Moffat Tunnel Improvement Dist. v. Housing Authority of City and County of Denver

• Decision Date: 20 April 1942
• Docket Number: 15003.
• Citation: Moffat Tunnel Improvement Dist. v. Housing Authority of City and County of Denver, 125 P.2d 138, 109 Colo. 357 (Colo. 1942)
• Parties: MOFFAT TUNNEL IMPROVEMENT DIST. v. HOUSING AUTHORITY OF CITY AND COUNTY OF DENVER et al.
• Court: Colorado Supreme Court

125 P.2d 138

109 Colo. 357

MOFFAT TUNNEL IMPROVEMENT DIST. v. HOUSING AUTHORITY OF CITY AND COUNTY OF DENVER et al.

No. 15003.

Supreme Court of Colorado, En Banc.

April 20, 1942

Error to District Court, City and County of Denver; Robert W Steele, Judge.

Condemnation action by the Housing Authority of the City and County of Denver against the Moffat Tunnel Improvement District Greenspoon, Rashburn, and others.To review a judgment awarding title and possession to the Housing Authority and awarding Greenspoon and Rashburn the fund deposited in court subject to any lien of the district, the district brings error.

Erskine R. Myer, of Denver, for plaintiff in error.

Frank L. Hays, Philip Hornbein, and Philip Hornbein, Jr., all of Denver, for defendants in error.

BURKE Justice.

These parties appeared in reverse order in the trial court and are hereinafter referred to as there, or as the District and the Housing Authority, respectively.Aside from the Housing Authority, approximately forty parties(including Greenspoon and Rashburn) and 'unknown owners' were named as defendants.Both the District and the Housing Authority are municipal corporations.

This was an action in condemnation brought to obtain title to sixteen lots in block 5 West Fairview, in Denver.The District demurred for want of jurisdiction and answered pleading perpetual tax liens superior to all titles, vested or obtainable.The cause proceeded regularly.The objections of the District were overruled, a jury fixed the value of the lots at $5,500, that sum was deposited in court and findings for the Housing Authority were announced March 24, 1941, directing that any lien the District might have on the lots be transferred to the fund.Thereupon a stipulation, covering some fifteen typewritten pages, was filed containing the statement 'that the real property owned by the City and County of Denver, school districts, and other municipal corporations and used for public purposes within the Moffat Tunnel District, is not and never has been assessed for Moffat Tunnel improvement taxes.'The District then moved that a lien on the fund in its favor be established.April 21, that motion was denied; the court found Greenspoon and Rashburn to have been the owners of the property and entitled to the fund, and entered judgment accordingly, awarding the Housing Authority possession of and fee title to said lots.To review that judgment this writ is prosecuted and we are asked to order that it operate as a supersedeas.On that motion we elected to finally dispose of the cause and it was accordingly submitted.

Briefly stated the assignments present: (1) The jurisdiction of the trial court; (2) the validity of the order releasing the lien of the District on the lots and transferring it to the fund; (3) lien or no lien of the District on the fund; (4) the question of just compensation.

The District was organized under sections 200 to 220, chapter 138, of '35 C.S.A., the organization approved in Milheim v. Moffat Tunnel Imp. District,72 Colo. 268, 211 P. 649, and its states, powers and limitations examined and adjudicated in Denver Land Co. v. Moffat Tunnel Imp. District,87 Colo. 1, 284 P. 339, andBoynton v. Moffat Tunnel Imp.District, 10 Cir., 57 F.2d 772.The Housing Authority was organized under chapter 82 of '35 C.S.A. and its status, powers and limitations examined and adjudicated in People ex rel. v. Newton,106 Colo. 61, 101 P.2d 21.For a better understanding of the character and objects of said corporation, those statutes and decisions should be read in connection herewith.We avoid unnecessary repetition and quotation.

The lots here in question were included in the Moffat Tunnel District and were subject to levy and tax for the purposes for which it was created.This property having become necessary to the Housing Authority to effectuate the purposes for which it was created it resorted to condemnation.If so taken and thus freed of the special levies of the District the security for the latter's large outstanding indebtedness would be reduced to that extent; hence the controversy here arising and the questions here presented.It should be added that all past assessments of the District on said lots have been paid so that only future installments are here involved, and the fund on deposit is ample to cover these should the District be held entitled thereto.

(1) The contention that the court was without jurisdiction rests largely upon the decree in the Boyntoncase, supra, and particularly that portion of it reserving jurisdiction for the purpose of effectuating it and protecting the rights therein adjudicated.If that contention is good then every dispute and every action of whatsoever character touching the District and the property therein subject to its assessments which might directly or indirectly affect in the remotest or most minute way under any conceivable theory the security for the...