State ex inf. Nesslage v. City of Lake St. Louis, 50608

• Citation: 718 S.W.2d 214
• Decision Date: 21 October 1986
• Docket Number: No. 50608,50608
• Parties: STATE of Missouri, ex inf., Larry D. NESSLAGE, et al., Relators, v. CITY OF LAKE ST. LOUIS, Respondent.
• Court: Court of Appeal of Missouri (US)

Page 214

718 S.W.2d 214

STATE of Missouri, ex inf., Larry D. NESSLAGE, et al., Relators, v. CITY OF LAKE ST. LOUIS, Respondent.

No. 50608.

Missouri Court of Appeals,

Eastern District,

Division One.

Oct. 21, 1986.

Norman C. Steimel, St. Charles, for respondent.

Louis S. Czech, Clayton, for relators.

Larry D. Nesslage, St. Charles Co. Pros. Atty., St. Charles, pro se.

CARL R. GAERTNER, Presiding Judge.

The City of Lake Saint Louis appeals a judgment ousting it of jurisdiction over Henke Road and finding that the Town of Dardenne Prairie had properly annexed the same. We reverse and remand with directions.

This case was tried without a jury, and must be reversed if it is not supported by substantial evidence, is against the weight of the evidence or erroneously declares or applies the law. Murphy v. Carron, 536 S.W.2d 30, 32 (Mo. banc 1976). The cause was determined on stipulated facts, a recital of which follows.

Proceeding under § 71.015, RSMo.Cum.Supp.1984, Lake Saint Louis passed a resolution on May 5, 1982, proposing the involuntary annexation of parts of Henke Road, and on December 20, 1983, the City obtained a declaratory judgment in the Circuit Court of St. Charles County authorizing the annexation. An election was held on April 3, 1984, in which 699 registered voters of the City of Lake St. Louis voted in favor and 75 voted against the annexation. On June 5, 1984, the City conducted a second election at which 328 voters favored and 169 opposed the annexation, four votes short of a two-thirds majority. In both elections no votes were cast in the area to be annexed as it is uninhabited. The City declared its annexation of the area to have been effective after the election of April 3, 1984.

Meanwhile, Dardenne Prairie sought to voluntarily annex areas including the same portions of Henke Road under § 71.012, RSMo.Cum.Supp.1984, through two ordinances to that effect.

Shortly after the second election in Lake Saint Louis, Dardenne Prairie filed a petition in Quo Warranto seeking to both oust Lake Saint Louis from jurisdiction over Henke Road and to have Lake Saint Louis' attempted annexation of that property declared invalid. Lake Saint Louis filed a separate petition in Quo Warranto seeking to oust Dardenne Prairie from Henke Road and asking the court to order Dardenne Prairie to show the basis of its assertion of jurisdiction over Henke Road. The causes were consolidated and the trial court found Lake Saint Louis' attempt to annex failed because no two-thirds majority was reached in the second election and that under § 71.012 Dardenne Prairie had properly annexed--and therefore properly exercised jurisdiction over--Henke Road.

As both parties claim to have completed their annexations successfully and both thereby assert jurisdiction over the same territory, we look first to the legal validity of their respective claims. Unless either fails this examination, we must then look to the question of prior jurisdiction.

I.

First, Lake Saint Louis' annexation will be examined. Where there is any public objection to a city's plan to annex land contiguous to its then existing boundaries the procedures set out in § 71.015 must be followed. No dispute exists that Lake Saint Louis properly passed an ordinance describing the annexation proposal and obtained a declaratory judgment approving the annexation from the appropriate circuit court. In issue here is the election requirement of § 71.015(6), under which the proposal must be:

approved by a majority of the total votes cast in the city, town, or village and by a separate majority of the total votes cast in the unincorporated territory sought to be annexed. However, should less than a majority of the total votes cast in the area proposed to be annexed vote in favor of the proposal, but at least a majority of the total votes cast in the city vote in favor of the proposal, then the proposal shall again be voted upon.... If at least two-thirds of the qualified electors voting thereon are in favor of the annexation, then the city may proceed to annex the territory.

