Capital Region Airport Authority v. TOWNSHIP OF DeWITT TP.

• Decision Date: 22 October 1999
• Docket Number: Docket No. 201181.
• Citation: 236 Mich. App. 576,601 N.W.2d 141
• Parties: CAPITAL REGION AIRPORT AUTHORITY, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. CHARTER TOWNSHIP OF DeWITT, Defendant-Appellant.
• Court: Court of Appeal of Michigan — District of US

601 N.W.2d 141

236 Mich. App. 576

CAPITAL REGION AIRPORT AUTHORITY, Plaintiff-Appellee, v. CHARTER TOWNSHIP OF DeWITT, Defendant-Appellant.

Docket No. 201181.

Court of Appeals of Michigan.

Submitted August 12, 1998, at Grand Rapids.

Decided July 23, 1999, at 9:00 a.m.

Released for Publication October 22, 1999.

Larry A. Salstrom, Okemos, for the plaintiff.

J. Richard Robinson, Okemos, for the defendant.

Before: SAAD, P.J., and JANSEN and HOEKSTRA, JJ.

SAAD, P.J.

Plaintiff Capital Region Airport Authority (CRAA), a state agency charged with operating Capital City Airport, brought this suit against the Charter Township of DeWitt claiming exemption from DeWitt's zoning ordinance so that it could develop a business park on airport grounds. The trial court held that DeWitt was not authorized to regulate airport land use and that the CRAA was not subject to DeWitt's land-use ordinances. DeWitt now appeals from the trial court's order granting summary disposition in favor of the CRAA pursuant to MCR 2.116(C)(10). We reverse and remand for further proceedings.

I FACTS AND PROCEEDINGS

The CRAA is the airport authority charged with operating Capital City Airport pursuant to the airport authorities act, 1970 PA 73, as amended, M.C.L. § 259.801 et seq.; MSA 10.380(1) et seq. Airport authorities, including the CRAA, were statutorily created in 1970 to assume the powers and responsibilities set forth in the Aeronautics Code, M.C.L. § 259.1 et seq.; MSA 10.101 et seq. Before the enactment of 1970 PA 73, these powers and responsibilities were held by the Michigan Aeronautics Commission. MCL 259.809; MSA 10.380(9). Capital City Airport occupies land in three counties (Ingham, Clinton, and Eaton) and four municipalities (defendant DeWitt Township, Delta Township, the City of Lansing, and Watertown Township). The Aeronautics Code allows the CRAA to lease airport lands for nonaeronautical purposes, and the CRAA has apparently done so in the past without protest or interference by DeWitt. MCL 259.105; MSA 10.205.

This conflict arose when the CRAA articulated its plan to develop airport lands in DeWitt contrary to DeWitt's zoning ordinance. The CRAA decided to subdivide a portion of Capital City Airport into a development to be known as the "Capital City Airport Business Park."¹ At least some of these lots were slated for lease to nonaviation-related businesses. The CRAA also negotiated plans with an existing tenant to construct a tortilla processing plant on airport grounds. These proposed developments were contrary to the zoning ordinance DeWitt promulgated pursuant to its authority under the Township Zoning Act (TZA), M.C.L. § 125.271 et seq.; MSA 5.2963(1) et seq.² Some of the anticipated tenants for the business park balked because they were unable to obtain DeWitt's zoning approval to operate on the airport grounds. The CRAA also made an unsuccessful attempt to obtain rezoning for the tortilla plant. DeWitt maintained that the TZA allowed DeWitt to enforce its zoning ordinance with respect to the CRAA's land use. DeWitt also argued that the CRAA was obligated to submit to DeWitt a "development plan" and to comply with the requirements in the Land Division Act (formerly the Subdivision Control Act of 1967); MCL 560.101 et seq.; MSA 26.430(101) et seq., in order to subdivide the land in question. The CRAA denied that DeWitt had the authority to regulate the CRAA's land use: it argued that the aeronautical statutes conferred on the CRAA the exclusive jurisdiction over airport property and operations. The CRAA sued DeWitt for declaratory relief to establish the CRAA's right of exclusive jurisdiction over airport land use.

Both parties moved for summary disposition. The CRAA asserted that the Capital City Airport property was exempt from DeWitt's zoning regulations and the Land Division Act because the Legislature intended for the CRAA to have sole jurisdiction over the airport. DeWitt gainsaid the CRAA's assertion, contending that none of the relevant statutes exempted the CRAA from local regulation. The trial court ruled for the CRAA and held that the Airport Authorities Act, M.C.L. § 259.801 et seq.; MSA 10.380(1) et seq. conferred on the CRAA exclusive jurisdiction over all airport operations, including land use, and therefore exempted the CRAA from both the zoning regulations and the Land Division Act. This appeal ensued.

