County Com'rs of Aroostook County, In re
| Decision Date | 29 June 1968 |
| Parties | In re return of COUNTY COMMISSIONERS OF AROOSTOOK COUNTY. |
| Court | Maine Supreme Court |
Barnett I. Shur, Portland, and Fred N. Beck, Presque Isle, for County Commissioners.
George B. Barnes, Houlton, for Proponents.
Ralph I. Lancaster, Jr., and Edward W. Atwood, Portland, for International Paper Co.
Louis C. Stearns, III, Bangor, and Walter S. Sage, Fort Fairfield, for Great Northern Paper Co. Merrill R. Bradford, and Malcolm E. Morrell, Jr., Bangor, for Irving Pulp & Paper Co., Ltd.
Edward H. Keith, Bangor, for Penobscot Development Co.
Bradford S. Wellman, Bangor, for Heirs of David Pingree, Sada Coe, Robinson & Prentiss & Carlisle Co., Inc.
Before WILLIAMSON, C. J., and WEBBER, TAPLEY, MARDEN, DUFRESNE and WEATHERBEE, JJ.
The County Commissioners of Aroostook, on petition of residents of the county and after notice and hearing, laid out a county road from Ashland, Maine to the Maine-Quebec border, running through Ashland, Garfield Plantation, and several unorganized townships a distance of approximately ninety miles over an existing private road. In their return the Commissioners recited: 'Believing no persons to be injured by the laying out of said County Road, or liable to be injured thereby, we have not awarded damages to anyone.' The Commissioners base their authority for laying out the road on 23 M.R.S.A. § 4001. 1
The International Paper Company, a landowner, in a 'Complaint and Notice of Appeal' in the Superior Court, appealed from the return of the Commissioners and claimed a review thereof. The complaint was made under M.R.C.P., Rule 80B, relating to review of administrative or governmental action, and the appeal was taken under 23 M.R.S.A. § 4002. 2 Barnett I. Shur, Esq. entered his appearance as attorney for the County Commissioners. A motion to strike the appearance of counsel for the Commissioners was granted by the presiding Justice in the Superior Court on the ground that the Commissioners, having acted as a court, were not proper parties to the appeal from their own decision.
The case is before us on report 'to determine whether or not the County Commissioners of Aroostook County are proper parties to this action,' ordered by the presiding Justice on motion of the Commissioners and the petitioners under M.R.C.P., Rule 72(c). By stipulation our ruling shall be determinative of identical motions in actions by six other landowners. The several actions are consolidated, except for reservation of separate trial on damages, and all proceedings stayed until decision of the reported issue.
We start with the premise that the County of Aroostook, and therefore the County Commissioners, have a continuing interest in the creation of the proposed county road, including the location and cost. To say that only the seven responsible persons resident in the county, who started the process of laying out the road by their petition to the Commissioners, and the several landowners in question, have an interest in the proposed road does not accord with the obvious facts. The county road affects the people of Aroostook County.
In the absence of some compelling rule of law, we are fully satisfied that the county has a right to appear and participate in the present action arising from the decision of the County Commissioners; that the County Commissioners, being the administrative agency of the county, have the right so to appear; and that thus the County Commissioners lawfully employed counsel of their own selection to appear in their behalf.
In the 'Complaint and Notice of Appeal' the International Paper Company prays that the Court:
'1. review and examine the proceedings of the County Commissioners below and dismiss said proceedings for lack of jurisdiction; or, if the Court finds jurisdiction, then;
'b. if it is determined that said road is of common convenience and necessity, determine and assess the damages incurred by International Paper Company as a result of the laying out of said road; and
'3. grant to International Paper Company such other relief as the Court shall deem proper.'
For our purposes the complaint may be broken into two parts. In the first part, the landowner seeks review and examination of the record of the Commissioners in laying out the road. It charges that the hearing violated constitutional rights, State and Federal; lack of jurisdiction; error in determining that the road is of 'common convenience and necessity' and in granting the prayer of the petitioners; error in laying out and locating the road; error in failure to hold hearing on damages; error in the conclusion of no injury from road; and in failure to award damages.
The complaint ends with the prayer that the proceedings before the Commissioners be dismissed for lack of jurisdiction.
To the extent at least that the stated grounds for review of the record and for dismissal were available prior to the adoption of Rule 80B by certiorari, there is no question of the right of the County Commissioners to defend their record. Inhabitants of Phippsburg v. County Com'rs of Sagadahoc County, 127 Me. 42, 141 A. 95 (1928); Nobleboro v. Lincoln County Commissioners, 68 Me. 548 (1878); Levant v. Penobscot County Commissioners, 67 Me. 429 (1877); Carter v. Wilkins, et al, 160 Me. 290, 203 A.2d 682 (1964); Inhabitants of Town of N. Berwick v. State Bd. of Ed. (Me.) 227 A.2d 462 (1967); Field & McKusick Me.Civ.Prac. § 80B.1 et seq.
As we read in Carter, supra, the principles of certiorari remain useful. The change in name does not alter the substance of the proceedings.
The vital question, however, is not with jurisdiction but is whether on the appeal from location and from damages the County Commissioners (or the County) are proper parties. If so, the County Commissioners had authority to employ and appear by counsel.
The position of the landowner is that the Board of County Commissioners is a Court, and that therefore on well understood principles it may not participate in an appeal from its own decision. In our cases we have repeatedly said that the Board of County Commissioners is a Court. For example, in Waukeag Ferry v. Arey, et als, 128 Me. 108, 146 A. 10 (1929), the Supreme Judicial Court exercised its power of 'general superintendence of all inferior courts for the prevention and correction of errors and abuses, where the law does not expressly provide a remedy.' (Now 4 M.R.S.A. § 7)
The County Commissioners form, in our view, an administrative agency or at most a quasi-judicial body in the performance of their duties in the laying out of highways. In short, they form a court for limited purposes. No one would suggest that they are judicial officers under our Constitution. Art. VI, Section 4. See Morrison v. McDonald, 21 Me. 550 (1842).
It does not follow, however, from the designation of 'Court' that when the subject matter is removed from their jurisdiction as a quasi-judicial court to the Superior Court on appeal for hearing and...
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