City of New Whatcom v. Bellingham Bay Imp. Co.

• Decision Date: 24 October 1894
• Citation: 38 P. 163,9 Wash. 639
• Parties: CITY OF NEW WHATCOM v. BELLINGHAM BAY IMP. CO. (FIVE CASES. SAME v. STANGROOM ET AL. SAME v. MORGAN ET AL. SAME v. CARLYON ET AL.
• Court: Washington Supreme Court

38 P. 163

9 Wash. 639

CITY OF NEW WHATCOM v. BELLINGHAM BAY IMP. CO. (FIVE CASES.

SAME v. STANGROOM ET AL.

SAME v. MORGAN ET AL.

SAME v. CARLYON ET AL.

Supreme Court of Washington

October 24, 1894

Appeal from superior court, Whatcom county; John R. Winn and Samuel M. Bruce, Judges.

Five actions by the city of New Whatcom against the Bellingham Bay Improvement Company, action by the same against M. L Stangroom and others, action by the same against E. R. Morgan and others, and an action by the same against E. F. G Carlyon and others, for the foreclosure of street-improvement assessments. The actions were consolidated. Judgment was rendered for defendants, and plaintiff appeals. Affirmed.

T. E Cade and J. R. Crites, for appellant.

Black & Leaming, for respondents Carlyon and others.

C. W. Dorr, for other respondents.

STILES J.

The above-entitled cases present the appeals of the city of New Whatcom from judgments of the superior court of Whatcom county dismissing suits for the foreclosure of street-improvement assessments, commenced in pursuance of Gen. St. § 641, ^[1] applicable to cities of the third class. A great number of points against the validity of the assessments are made by the respondents, and in support of the court's action; some applying to all of the cases and some to one or more only. But there is one of these points, which is raised in every case, which the record shows was probably the real basis of the judgments of dismissal, and which we consider as conclusive of the correctness of the action taken. When it came to the point of assessing the cost of the several improvements upon the lands fronting thereon, the city sent out its engineer, who measured and estimated the cost of the work in front of each lot, and reported it to the street committee of the council. The committee reported the engineer's estimates as the "expense of the work in front of each tract," and the council adopted the same as its equalization and assessment of the benefits to each tract. This was, if anything, a more odious method of assessing the cost of street work than that of frontage, which was recently condemned in Town of Elma v. Carney (Wash.; filed Aug. 6, 1894) 38 P. 707, and finds even less justification under the statute. In one instance-Garden street, from Ivy to Cedar, three blocks, including forty-eight lots, each of the same size-the assessments varied from $79.87 to $494.98 per lot. On another portion of the same street, improved under the same resolution, lot 6 in block 81, valued at only $600, was assessed in the sum of $500...