City of Indianapolis v. Indiana St. Bd. of Tax Com'rs

• Decision Date: 03 April 1973
• Docket Number: No. 372A140,372A140
• Citation: 294 N.E.2d 136
• Parties: CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS, For and On Behalf Of Its City-County Council of the City of Indianapolis and of Marion County, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. INDIANA STATE BOARD OF TAX COMMISSIONERS, Carleton L. Phillipi, Chairman, et al., Defendants-Appellees.
• Court: Indiana Appellate Court

Page 136

294 N.E.2d 136

CITY OF INDIANAPOLIS, For and On Behalf Of Its City-County

Council of the City of Indianapolis and of Marion

County, et al., Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. INDIANA STATE BOARD OF TAX COMMISSIONERS, Carleton L.

Phillipi, Chairman, et al., Defendants-Appellees.

No. 372A140.

Court of Appeals of Indiana, Second District.

April 3, 1973.

Rehearing Denied May 3, 1973. Opinion Superseded 308 N.E.2d 868.

Gary R. Landau, Corp. Counsel Robert G. Elrod, Asst. City Atty., Frank E. Spencer, Indianapolis, for appellants.

Halbert W. Kunz, Kunz & Kunz, Carl J. Meyer, Rhoads, Linder, Meyer & Buehl, G. Pearson Smith, Jr., Bose McKinney & Evans, E. C. Ulen, Jr., Baker & Daniels, Chalmer Schlosser, Jr., Schlosser, White & Schlosser, Ben J. Weaver, Johnson, Weaver & Martz, Warren C. Moberly, Harrison, Moberly, Wallace & Gaston, Lou Rosenberg, Indianapolis, Theodore L. Sendak, Atty. Gen. of Indiana, Merle B. Rose, Deputy Atty. Gen., for appellees.

SULLIVAN, Judge.

This appeal concerns the authority of the State Board of Tax Commissioners to modify budgets, tax levies and rates as approved by the Marion County Tax Adjustment Board. The findings of fact of the court below which are not here contested disclose that:

On October 1, 1970, the County Board of Tax Adjustment of Marion County (County Tax Board) submitted to the Marion County Auditor its proposed 1971 budgets, together with rates and levies for 1970 payable in 1971 as reviewed, for municipal corporations within Marion County. The budget figures, rates and levies were the same as those recommended by the City-County Council, and in some instances constituted a reduction of the individual budgets and levies requested by the various municipal corporations. The rates were duly published by the County Auditor and were forwarded to the State Board of Tax Commissioners (State Tax Board). Certain of the municipal corporations which had received reductions in their budgets made timely appeals to the State Tax Board. Among these appeals was a joint appeal by the Board of Directors of the County Department of Public Wlfare of Marion County (County Welfare Board) and the Indiana Department of Public Welfare (State Welfare Department).

Welfare budgets follow a different 'routing' than those of other agencies--the State Welfare Department must approve or modify the budget of a county welfare board before its submission to the County Auditor, in order to establish conformity among all Indiana counties, and to insure that federal standards which Indiana has undertaken to follow have been met. See IC (1971) 12-1-2-12, Ind.Ann.Stat. § 52-1113 et seq. (Burns 1964 Repl.)

Pursuant to notice published by the State Tax Board, public hearings were held on December 14-16, 1970 with respect to the 1971 budgets and the 1970, payable in 1971, levies and rates of all municipal corporations within Marion County. On February 3, 1971, the State Tax Board entered an order establishing the 1971 budget for the Marion County Welfare Fund. As so established, the budget was in excess of that recommended by the County Tax Board and the City-County Council.

Plaintiffs Herbig, Muntz and Melchert, as members of the class of Marion County taxpayers and plaintiffs Hoffman and Buel as the Marion County Auditor and Treasurer, respectively, brought this action in the Superior Court of Marion County, Room 7 on February 24, 1971 against the Indiana State Board of Tax Commissioners. The other plaintiff and defendants were subsequently added by order granting leave to intervene. The prayer for relief in that complaint was as follows:

'(That) (1) the Court temporarily restrain and permanently enjoin the defendant, State Board of Tax Commissioners, from increasing any budget, levy or rate as fixed by the County Board of Tax Adjustment for property taxes for 1970, payable in 1971; (2) that the Court declare that the order of February 3, 1971 by the defendant, State Board of Tax Commissioners, increasing the appropriations for the County Department of Public Welfare is void and illegal; (3) that the Court enter its declaratory judgment that the rates as established by On March 25, 1971, the trial court entered judgment against the plaintiffs, and subsequently on April 21, 1971 entered findings of fact and conclusions of law. Plaintiff City of Indianapolis made timely filing of a motion to correct errors setting forth nine specifications of error, which motion was overruled on June 11, 1971. Plaintiffs appealed to the Indiana Supreme Court but on defendants-appellees' motion, the appeal was transferred to the Court of Appeals.

the County Board of Tax Adjustment have become final by the inaction of the State Board of Tax Commissioners and cannot hereafter be changed; (4) that the Court enter a declaratory judgment that the rates as established by the County Board of Tax Adjustment shall be used by the Auditor and Treasurer of Marion County for the purposes of collecting property taxes for 1970, payable in 1971 in Marion County, Indiana; and (5) that the Court grant unto plaintiffs all other proper relief.'

