Crabapple Lake Parc Cmty. Ass'n, Inc. v. Circeo
| Decision Date | 19 May 2014 |
| Docket Number | No. A13A1584.,A13A1584. |
| Citation | 751 S.E.2d 866,325 Ga.App. 101 |
| Court | Georgia Court of Appeals |
| Parties | CRABAPPLE LAKE PARC COMMUNITY ASSOCIATION, INC. v. CIRCEO et al. |
OPINION TEXT STARTS HERE
Lueder, Larkin & Hunter, David Clarke Boy IV, Cynthia Carson Hodge, Albert Dwight Williams, Alpharetta, John T. Lueder, for Appellant.
Winter, Capriola & Zenner, Richard John Capriola, David Brian Weinberg, Atlanta, for Appellees.
Crabapple Lake Parc Community Association, Inc.1 (“Crabapple” or “the association”) brought a declaratory judgment action against Louis J. Circeo and Janet G. Lacey—two homeowners in the community—seeking to establish that it is (1) authorized to construct a pathway and a footbridge on an existing easement that runs across the Circeo and Lacey properties and (2) authorized to provide all other property owners in the community access across the easement to the lake and dam located behind the Circeo and Lacey properties. Following cross motions for summary judgment, the trial court denied Crabapple's motion and granted summary judgment in favor of Circeo and Lacey. Crabapple appeals and we affirm in part and reverse in part.
Summary judgment is proper when there is no genuine issue of material fact and the movant is entitled to judgment as a matter of law. OCGA § 9–11–56(c). We review a grant or denial of summary judgment de novo and construe the evidence in the light most favorable to the nonmovant. Home Builders Assn. of Savannah v. Chatham County, 276 Ga. 243, 245(1), 577 S.E.2d 564 (2003).
The relevant facts in the record are not in dispute. On October 19, 1993, Torrey/Lake Parc, L.P. (the “Declarant” or “developer”), the owner of a tract of land in Roswell to be developed into an approximately 260–lot, residential community of single-family housing, recorded a “Declaration of Protective Covenants” for Crabapple in the property records of Fulton County, thereby subjecting the property to be developed, which initially did not include the lake at issue, to the terms of the Declaration.
In August 1994, pursuant to authority granted by the Declaration, the Declarant conveyed to Crabapple and subjected to the Declaration an additional 7.43 acres of land that include a several acre lake, an earthen dam, and additional land below the dam. The property description in the deed references a plat of a subdivision of the development entitled “Crabapple Lake Unit II” that was recorded in the Fulton County property records (the “Crabapple II plat”) at about the same time.2 The plat shows that the lake is located on one side of the Crabapple II subdivision and it abuts the back of approximately 20 of the lots in the subdivision (the “Lake Lots”). On the Crabapple II plat, on the drawing of the lake near the dam, appear the words “LAKE” and underneath it “Common Area.” The property description in the deed together with the Crabapple II plat show that the lake, dam, and the additional area below the dam were all part of the single conveyance of 7.43 acres of land. From the time the Declaration was recorded and therefore at the time of the lake and dam conveyance, Section 6.32 of the Declaration expressly provided that only Lake Lot owners could use the lake:
Use of the lake, a portion of which is within the Community, is restricted to Owners of Lake Lots. No ice skating, swimming, water skiing or motorized craft shall be permitted on the Lake. Fishing by Lake Lot Owners is permitted.... No boat may be left overnight—within twenty-five feet of the high-water mark of the Lake.
The easement at issue in this case is described exclusively on the Crabapple II plat; neither party contends or has shown that the easement is specifically mentioned in any other document associated with the formation of the association. The plat shows an easement labeled “20' Maintenance & Access Esmt.” running along the common property line between Lake Lots 58 and 59, with 10 feet of the easement on each property. The dam is located behind these two lots, and the easement runs from a street in the development in front of the two lots to the dam-side property lines for the two lots, which lines are shown as being beyond the 100–year high water mark for the lake and running across the dam itself. Running across the rear of lots 58 and 59, between the high water mark and the back property line of the two lots, is a concrete flume or spillway that is approximately 35' wide and several feet deep. Thus, in order to travel across the relevant easement to get to the top of the dam, one would have to traverse the spillway.
