Helms v. Barbour County, 1030596.
Decision Date | 27 May 2005 |
Docket Number | 1030596. |
Citation | 914 So.2d 825 |
Parties | Haywood A. HELMS and Minnie Lou Helms v. BARBOUR COUNTY, Alabama, et al. |
Court | Alabama Supreme Court |
Joe W. Adams of Adams, Spivey & Adams, L.L.C., Ozark, for appellants.
Walter B. Calton, Eufaula, for appellees.
Haywood A. Helms and his wife Minnie Lou Helms own a parcel of land in Barbour County located adjacent to an unpaved public county road maintained by the County. Within its right of way, the County provides routine maintenance to unpaved public roads by scraping the roadway and clearing the ditches beside the road to allow for water drainage. Before 1995, the side of the ditch adjacent to the Helms property was a high, vertical bank. The County's right of way reached only to the top of the vertical bank. In 1995, the Helmses tapered the bank to soften the slope leading to the ditch in order to make the property more productive and more scenic. The tapering operation, however, did not alter the County's right of way because it left in place the lower portion of the vertical bank and the ditch beside the road, which was necessary for adequate water drainage. Mr. Helms planted pine trees on the newly created slope and erected a single-strand, electric fence approximately nine feet from the bottom of the ditch, which he contends was to keep his goats away from the newly planted pine trees.
In October 1999, an employee of the County, operating a grading machine within the scope of his employment, destroyed many of the young pine trees the Helmses had planted. The Helmses claim the value of the pine trees is $6,500. The grading operation also eliminated the remainder of the vertical bank, so that it is now necessary that the slope of the Helmses' property be used for water drainage. As a result, under the County's definition of "right of way," the County's right of way, after the grading operation, was extended from what was once the top of the vertical bank beside the ditch on the side of the road to the top of the gentle slope. The County contends that the grader operator believed the electric fence marked the County right of way and that the grading operation affected land only five feet from the bottom of the ditch. When the Helmses sought an explanation from the County for the destruction of the trees, they were told that the County had the right to destroy the trees in the grading operation because the trees were on the County's right of way. The County defines the right of way as "the top of the back slope [on one side of the road] to the top of the back slope [on the other side]...." Consequently, after the grading operation, the right of way was presumably expanded further onto the Helmses' property, from what was the top point of the vertical bank to the top of the gentle slope created when the Helmses tapered the bank in 1995.
On March 31, 2000, the Helmses filed the following claim against the Barbour County Commission:
On November 15, 2000, the Helmses sued the County, the Commission, and the members of the Commission, in their official capacity (hereinafter the County, the Commission, and its members are referred to collectively as "the Commission"). In addition to claiming that their property had been damaged by the County's actions, the Helmses sought a judgment declaring that the Commission's definition of its right of way was arbitrary and capricious, and, therefore, unlawful. The Helmses aver that the Commission's definition of right of way, which allows for expansion of the right of way, violates the federal and state constitutions in that it allows the Commission to take property from owners without due process and without fair compensation. The Helmses sought a judgment declaring that the Commission's right-of-way policy is unlawful, sought injunctive relief enjoining the Commission from further using its right-of-way policy to expand its right of way, and sought damages "for loss of [the] pine trees, loss of their growth and for trespass."
On December 13, 2000, the Commission filed a motion to dismiss the Helmses' action. The Commission alleged that the Helmses' claim against the County, made pursuant to § 6-5-20, Ala.Code 1975, and a prerequisite to legal action against the County, was not sufficiently itemized because, it contends, the claim did not request that the County's right-of-way policy be declared unconstitutional and did not request damages for the loss of property.
On December 10, 2002, the trial court, upon the pleadings and facts stipulated by the parties, granted the Commission's motion and dismissed the Helmses' complaint. In its order, the trial court stated that the
On January 8, 2003, the Helmses filed a motion to alter, amend, or vacate that judgment, alleging that the Court had erred in concluding that the theories of liability and damage asserted in their complaint were not presented in their § 6-5-20 claim. On November 24, 2003, the trial court denied the...
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