning ordinance. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of the City, finding that the ordinance at issue was rationally related to the achievement of legitimate state interests. We affirm.

I. FACTS

A detailed account of the events giving rise to this lawsuit may be found in our prior opinion in this case and in the district court's summary judgment order. See Bannum, Inc. v. City of Fort Lauderdale, 901 F.2d 989, 990-95 (11th Cir.1990); Bannum, Inc. v. City of Fort Lauderdale, 996 F.Supp. 1230, 1231-34 (S.D.Fla.1997). Therefore, we provide only a brief factual overview.

Bannum, Inc. and Bannum Properties, Inc. (collectively Bannum) are Kentucky corporations that work in cooperation with the United States Bureau of Prisons to provide supervised residential programs for ex-offenders. In January 1985, the Bureau of Prisons awarded Bannum a contract to establish a community treatment center (CTC) in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. Generally, the program participants were federal prisoners that had been convicted of nonviolent white collar crimes and were serving the last stages of their sentences before release. The CTC agreed to provide housing and job Bannum filed an application with the City for an occupational use license to operate its center. Bannum also sought to lease rooms at the Areca Palms Motel (Areca Palms) in Fort Lauderdale to house the CTC participants. In April 1985, the City zoning authorities approved Bannum's application for the use license on the condition that Bannum move its office facilities to a commercial zone and obtain a separate license. Bannum complied, leased rooms at the Areca Palms and commenced operation of its center.

placement services in an effort to assist the participants in resuming their lives outside of prison as productive members of society.

In December 1985, after receiving complaints from City residents, the Fort Lauderdale Code Enforcement Board issued Areca Palms owner Gordon Johnson a notice of violation of Section 47-11.1.1(d) of the Fort Lauderdale Code of Ordinances, which requires a special use permit for the operation of a "custodial facility" within the City. ¹ Although the City's code contained the "custodial facility" designation at the time Bannum initially sought and obtained licensing, Bannum did not specifically apply for a special use permit. Faced with threats of daily fines for violating the zoning ordinance, Areca Palms ordered Bannum to vacate the rooms assigned to it. Johnson, however, maintained that the CTC did not constitute a "custodial facility" and appealed the citation to the Board of Adjustments, which held a meeting in February 1986 and denied relief. The following month, while Johnson was in the process of appealing the Board of Adjustments' decision to the Circuit Court of Broward County, the Bureau of Prisons removed the CTC participants from Areca Palms.

Bannum worked with city officials during the next seven months to locate an alternate site to house the CTC participants. Upon finding a suitable location, Bannum filed an application with the Planning and Zoning Board to secure a special use permit to operate the CTC at the alternate site. At a hearing in October 1986, the Planning and Zoning Board informed Bannum that it would not issue a special use permit unless Bannum provided the police department with the names and status of the ex-offenders that would be housed at the center. The Bureau of Prisons would not authorize Bannum to disclose such information, and the Planning and Zoning Board eventually recommended the denial of Bannum's application.

In response to Bannum's subsequent submission of a revised application for a special use permit, the City Commission sent Bannum a letter expressing its opinion that "the City has accommodated a disproportionate share of social service facilities[.]" The letter also stated the reasons that the City decided to condition Bannum's receipt of a special use permit upon Bannum's providing information about the CTC participants: essentially, the City wanted the right to "reject" proposed participants "based upon legitimate concerns for community safety." The letter also stated some apprehensiveness regarding the possibility that Bannum's center may house participants that had been "involved with control[led] substances" or "diagnosed as psychotics[.]" Ultimately, Bannum lost its contract with the Bureau of

Prisons due to its failure to obtain the required zoning permit to operate the CTC.