ISSUES

The parties seek to present three issues in this appeal:

1) Did the budgets and rates as submitted by the County Tax Board become final and effective as a result of the failure of the State Tax Board to act on them 'on or before the thirtieth day of November, or as soon thereafter as possible.' IC (1971), 6-1-46-8, Ind.Ann.Stat. § 64-1911 (Burns 1971 Repl.)?

2) Did the Consolidated First Class Cities and Counties Act, IC (1971), 18-4-1-1 et seq., Ind.Ann.Stat. § 48-9101 et seq. (Burns 1971 Supp.) give the City-County Council of Indianapolis and Marion County sole power over budgets, rates and levies of all separate municipal corporations in the County so as to preclude the State Tax Board from increasing such budgets and rates upon the appeal of the special municipal corporations?

3) May the State Tax Board set a budget or tax rate for the County Department of Public Welfare which exceeds the budget or rate set by said department or by the City-County Council?

During oral argument we, sua sponte, questioned whether or not the case was now moot inasmuch as the final installment of the taxes in question had become due, payable, and presumably paid, in November of 1971.

It must be noted that this is not a case in which a declaratory judgment is sought, using a specific tax year as an example. The prayer for relief here is specifically directed and limited to 1970 taxes payable in 1971. Only under the 'all other proper relief' portion of the prayer could a review even attempt to justify a consideration of nebulous future legal rights or obligations. We do not deem it appropriate or proper, in light of the posture of the issues here, to venture beyond the limitations of plaintiffs' grievance as stated.

IN GENERAL, APPELLATE COURTS SHOULD NOT DECIDE LEGAL

QUESTIONS UNRELATED TO LEGAL RIGHT OF INTEREST

PRESENTLY IN CONTROVERSY

The United States Constitution, Article 3, Section 2 wisely limited the judicial power within its purivew to 'cases (and) . . . controversies'. The logic of this limitation is evident in the sound, practical considerations voiced by the Indiana Supreme Court a hundred years ago in the case of Wallace v. City of Indianapolis (1872) 40 Ind. 287, 289:

'The counsel for appellants say that 'a practical difficulty may seem to be in the way of a reversal of the judgment of the court below, the acts sought to be enjoined having been already consummated.' It is admitted, and we think it is clear, that if we were to reverse the judgment and hold the complaint good, the court below could not grant the injunction asked for, to prevent the doing of acts which are already done. Yet the counsel seem desirous that we should go to the labor and research, requiring a long opinion to decide the questions arising from sustaining the demurrer. This we must decline to do. It is not our duty to decide mere legal questions, when neither party can derive any legal benefit from such decision, and we have too many real questions before us, requiring our time and labor, to allow us to write mere speculative opinions to gratify ourselves or others, and in which no one has any legal right or interest depending.'

Indiana's Declaratory Judgments Act, IC (1971) 34-4-10-1, Ind.Ann.Stat. § 3-1101 et seq. (Burns 1968 Repl.) does not extend the horizons of our review powers. It affects only the scope of the remedies which may be afforded, not the range of the 'cases' which may be considered. In Ind. Alcoholic Beverage Commission v. Deets (1962), 133 Ind.App. 444, 449-450, 179 N.E.2d 217, 220, our predecessors said:

'The Declaratory Judgments Act, § 3-1101, et seq., Burns' 1946 Replacement, affords a statutory action predicated upon the provisions thereof and makes essential, as a basis of jurisdiction, that an actual controversy be presented, that is, a justiciable controversy or question, which is clearly defined and affects the legal rights, the legal statutes, or the legal relationships of the parties having adverse legal interests. Bryarly et al. v. State of Indiana et al. (1953), 232 Ind. 47, 53, 111 N.E.2d 277. The contest must disclose a substantial present interest in the relief sought in the initiator of the proceeding and must tender facts of a substantial nature which will warrant particular relief by way of a judgment of conclusive character. And the dispute must reflect more than a mere theoretical or moot question or an excursion for free advice where there exists no present existing real or actual controversy, or the ripening seeds of such a controversy. Zoercher et al. v....