Board of Educ. of Granite School Dist. v. Salt Lake County, 17175

• Decision Date: 08 February 1983
• Docket Number: No. 17175,17175
• Parties: 9 Ed. Law Rep. 1063 The BOARD OF EDUCATION OF the GRANITE SCHOOL DISTRICT, a body politic of the State of Utah, Plaintiff, Appellant and Cross-Respondent, v. SALT LAKE COUNTY, a body corporate and politic and Arthur Monson, Salt Lake County Treasurer, Defendant, Respondent and Cross-Appellant.
• Court: Utah Supreme Court

Page 1030

659 P.2d 1030

9 Ed. Law Rep. 1063

The BOARD OF EDUCATION OF the GRANITE SCHOOL DISTRICT, a body politic of the State of Utah, Plaintiff Appellant and Cross-Respondent, v. SALT LAKE COUNTY, a body corporate and politic and Arthur Monson, Salt Lake County Treasurer, Defendant Respondent and Cross-Appellant.

No. 17175.

Supreme Court of Utah.

Feb. 8, 1983.

M. Byron Fisher, Charles B. Casper, Salt Lake City, for Board of educ.

Theodore L. Cannon, Bill Thomas Peters, John Avery, Salt Lake City, for Salt Lake County.

HOWE, Justice:

The Board of Education of the Granite School District (Granite) brought this action seeking damages from Salt Lake County (County) and Arthur Monson, Salt Lake County Treasurer, (Treasurer) alleging that they had failed to timely pay to Granite its share of property taxes which the Treasurer had collected. The Treasurer counterclaimed for costs (in excess of sums already paid by Granite) of collecting, apportioning, and distributing taxes on behalf of Granite. The district court denied relief to both parties. Granite appeals and the Treasurer cross-appeals from those denials.

The Treasurer collects taxes for 48 separate taxing entities located within Salt Lake County and then disburses the revenues to them. On behalf of Granite District he does so pursuant to U.C.A., 1953, § 59-10-66, which states in pertinent part:

It is the duty of the county treasurer to pay to the treasurer of each ..., school district ..., on the first day of each month, all moneys in his hands collected for and due such ... school [district] .... The county treasurer shall pay to the treasurer of each ... school district ... [its] proportionate share of delinquent taxes, interest, penalty and costs on all tax sales and redemptions therefrom, monthly, and shall make a final settlement ... on the last day of March of each year....

U.C.A., 1953, § 53-7-10 requires:

Such taxes shall be collected by the county officers as other taxes are collected and the county treasurer shall pay the same to the treasurer of said board within thirty days after it is collected, who shall hold the same subject to the order of the board of education.

Construed harmoniously these statutes require the Treasurer to pay collected funds to school districts within thirty (30) days of receipt and by the first of each month, and to make a final settlement on March 31 of each year. See Osuala v. Aetna Life and Casualty, Utah, 608 P.2d 242 (1980) which held that statutes should be harmonized in order to carry out the intent and purpose of the law. It is undisputed that the Treasurer failed to strictly comply with these statutes.

District Judge David K. Winder entered a partial summary judgment resolving the issue of liability in Granite's favor as a matter of law but reserving the issue of damages for trial. In the interim Granite amended its complaint to change its theory of recovery from one at law to unjust enrichment in equity. The parties agreed to this amendment and the Treasurer also proceeded in equity seeking recovery for unreimbursed collection costs based upon unjust enrichment.

At the trial, District Judge Jay E. Banks ruled that the Treasurer had "acted in good faith and in a reasonable manner with regard to the collection, apportionment and distribution of tax monies collected by him." The court also found that:

The Treasurer, by adopting a program of preliminary distribution to the various taxing entities as funds are cleared by his office [sic] has thereby substantially complied with his statutory duties governing such distribution.

The court further held that there was no evidence presented to show, and that Granite did not prove, how much money belonging to Granite was on deposit by the Treasurer on any given date during the time period complained of by Granite.

During the years in question the Treasurer had paid all interest earned on collected taxes on deposit to the County's general account. Nonetheless, the trial court determined that "Salt Lake County was not unjustly enriched at the expense of Granite School District through the actions of the Salt Lake County Treasurer." The trial court also concluded that Granite

was not unjustly enriched at the expense of Salt Lake County through the activities

of the Salt Lake County Treasurer even though the evidence is uncontroverted that it costs more to assess, collect, apportion and distribute tax monies for Granite School District then [sic] is billed to and paid by Granite School District.