PROCEDURAL HISTORY

Bannum commenced this action against numerous defendants, including the City and other city administrative boards and officials. The complaint alleged violations of 42 U.S.C. §§ 1981, 1983 and 1985, as well as Article VI and the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution. The defendants moved to dismiss the action, arguing that they were entitled to absolute, qualified and municipal immunity. Treating the motion to dismiss as one for summary judgment, the district court granted the motion as to all defendants. Bannum appealed the immunity ruling as to the City only, and this court vacated that portion of the district court's judgment. Bannum, 901 F.2d 989 (11th Cir.1990). On remand, after further discovery, Bannum and the City filed cross motions for summary judgment on Bannum's constitutional claims. The district court granted summary judgment in favor of the City, and this appeal followed.

II. ISSUE AND STANDARD OF REVIEW

The issue presented in this appeal is whether section 47-11.1.1(d) of the Fort Lauderdale Code of Ordinances, either as written or as applied, violated Bannum's constitutional rights to equal protection or due process of law.

We review the district court's summary judgment ruling de novo, applying the same legal standard that the district court employed in the first instance. Hairston v. Gainesville Sun Publ'g Co., 9 F.3d 913, 918-19 (11th Cir.1993).

III. DISCUSSION

A. The Rational Basis Test

Section 47-11.1.1(d) of the Fort Lauderdale Code of Ordinances neither targets a protected class nor implicates fundamental rights. Accordingly, we apply the rational basis test to Bannum's equal protection and due process claims. ² See Georgia Manufactured Hous. Ass'n, Inc. v. Spalding County, Georgia, 148 F.3d 1304, 1306-07 (11th Cir.1998). In short, the City must prevail if section 47-11.1.1(d) is rationally related to the achievement of some legitimate government purpose. Georgia Manufactured Hous. Ass'n, 148 F.3d at 1306-07.

Under rational basis review, our inquiry is twofold. First, we must "identify[ ] a legitimate government purpose-a goal-which the enacting government body could have been pursuing." Haves v. City of Miami, 52 F.3d 918, 921 (11th Cir.1995). For purposes of Bannum's case, it is particularly significant that "[t]he actual motivations of the enacting governmental body are entirely irrelevant." Haves, 52 F.3d at 921. ³ Second, we must "ask[ ] whether a rational basis exists for the enacting governmental body to believe that the legislation would further the hypothesized purpose." Haves, 52 F.3d at 922. Thus, section 47-11.1.1(d) survives rational basis scrutiny "[a]s long as [the] reasons for the legislative classification may have been considered to be true, and the relationship between the classification and the goal is not so attenuated as to render the distinction arbitrary or irrational[.]" Haves, 52 F.3d at 922 (internal quotation and citation omitted).

B. Bannum's Constitutional Claims

Bannum contends that section 47-11.1.1(d) is unconstitutional as applied because negative attitudes and irrational fears about the CTC participants motivated the City's decision to enforce the "custodial facility" provision. Bannum also contends that the ordinance is unconstitutional on its face because it arbitrarily singles out social service programs for differential treatment, requiring that they obtain a special use permit in order to operate, while declining to impose such a burden on other similar uses of property-such as multi-family residences, apartment houses, motels, hotels, foster homes, mobile home parks, convents and fraternity houses.

With respect to the first prong of the rational basis test, the City advances several "legitimate state interests" that it claims to have been pursuing in enacting section 47-11.1.1(d), and in requiring Bannum to obtain a special use permit to operate its CTC. These "general welfare" interests include public safety and conservation of municipal resources. We have little doubt that these interests qualify as "legitimate" for purposes of rational basis review. See Corn v. City of Lauderdale Lakes, 997 F.2d 1369, 1387 (11th Cir.1993) (approving of "safety" and "effect on city services" as permissible bases for imposing land use restrictions), cert. denied, 511 U.S. 1018, 114 S.Ct. 1400, 128 L.Ed.2d 73 (1994); see also Bannum, Inc. v. City of St. Charles, 2 F.3d 267, 271 (8th Cir.1993) (approving of overall "public welfare" as legitimate rationale to support municipal...