Nehrbas v. Incorporated Village of Lloyd Harbor

• Decision Date: 10 January 1957
• Citation: 140 N.E.2d 241,159 N.Y.S.2d 145,2 N.Y.2d 190
• Parties: , 140 N.E.2d 241, 61 A.L.R.2d 965 Harold A. NEHRBAS et al., Appellants, v. INCORPORATED VILLAGE OF LLOYD HARBOR et al., Respondents.
• Court: New York Court of Appeals Court of Appeals

Page 145

159 N.Y.S.2d 145

2 N.Y.2d 190, 140 N.E.2d 241, 61

A.L.R.2d 965

Harold A. NEHRBAS et al., Appellants, v. INCORPORATED VILLAGE OF LLOYD HARBOR et al., Respondents.

Court of Appeals of New York.

Jan. 10, 1957.

Francis A. McGrath, K. Frederick Gross and Edward V. Gross, Brooklyn, for appellants.

David L. Glickman, Huntington, for respondents.

FULD, Judge.

The Village of Lloyd Harbor, having a population of about 1,800 and located a few miles from the business section of the Town of Huntington, is a community of homes. The village zoning ordinance, as amended in 1936, classified all of its land as residential, with the exception of a small area zoned for business. In 1950, after the latter area had been sold for residential use, the ordinance was changed to provide that the entire village be zoned as residential and restricted to single-family dwellings.

In 1953, plaintiffs purchased an eight-acre parcel, within the village, on which they built a house. A year later, the village acquired a two-acre plot. Located thereon, about 450 feet from plaintiffs' home is a large Tudor-style barn. In existence for many years, it was long used for the storage and garaging of tractors and other farm equipment. The village plans to remodel the structure into a sort of municipal headquarters to be used (1) to furnish an office for the village clerk, a meeting place for the village trustees, discussion of village affairs and courtroom facilities for the village police justice; (2) to provide a locker room and toilet facilities for highway employees; and (3) to house a police car, two enclosed garbage trucks, a tractor, snow removal equipment and smaller appliances used in connection with the repair and maintenance of roads.

The highway repair equipment is used at most three days a week, the garbage trucks twice a week. The latter leave the barn at a quarter to eight in the morning on those two days, pick up the refuse and take it directly to an incinerator located outside of the village. The trucks are always empty when they start out from the barn and when they return to it, and no garbage is at any time disposed of within the village of Lloyd Harbor. The barn's outward appearance will not be affected by the increased uses to which it will be put, the record evidence being ample that the building will be attractively landscaped and that its operations will be inconspicuous and unobtrusive.

When plaintiffs learned what was planned, they brought this suit against the village and its trustees to prevent them from using the structure 'in any manner except for a single family dwelling.' Although the complaint sets out what plaintiffs have chosen to denominate three causes of action one for a declaration that the 1950 amendment to the zoning ordinance is unconstitutional and the other two for an injunction we regard their plaint as single, concluding as we do that its gravamen and gist are contained in the second cause of action, with its recital that the village is violating its zoning ordinance 'as it has existed at all times since its original enactment' in April of 1936. Accordingly, our discussion, though directed to that cause of action, is dispositive of the complaint in its entirety.

The court at Special Term dismissed two causes of action, the first and third, and the Appellate Division dismissed the remaining one. Both courts agreed that a municipality could not be prevented from performing a governmental function merely because such performance would violate a zoning ordinance, but they differed in their delineation of the 'governmental' and the 'proprietary.' The Appellate Division (152 N.Y.S.2d 29, 1 A.D.2d 1033), after finding that on the proof adduced 'neither the structure in question nor the manner in which the village proposes to use it * * * constitutes a nuisance in fact', went on to decide that all of the proposed uses were governmental and could, therefore, be carried on in a residential zone despite the ordinance's restrictions.

In the very nature of things, a municipality must have the power to select the site of building or other structures for the performance of its governmental duties. Accordingly, it necessarily follows, a village is not subject to zoning restrictions in the performance of its governmental, as distinguished from its corporate or proprietary, activities. See, e. g., Village of Larchmont v. Town of Mamaroneck, 239 N.Y. 551, 147, N.E. 191, modifying 208 App.Div. 812, 203 N.Y.S. 957; Stiger v. Village of Hewlett Bay Park, 283 App.Div. 827, 129 N.Y.S.2d 38; Sunny Slope Water Co. v. City of Pasadena, 1 Cal.2d 87, 98, 33 P.2d 672; City of Cincinnati v. Wegehoft, 119 Ohio St. 136, 137, 162 N.E. 389; 2 Metzenbaum on Law of Zoning (2d ed., 1955), p. 1280; cf. Hewlett v. Town of Hempstead, 3 Misc.2d 945, 133 N.Y.S.2d 690, affirmed 1 A.D.2d 954, 150 N.Y.S.2d 922, motion for leave to appeal denied 1 N.Y.2d 643, 154 N.Y.S.2d LXIX, 1 N.Y.2d 644, 154 N.Y.S.2d LXX. In the Village of Larchmont case, supra, 239 N.Y. 551, 147 N.E. 191, for instance the village had its water supply system in the residential district of the neighboring Town of Mamaroneck and sought to construct a small building near its pump works. Although the town ordinance explicitly prohibited such use in a residential area, the town was enjoined from enforcing it against the village in view of the fact that the building in question was designed for a governmental use.

Once we conclude that a village is free to locate its governmental operations in any district it chooses, we are left with the question whether the uses planned for the village building are of a governmental or proprietary character.

Insofar as the structure may be used as a courtroom, a meeting place for the village trustees or an office for the village clerk, there is no problem; it is conceded that such uses are governmental. However, it is plaintiffs' contention that the building is to be used only as a garage for police cars and for highway department trucks and equipment employed in the repair or highways and in the collection of garbage, and it is urged that, in carrying out such activities, the village performs a corporate function and acts in a proprietary capacity.

Whether a particular activity involves a governmental function or one proprietary is a matter not always easy of determination. Past decisions, mostly in the field of tort liability, see, e. g., Brush v. Commissioner, 300 U.S. 352, 362, 57 S.Ct. 495, 81 L.Ed. 691; 18 McQuillin on...