On May 31, 1995, Lacey purchased lot 58; on August 28, 2001, Cicero purchased lot 59. Both the Circeo and Lacey deeds state that they are “subject to all easements and restrictions of record, if any” and both deeds incorporate by reference the Crabapple II plat.
In 2008 and 2009, Crabapple engaged in a project to improve the lake and dam area, including landscaping the dam area and making plans to construct a park on the top of the dam for use by all owners in the development. The plans for further improvement include constructing a wooden footbridge over the easement and over the concrete spillway. On February 26, 2008, following a vote of the membership, Crabapple recorded an amendment for Section 6.32 of the Declaration that purported to open access to the lake to all of the lot owners in the development and to provide for access to the lake “from within an easement in the Community” or “from Common Property[3] adjacent to the Lake.” New Section 6.32 provides as follows:
Permitted use of the Lake by Owners [4] in the Community shall be limited only to fishing and boating.... No other use of the Lake shall be permitted.... Access to the Lake for permitted use shall be from within an easement in the Community or from Common Property adjacent to the Lake. The Owner of any Lake Lot may access the Lake from such Lake Lot.... No boat may be left overnight on a Lake Lot or Common Property within twenty-five feet of the high-water mark of the lake.
(Emphasis supplied).
Prior to beginning work on the park and foot bridge, Crabapple filed this declaratory judgment action. Crabapple contends that it has an easement across the Circeo and Lacey lots that provides it authority to construct a pathway and bridge to access the dam and lake and to allow all Owners in the association to use the areas for recreational purposes. Crabapple primarily argues that based on the name of the easement as shown on the Crabapple II plat, the relevant easement has two functions—maintenance and access—and that, while Crabapple itself requires the easement for maintenance of the dam and lake, the “access” function gives it authority to allow all members of the community to use the easement to access the lake and dam. Cicero and Lacey stress that at the time the easement was created, only Lake Lot owners had authority to use the lake, and therefore the word “access” in the name of the easement cannot be construed as having granted lake and dam access to the full membership of the association. Rather, as held by the trial court, they contend the easement provides for “access by the community for purposes of maintenance.” Cicero and Lacey argue that such expanded access (as well as any construction on the easement) is prohibited because it would unreasonably expand the scope and nature of the original easement without their consent.
In response to cross-motions for summary judgment, the trial court granted summary judgment in favor of Cicero and Lacey and denied Crabapple's motion. The trial court held that the 20' Maintenance and Access easement came into existence when the lake was accessible only to Lake Lots, that its scope was determined at that time, and that therefore the lake was a “limited common element” and the easement did not authorize general access to the lake via the easement for all members of the association; that the scope of the easement cannot be extended or expanded after the fact; and that a “community document” provides that no structures may be built on a maintenance easement.
1. Crabapple contends the trial court erred in its rulings, primarily by misapplying the rules of contract construction to the various terms of the Declaration that bear on the nature and scope of the relevant easement. Our application of the rules of construction to the relevant documents, however, is de novo. D.S. Ameri Constr. Corp. v. Simpson, 271 Ga.App. 825, 826, 611 S.E.2d 103 (2005). We will first determine whether one or more of the original Declaration, the Crabapple II plat, or the conveyance of the lake to Crabapple granted to all members of the association access to the lake and dam over the Circeo and Lacey easement prior to the time that Circeo and Lacey purchased their lots. We will then address the effect of the amendment to Section 6.32 of the Declaration together with Crabapple's proposed plans for the easement.
(a) The only specific information available regarding the relevant easement is its name: “20' Maintenance & Access Esmt.” We therefore first look to the Declaration to determine whether it provides direction regarding the nature and scope of this easement. The declaration of a homeowner's association is considered a contract, and we therefore apply the normal rules of contract construction to determine the meaning of the terms therein. Hall v. Town Creek Neighborhood Assoc., 320 Ga.App. 897, 899, 740 S.E.2d 816 (2013); Southland Dev. Corp. v. Battle, 272 Ga.App. 211, 213–214, 612 S.E.2d 12 (2005). See also Municipal Elec. Auth. of Ga. v. Gold–Arrow Farms, 276 Ga.App. 862, 866(1), 625 S.E.2d 57 (2005) (). The normal rules of contract construction require us to ascertain the intent of the parties based on the plain language of the agreement as a whole:
The cardinal rule of construction is to ascertain the intent of ...
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