Lee County v. Town of St. Charles

Decision Date13 September 2002
Docket NumberRecord No. 012543.
Citation568 S.E.2d 680,264 Va. 344
PartiesLEE COUNTY v. TOWN OF ST. CHARLES.
CourtVirginia Supreme Court

Roy M. Jassee, Norton (C.M. Callahan, Jonesville; Mullins, Harris & Jessee, Norton, on brief), for appellant.

Michael H. Abbott (Jeffrey A. Sturgill; Sturgill & Kennedy, on brief), Wise, for appellee.

Present: CARRICO, C.J., LACY, HASSELL, KEENAN, KOONTZ, and LEMONS, JJ., and COMPTON, Senior Justice.

Opinion by Justice BARBARA MILANO KEENAN.

In this appeal, we consider whether the trial court erred in ruling that a board member of a water and sewer authority must reside within the authority's service area to be qualified to hold that office.

In 1967, Lee County (the County) and the Town of St. Charles (the Town) entered into a joint resolution to create the St. Charles Water and Sewer Authority (the Authority) to provide water and sewer services to the residents of a designated service area. In the joint resolution, the County and the Town appointed five members to the Authority's Board of Directors (the Board). However, the joint resolution and the Authority's articles of incorporation and by-laws were silent concerning qualification requirements for future Board members.

In 1992, the Town filed a declaratory judgment action against the County to determine the respective rights of the two entities to appoint members to the Board. In 1997, the trial court entered an order declaring that the Town and the County each have the right to appoint two members to the Board and that the fifth board member shall be appointed jointly by the Town and the County. The court did not address the issue whether members of the Board must reside within the Authority's service area.1

The present litigation began after Nell Stewart, who was serving as the joint appointee on the Board, moved her residence from St. Charles to Pennington Gap. Although Stewart's new residence is located within the County, that residence is outside the Authority's service area.

The Town Council voted to remove Stewart from the Board and to appoint a new member as her replacement. The Town requested that the County also act to remove Stewart from the Board and to designate its choice for a joint appointee to replace her. The County, by vote of its board of supervisors, refused the Town's request. The Town filed the present declaratory judgment action against the County, asking that the trial court determine, among other things, the qualification requirements for membership on the Board. After hearing argument of counsel, the court held that all Board members must be residents of the Authority's service area. In explaining its decision, the court stated:

This [residency] requirement makes sense in that a member of [the Authority], in effect, represents all the people within the service area of the Authority. Therefore, to properly represent the citizens of the service area, that member should be a resident of the defined service area of the Authority. Without this requirement, a person could live in another area of the county (or even in another county or state) served by a different water and sewer authority and yet make decisions which directly affect the lives of the citizens served by [the Authority].

The trial court disqualified Stewart from membership on the Board and directed the Town and the County to appoint jointly a replacement member who met this residency requirement. The County appeals from this judgment.

The County argues that the trial court, erred in imposing a service area residency requirement for Board membership and notes that Code § 15.2-5113(A), which addresses the selection of board members of a water and sewer authority, does not specify such a requirement. The County observes that numerous other statutes impose a residency requirement for appointment to various offices, boards, and commissions in the Commonwealth. Therefore, the County argues, had the General Assembly intended that all board members of a water and sewer authority be residents of that authority's service area, the General Assembly would have expressly stated such a requirement. The County also notes that the joint resolution establishing the Authority, as well as its articles of incorporation and by-laws, do not contain a residency requirement for all Board members.

In response, the Town argues that Code § 15.2-5113(A) does not prohibit the imposition of a residency requirement, and that a residency requirement can be inferred from the fact that the joint resolution establishing the Authority named as Board members individuals who were all residents of the Authority's service area. The Town also notes that from the date the Authority was created until the date Stewart moved to Pennington Gap, all Board members had been residents of the Authority's service area. Finally, the Town argues that the trial court's 1997 order implicitly established a residency requirement for the fifth Board member by requiring that this member be appointed jointly by the County and the Town. We disagree with the Town's arguments.

In our review of the trial court's judgment, we first observe that the trial court's legal conclusions are not binding on this Court, and we are accorded the same opportunity as the trial court to consider the issue of law presented. See Eure v. Norfolk Shipbuilding & Drydock Corp., 263 Va. 624, 631, 561 S.E.2d 663,...

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    ...of a statute is plain and unambiguous, we are bound by the plain meaning of that statutory language.” Lee County v. Town of St. Charles, 264 Va. 344, 348, 568 S.E.2d 680, 682 (2002). “ ‘It is a cardinal rule of construction that statutes dealing with a specific subject must be construed tog......
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