Rock Island Metal Foundry v. City of Rock Island
| Decision Date | 23 March 1953 |
| Docket Number | No. 32616,32616 |
| Citation | 111 N.E.2d 499,414 Ill. 436 |
| Court | Illinois Supreme Court |
| Parties | ROCK ISLAND METAL FOUNDRY, Inc. v. CITY OF ROCK ISLAND et al. |
Robert A. Eagle, Rock Island, for appellants.
Huber, Reidy & Katz, Rock Island (Isador I. Katz, Rock Island, of counsel), for appellee.
This is an appeal from a judgment of the circuit court of Rock Island County which reversed a decision of the zoning board of appeals of the city of Rock Island. The trial court has certified that the validity of a municipal ordinance is involved, and that the public interest requires an appeal to this court. Ill.Rev.Stat.1951, chap. 110, par. 199.
Since 1923 the Rock Island Metal Foundry, Inc., has operated a foundry in a plant built on three lots in Rock Island. The property here involved consists of two additional lots lying immediately south of the original plant, which were zoned for residential use by an ordinance enacted by the city of Rock Island in 1941. In 1946 and 1947 building permits were issued by the building inspector of the city for the erection of large quonset huts on these two lots. The permit first issued authorized the erection of a warehouse building. The second permit was issued for the erection of a building for foundry purposes. In August of 1947 the first quonset building was converted from warehouse use to foundry use; both buildings have been used for foundry operations since that time.
In 1948 the city of Rock Island adopted a new zoning ordinance which was in substance a re-enactment of the 1941 ordinance. Under the 1948 ordinance the use of the lots in question remained restricted to residential purposes. In July of 1951, property owners in the neighborhood appealed to the zoning board of appeals from the action of the building inspector in granting the permits for the erection of the quonset buildings. The board conducted a hearing at which a number of the neighboring property owners testified with respect to the noise, vibration, fumes, dirt, and gas occasioned by the foundry work carried on in the two quonset huts.
The company offered no evidence at the hearing before the zoning board. Instead, the attorney for the company made an unsworn statement and requested that it be made a part of the record. He related the history of the company and of its use of its property, and then argued that the first zoning ordinance, passed in 1941, was never effective because it had never been properly published; that at the time of the construction of the quonset huts no enforcible zoning ordinance was in effect; and that consequently the quonset buildings, completely constructed a full year before the first effective zoning ordinance was passed in August of 1948, constituted a lawful, nonconforming use.
The zoning board of appeals found that the company was conducting foundry operations on property zoned for residential use, contrary to the provisions of the zoning ordinances of the city. The company sought review of the board's decision under the provisions of the Administrative Review Act. Ill.Rev.Stat.1951, chap. 110, pars. 264 et seq.
At the hearing before the circuit court, the company introduced evidence relating to the used to which property in the vicinity of the lots in question was put, and to the failure to publish the zoning map referred to in the 1941 zoning ordinance. Counsel for the city objected to the introduction of any evidence, and refused to introduce any evidence, on the ground that judicial review under the Administrative Review Act is limited to a review of the record made before the administrative body. In a written opinion the circuit court sustained the objection to the evidence insofar as it related to the use of the property in question and property in its vicinity, but overruled the objection insofar as it related to the defective publication of the 1941 ordinance. The court held that the publication of the zoning ordinance without publication of the map which by reference was made a part of the ordinance was not in accordance with law and that the 1941 ordinance therefore never became effective; that the quonset buildings were constructed and used for foundry purposes before the enactment of an...
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...a hearing to take additional evidence (see Ill.Rev.Stat.1981, ch. 110, par. 3-111(a)(6), (7)). Rock Island Metal Foundry, Inc. v. City of Rock Island (1953), 414 Ill. 436, 439-40, 111 N.E.2d 499; see Strohl v. Macon County Zoning Board (1952), 411 Ill. 559, 104 N.E.2d 612; Appel v. Zoning B......
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