G.F. Heublein, Inc. v. Board of Street Com'rs of City of Hartford

• Decision Date: 30 April 1929
• Citation: 146 A. 20,109 Conn. 212
• Parties: G. F. HEUBLEIN, INC., v. BOARD OF STREET COM'RS OF CITY OF HARTFORD.
• Court: Connecticut Supreme Court

146 A. 20

109 Conn. 212

G. F. HEUBLEIN, INC., v. BOARD OF STREET COM'RS OF CITY OF HARTFORD.

Supreme Court of Errors of Connecticut.

April 30, 1929

Appeal from Court of Common Pleas, Hartford County; Thomas J Molloy, Judge.

Proceeding by the Board of Street Commissioners of the City of Hartford to take land belonging to G. F. Heublein, Inc., for extension of a street. From a judgment, entered on acceptance of the report of a committee appointed by the court, after overruling a remonstrance thereto on appeal from an assessment of benefits and damages, the City appeals. No error.

W Arthur Countryman, Jr., of Hartford, for appellant.

John T. Robinson, of Hartford, for appellee.

Argued before WHEELER, C.J., and MALTBIE, HAINES, HINMAN, and BANKS JJ.

HAINES, J.

This action resulted from an extension by the city of Hartford of Chapel street in a northwesterly direction from the west side of Ann street to High street. Prior to this time the plaintiff-appellee owned a tract of land on the west side of Ann street with a frontage thereon of 138.1 feet and a depth of approximately 200 feet with a wooden building of small value on the northwest corner, and a large brick garage on the southwest corner. The city, on April 25, 1927, took, for the purpose of this extension of Chapel street, an irregular piece of the plaintiff's land, triangular in shape, with a frontage of 98.1 on Ann Street and 150 feet frontage on the Chapel Street extension.

Under the provisions of the charter of the city of Hartford (17 Special Laws of 1917, p. 977, as amended by 18 Special Laws of 1921, p. 865, and sections 90ff Ordinances, Compilation of 1920) the layout and award were made by the board of street commissioners, which prepared separate schedules of damages and assessing benefits, awarding $30,709.61 for the land taken and $87.25 for damages to buildings, making $30,796.86 total damages, and benefits amounting to $18,666.90, giving the appellee the net sum of $12,129.96.

Not satisfied with this result, the owner appealed to the court of common pleas for Hartford county " from said appraisement and award of damages and assessments for special benefits or betterments." This action was taken under the authority of the provisions of the city charter found in 7 Special Laws (1873) 527, of which act section 3 reads: " Appeals may be taken from the assessment of benefits only; but if taken from the appraisal of damages, shall be from the said appraisal and also from the assessment of benefits made at the same time for the same public work." In that appeal the owner asked the court for " a reappraisal and award of damages," and a " re-assessment of special benefits and betterments."

The court appointed David A. Wilson, Esq., as a committee to hear the parties and report his findings to the court. The hearings were duly held by the committee, who also viewed the premises and thereafter filed his report with the court wherein the damages were found to be $58,518.23 for the land taken and $87.25 for " structural damages," a total of $58,605.48, and benefits the same as originally fixed by the board of street commissioners, $18,666.90, giving the property owner the net sum of $39,938.58, or a net increase over the finding of the board of street commissioners of $27,808.62.

The city filed a remonstrance to the accept ance of this report to which the owner demurred, but the court sustained the demurrer, accepted the report, and entered judgment accordingly, and the city appealed to this court.

The report of the committee was filed February 28, 1928, and on March 12, 1928, the city filed a request for the incorporation in the report of the following " subordinate facts" : (1) The value of that portion of the property * * * not taken * * * before the taking, and (2) the value of the same portion after the taking." On March 27, 1928, the committee answered the first request by the figures $59,419.17 and the second by the figures $78,086.07. One of the grounds of the remonstrance to the acceptance of the report was that the last-named figures " were found without evidence," and the overruling of this claim is the basis of some of the grounds of the present appeal.

The ultimate fact to be determined, where land is taken in proceedings of this character, is the net amount to which the landowner is entitled as compensation for the loss caused him by the taking of his property and the carrying out of the public purpose proposed. The true measure of this loss is " the difference between the market-value of the whole tract as it lay before the taking, and the market-value of what remained of it thereafter and after the completion of the public improvement." Martin v. West Hartford, 93 Conn. 86, 88, 105 A. 342, 343; Gaylord v. Bridgeport, 90 Conn. 235, 239, 96 A. 936; Cook v. Ansonia, 66 Conn. 413, 431, 34 A. 183. The procedure authorized by the Hartford Charter is to deduct the increased value of the remaining land--the benefits--from the value of the land taken, but this manifestly reaches the same result as the rule in the Martin case. This process requires the ascertainment of two distinct facts, the extent to which the owner is damaged, and the extent to which he is benefited, by the taking of his land and the putting through of the public improvements. The proceedings for the determination of these facts are regarded as separate and distinct, and in a sense independent of each other. Newton's Appeal, 84 Conn. 243, 79 A. 742.

As to the claim that the value of the remaining portion, after the taking, was found without evidence: If the report contains facts from which this figure can be found, this claim clearly lacks support. The report shows the value of this portion before the taking was $59,419.17, and the value of the part taken was at the same time $58,518.23, thus fixing the value of the whole tract before the taking as $117,937.40. It further shows that the extension of the street increased the value of the remaining tract $18,666.90, and this, added to the original value of that tract, gives $78,086.07 as the value of the remaining land after the taking. While this latter figure therefore was not directly testified to, it is easily deducible from other facts in the report which were found upon evidence.

It is also manifest that the report as thus analyzed gives us the necessary figures to apply either the rule in the Martin Case or that provided by the Hartford Charter, and whichever method is adopted, the same result is reached as was reached by the report of the committee. Applying the rule in the Martin Case to the above figures, by deducting the value of the remaining tract after the taking, $78,086.07, from the value of the entire tract before the taking, $117,937.40, and adding the structural damage, $87.25, gives $39,938.58, the amount of the judgment rendered in the court of common pleas. We understand counsel for the city to argue that there is no warrant for this use of the figures showing benefits--$18,666.90--for the reason that the report shows the owner failed to offer " sufficient evidence" to change this figure, which was the same as that fixed by...