We heard oral argument on August 12, 1998, one month after our Supreme Court granted leave to appeal in Burt Twp. v. Dep't of Natural Resources, 227 Mich.App. 252, 576 N.W.2d 170 (1997), lv. gtd. 458 Mich. 865, 582 N.W.2d 836 (1998), aff'd. 459 Mich. 659, 593 N.W.2d 534 (1999). Because Burt Twp. also involved the issue of a state agency's alleged immunity from local land-use control, we anticipated that the Supreme Court's ruling would be dispositive of the controlling issue here. Therefore, we held this matter in abeyance pending our Supreme Court's opinion. The Supreme Court issued its opinion on June 2, 1999.

II ANALYSIS

The CRAA and DeWitt assert competing rights and interests under the aeronautical statutes and the land-use regulation enabling statutes, respectively.³ This presents a question of law, which we review de novo on appeal. Faircloth v. Family Independence Agency, 232 Mich.App. 391, 401, 591 N.W.2d 314 (1998).

A State Agencies' Obligation to Comply with Local Land-Use Ordinances

In our analysis of DeWitt's authority to regulate airport property, we begin with our Supreme Court's landmark decision in Dearden v. Detroit, 403 Mich. 257, 269 N.W.2d 139 (1978). Dearden involved a conflict between the city of Detroit's zoning regulations and the Department of Corrections' plans to operate a halfway house on leased property in a neighborhood zoned for two-family residential use. The city of Detroit refused to issue a variance permit for this use. Id., 260, 269 N.W.2d 139. The Department of Corrections challenged this decision, contending that because it was a state agency, it was exempt from local zoning regulations.

Our Supreme Court rejected the proposition that all state agencies are inherently immune from local zoning regulations, and ruled instead that the question was one of legislative intent. Id., 264-265, 269 N.W.2d 139. The Court noted that the Legislature, in establishing the department's jurisdiction, "expressly provided" that "[s]ubject to constitutional powers vested in the executive and judicial departments of the state, the department shall have exclusive jurisdiction over ... penal institutions." Id., 265, 269 N.W.2d 139; MCL 791.204; MSA 28.2274. The Court read this language as a "clear expression of the Legislature's intent to vest the department with complete jurisdiction over the state's penal institutions, subject only to the constitutional powers of the executive and judiciary, and not subject in any way to any other legislative act, such as the zoning enabling act." Dearden, supra, at 265, 269 N.W.2d 139. The Court further noted that the statute allotted to the Michigan Corrections Commission the power to "determine all matters relating to the unified development of the penal institutions." Id., 266, 269 N.W.2d 139. The Court concluded:

[T]he zoning enabling act does not indicate whether or not the Legislature intended to subject the department to local zoning ordinances. We can find no expression of a legislative intent in the language of that act to subject the department's exclusive jurisdiction over the state's penal institutions, and its duty to coordinate and adjust those institutions as an integral part of a unified, general correctional system, to the many and varied municipal zoning ordinances throughout the state. If the department were subject to those ordinances, the underlying policies of the general correctional system could be effectively thwarted by community after community prohibiting the placement of certain penal institutions in appropriate locations. A careful reading of the statute establishing the department evidences a contrary legislative intent.

We hold that in enacting M.C.L. § 791.201, et seq.; MSA 28.2271, et seq., the Legislature intended to grant the Department of Corrections immunity from local zoning ordinances when establishing state penal institutions. Consequently, defendant's zoning ordinance is void to the extent that it attempts to prohibit the use of the subject property as a rehabilitation center. [ Id., 266-267, 269 N.W.2d 139.]

In sum, Dearden established that the question of state agency authority versus local land control is decided according to the legislative intent for the particular situation, rather than a set rule favoring either the agency or the municipality.

This Court's attempts at discerning legislative intent for purpose of the Dearden analysis has resembled a Hegelian dialectic. As will be seen in the following discussion, this Court was initially disposed to find agency immunity where the agency's enabling statute authorized it to engage in the particular activity in question, absent specific statutory language to the contrary. In later decisions, this Court switched its position, and became disposed to find local government authority over the state agency absent specific statutory language that the agency enjoyed exclusive jurisdiction over the particular activity. Ultimately, our Supreme Court clarified Dearden and called on courts to discern legislative intent through examination of the various statutory provisions rather than emphasis on "particular talismanic words." Burt Twp. v. Dep't of Natural Resources, supra, 459 Mich. at 669, 593 N.W.2d 534.

The first noteworthy post-Dearden decision regarding this issue came in Marquette Co. v. Bd. of Control of Northern Michigan Univ., 111 Mich.App. 521, 314 N.W.2d 678 (1981). Although this case actually dealt with a state agency's immunity from the State Construction Code, M.C.L. § 125.1501 et seq.; MSA 5.2949(1) et seq., rather than a local...