Price v. Edmonds, 5-1980

• Decision Date: 07 December 1959
• Docket Number: No. 5-1980,5-1980
• Citation: 231 Ark. 332,330 S.W.2d 82
• Parties: Howell B. PRICE et al., Appellants, v. Cecil U. EDMONDS, Appellee.
• Court: Arkansas Supreme Court

Page 82

330 S.W.2d 82

231 Ark. 332

Howell B. PRICE et al., Appellants, v. Cecil U. EDMONDS, Appellee.

No. 5-1980.

Supreme Court of Arkansas.

Dec. 7, 1959.

Rehearing Denied Jan. 11, 1960.

W. H. Dillahunty, Hale & Fogleman, West Memphis, for appellants.

Fletcher Long, Forrest City, for appellee.

HOLT, Justice.

Appellee, Edmonds, is a resident and taxpayer of the City of West Memphis, Arkansas, and pays electric and water rates to a distribution system there which the city owns and operates for distribution of electric power and water to its inhabitants. The ownership of the system is exclusive in the city by ordinance enacted in 1954. Appellants are the duly appointed and acting members of the utility commission and are charged with the operation of the electric power distribution system, the water works and sewer systems of West Memphis. It appears undisputed that some of the members of the commission have made contracts with concerns in which members of the commission have an interest. Appellee, Edmonds, brought the present action in which he sought a restraining order enjoining appellants, as the utility commission and as individual members, from entering into any type of contract, or making payments under any previous contracts, with concerns in which one or more of the commissioners may have an interest, and further sought permission to inspect the records and books of the utility district which he alleged had been denied him.

On a hearing for a temporary injunction, the trial court's 'Order for Temporary Relief' contained, among others, the following recitals: 'On the 30th day of June, 1959, the above entitled cause came on for a hearing upon the petition and prayer of the plaintiff for temporary relief in the following respects: (1) that the utility commissioners acting for the City of West Memphis, Arkansas, be enjoined and restrained from making and collecting rates for utilities; (2) that the utility commissioners aforesaid be enjoined and restrained from spending funds of the utility commission in connection with contracts with themselves or with companies in which a commissioner has a beneficial interest; and (3) that petitioner Cecil Edmonds, as a citizen and rate-payer, be allowed to examine any and all records of the aforesaid utility commission. * * * It is, * * *, by the court Considered and Ordered that (1) petitioner's prayer that the utility commissioners of West Memphis be enjoined and restrained from making and collecting utility rates should be and it is hereby denied; that (2) petitioner's prayer that the utility commission of West Memphis and each member thereof be enjoined and restrained from making contracts and spending commission funds with its own members and/or companies in which they have a beneficial interest should be and it is hereby granted; and that (3) petitioner's prayer that the utility commission be compelled to make all its records available to him for examination has been taken out of the jurisdiction of this court by a Mandate of the Supreme Court of Arkansas dated July 2, 1959.'

Appellant says, 'The only question now before this court is that of the propriety of the granting of the temporary injunction.'

On the record presented, we hold that the trial court correctly granted temporary injunctive relief and that there was no abuse of the court's discretion in so doing.

Here the facts are undisputed that appellants, while acting as the utility commissioners for West Memphis, were spending funds of the utility commission in connection with contracts with themselves or with companies in which a commissioner had a beneficial interest. In these circumstances, what we said in Riggs v. Hill, 201 Ark. 206, 144 S.W.2d 26, 28, applies with equal force here. 'The granting or refusing of injunctive relief rests within the judicial discretion of the trial court, and its action in the matter will be sustained on review by an appellate court, where the power has not been abused. Ordinarily, it is sufficient if a transaction is shown which makes a proper subject for investigation in a court of equity. The rule applies to the grant or denial of a preliminary injunction, and to rulings on motion to dissolve the injunction. Such orders will not be disturbed on review unless they are contrary to some rule of equity, or the result of improvident exercise of judicial power.' 28 Am.Jur., 500, 501.

We reaffirmed this holding in the more recent case of Scrivner v. Portis Mercantile Company, 220 Ark. 814, 250 S.W.2d 119, 120, in this language: 'As to (c), an appeal may be taken from the issuance of a temporary injunction. Ark.Stats.1947, § 27-2102. But the granting of the order is a matter that lies within the chancellor's discretion. Riggs v. Hill, 201 Ark. 206, 144 S.W.2d 26. By his pleadings Scrivner concedes that the State owns the land and that he is in effect a trespasser. The prosecuting attorney, pursuant to his authority to represent the State in civil actions, §§ 24-101 and 24-103, asks that the trespass be enjoined pendente lite. The proof taken at the preliminary hearing sustains the view that Scrivner's possession is wrongful. There was no abuse of discretion in the issuance of the injuction.'

On appellant's contention that Edmonds had no right to maintain the present suit against the commission, we hold that since the evidence shows that he was a citizen, property owner, taxpayer, ratepayer or 'consumer', he did have the right to maintain the present suit. The Constitution of Arkansas, Article 16, Section 13, provides: 'Any citizen of any * * * city * * * may institute suit in behalf of himself, and all others interested, to protect the inhabitants thereof against the enforcement of any illegal exactions whatever.'

Many of our cases indicate that this section of the constitution was designed to prohibit the illegal expenditure of government funds before they occur. This right has been extended in suits brought against improvement districts by property owners residing therein. In the recent case of Keenan v. Williams, 225 Ark. 556, 283 S.W.2d 688, 689, there was at issue the misuse of district funds by the commissioners of a drainage district and complaint was brought by three landowners within the district. We there said: 'It cannot be doubted that these matters are within the jurisdiction of equity. The state's policy is declared by the constitution, which authorizes any citizen of a county, city, or town to institute suit to prevent the enforcement of illegal exactions. Art. 16, § 13. Even though the constitution does not expressly refer to improvement districts it has been repeatedly held that, in harmony with the constitutional policy, equity has jurisdiction of suits to prevent the misapplication of improvement district funds. Huddleston v. Coffman, 90 Ark. 219, 118 S.W. 1010; City of Bentonville v. Browne, 108 Ark. 306, 158 S.W. 161; Seitz v. Meriwether, 114 Ark. 289, 169 S.W. 1175.'

In this connection we must not overlook what also appears to be the undisputed facts: (1) The ownership of the distribution system is in the City exclusively. (2) The funds collected from rates, subject to payment of debts and outstanding liens for bonded obligations, are public funds. (3) The directing body of the utility district, the Commissioners, has authority originating exclusively in a grant from duly elected public officials, the city council. (4) Edmonds has a proprietary and pecuniary interest in the distribution system and in the funds of the district, and represents the class which owns the whole interest, subject only to payments already mentioned.

Ordinarily, as appellants contend, the utility commission would have been the proper party to institute this action; however, in the instant case the record shows that they took no action whatever until they were brought into court by appellee who charged them with having committed illegal and unlawful acts which they admitted to be true. In the case of Seitz v. Meriwether, 114 Ark. 289, 169 S.W. 1175, 1177, in which the right of a taxpayer to sue was questioned (an improvement district case which involved a municipal corporation and its inhabitants) we there said: 'A court of equity may, at the suit of property holders or taxable inhabitants of a municipal corporation, restrain the corporation and its officers from making an unauthorized appropriation of the corporate funds. This is so because the corporation holds its money for the corporators, the inhabitants of the town or city, to be expended for legitimate corporate purposes, and a misappropriation of these funds is an injury to the taxpayer, for which no other remedy is so effectual or appropriate as an injunction.'

Yet it appears that they still contend that they have done no wrong officially or individually. In the...