PARTIAL SUMMARY JUDGMENT

Granite contends that Judge Banks' departure from Judge Winder's order of partial summary judgment constituted an appellate review of an interlocutory order which was clearly beyond his authority. However, revision of an adjudication that is not final may be appropriate. The question is under what circumstances revision is appropriate. See Richardson v. Grand Central Corp., Utah, 572 P.2d 395 (1977), where with respect to conflicting rulings on pleadings in a somewhat analogous problem, this Court held that a ruling by one judge as to the sufficiency of the pleadings does not prevent another judge from considering the same question of law if it is properly raised on a subsequent motion which presents the case in a different light. See also State ex rel. Stenberg v. Nelson, 157 Mont. 310, 486 P.2d 870 (1971) where, after amendments to pleadings, filing of pretrial memoranda and a pretrial conference, a second judge severed an action into three separate trials even though the first judge, who had been disqualified, had ordered one trial. But see Moore v. City of Las Vegas 92 Nev. 402, 551 P.2d 244 (1976), where it was held that a second judge abused his discretion in overruling the first judge since the only feature which distinguished the motion for rehearing before the second judge from previous motions which had been denied was the citation of additional authority.

In this case, Judge Winder's order, being a partial summary judgment, was open to revision if changed circumstances would justify it. Therefore the controlling question is whether the fact that Granite changed its theory of recovery from one at law to one in equity constituted a different presentation of the issue of liability to Judge Banks. We hold that Granite's amendment to seek recovery on the basis of unjust enrichment had no significant effect upon the issue of liability since that issue depended solely upon an interpretation of the statutes in question regardless of the basis of recovery. Because the amendment did not affect the basic issue, the Treasurer's argument is unpersuasive that simply by virtue of its amendment, the complaint required that the whole case be considered anew--including the issue of liability. Consequently, it was error for Judge Banks to reconsider the issue of liability when it had been resolved previously and nothing intervened to present the issue to him in a different light.

STATUTORY INTERPRETATION

Furthermore, Judge Banks' application of the "substantial compliance" rule outlined in Kennecott Copper Corp. v. Salt Lake City, Utah, 575 P.2d 705 (1978) to the Treasurer's practice in transferring collected school district revenues was also in error. Preliminarily, the fundamental consideration in interpreting statutes is legislative intent; and that is determined in light of the purpose the statute was designed to achieve. Intent is applied to carry out the purpose if it can be done in a manner which is consistent with the language of the statute. Johnson v. State Tax Commission, 17 Utah 2d 337, 411 P.2d 831 (1966). Quoting from 1A Sutherland Statutory Construction (4th Ed.) § 25.03, in Kennecott, 575 P.2d at 706 we noted:

There is no universal rule by which directory provisions may, under all circumstances, be distinguished from those which are mandatory. The intention of the legislature, however, should be controlling and no formalistic rule of grammar or word form should stand in the way of carrying out legislative intent. [Emphasis added.]

* * *

Generally those directions which are not of the essence of the thing to be done, but which are given with a view merely to the proper, orderly and prompt conduct of business, and by failure to obey no prejudice will occur to those whose rights Granite's receipt of revenues and the right to the use of those revenues are substantially delayed by the Treasurer's failure to observe § 59-10-66 and § 53-7-10. The purpose of these statutes is not merely the proper and orderly conduct of business. The rights of the school districts to receive the collected revenues are protected by the statutes; and, those rights are jeopardized when instead of distribution on a monthly basis or within thirty days of collection, over 98% of taxes are collected by November 30 of each year and the transfer practice has been in significant disharmony with the statutes.

are protected by the statute, are not commonly considered mandatory, ... [T]he provision will not be considered mandatory if the purpose of the statute has been substantially complied with and no substantial rights have been jeopardized. [Emphasis added.]

The following offers an indication of the history of the Treasurer's transfer practice:

                1973 (Treasurer Lambourne)  Date Transferred   Amount Transferred
                                            -----------------  ------------------
                                            December 13, 1973      $ 5,853,000.00
                                            January 2, 1974            140,000.00
                                            January 7, 1974          4,024,000.00
                                            February 1, 1974         1,646,000.00
                                            February 27, 1974           19,869.69
                                            May 28, 1974             2,066,886.32
                                                               ------------------
                                            TOTAL                  $13,749,756.01
                1974 (Treasurer Monson)     Date Transferred   Amount

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