The trial court found the proposal did not carry by the required majority in the area to be annexed in the first election and therefore, that a second election was required. We disagree.

No appellate court has construed the meaning of the election requirement of § 71.015 where the area sought to be annexed is uninhabited. ¹ In doing so ourselves, we fundamentally seek to give effect to the intent of the lawmakers. That intent may be gleaned not only from the plain words of the statute, but also by identifying the problems sought to be remedied and from the circumstances and conditions existing at the time of enactment. Sermchief v. Gonzales, 660 S.W.2d 683, 688 (Mo. banc 1983).

The plain words of the statute provide little guidance here: when no votes are cast in the area to be annexed because it is uninhabited, there cannot logically be either a "majority" or "less than a majority" of those votes. Thus, we turn to the circumstances extant when § 71.015(6) was enacted.

Section 71.015 was amended in 1980 to include the election requirement amidst allegations the prior statute violated the due process rights of those whose property was being annexed as they were given no voice in the annexation process. See, e.g., City of Branson v. Biedenstein, 618 S.W.2d 665 (Mo. banc 1981); City of Lake Ozark v. Prewitt, 631 S.W.2d 103 (Mo.App.1982). We can infer from this that the intent of the legislature was to give inhabitants of an area sought to be involuntarily annexed a means of protecting their interests.

That rationale is clearly inapplicable here, as no one lives in the area of the proposed annexation. To construe the statute to require a second election in this circumstance would be a patently absurd waste of public time and money. The legislature is presumed to intend a just law that will serve the general welfare rather than an absurd one. State ex rel. Lack v. Melton, 692 S.W.2d 302, 304 (Mo. banc 1985). Accordingly, we find that § 71.015(6) does not dictate a second election where a simple majority is achieved in the city seeking to annex and the area to be annexed is uninhabited. Lake Saint Louis thus properly annexed Henke Road with the first election.

II.

Regarding the annexation of the disputed territory by Dardenne Prairie, the issue, as presented by Lake Saint Louis, is whether the term "municipality" as used in § 71.012 encompasses a town organized under § 80.020, RSMo.1978. Lake Saint Louis contends the voluntary annexation procedures under § 71.012 are not available to towns and villages, and that such entities are limited to the extension of their boundaries pursuant to the procedures set forth in § 80.030, which provides that a town or village desiring to annex adjacent territory "shall file a petition with the county court...." Lake Saint Louis argues that this statute, relating as it does only to a specific type of governmental entity, prevails over the generalization "any municipality" in § 71.012. We disagree.

The cardinal and overriding rule of statutory construction is that the intent of the legislature controls. Tribune Publishing Co. v. Curators of University of Missouri, 661 S.W.2d 575, 583 (Mo.App.1983). In the absence of any recorded legislative history in Missouri, a number of guidelines have developed to which courts resort in order to determine legislative intent if it is not clear from the plain and ordinary language used in the statute. Id. These guidelines, sometimes referred to as rules of statutory construction, are "diverse and sometimes conflicting;" they are not absolutes but "may be considered merely as aids in reaching" the purpose and object of the legislation. Edwards v. St. Louis County, 429 S.W.2d 718, 722 (Mo. banc 1968).

One such aid is that words not specially defined in the statute should be interpreted according to their ordinary meaning. St. Louis Country Club v. Administrative Hearing Commission of Mo., 657 S.W.2d 614 (Mo. banc 1983). As such, "municipality" is defined in Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language, unabridged, 1981, as meaning "a primarily urban political unit (as a town or city) having corporate status and usually powers of self-government." Dardenne Prairie is incorporated and self-governing. However, the record before us is silent regarding its population, geographic size or the nature of its land use, important factors in the popular conception of the distinction between urban and rural communities. See City of St. Peters v. Kodner Development Corporation, 525 S.W.2d 97, 99 (Mo.App.1975). Therefore, we cannot conclude that Dardenne Prairie is a municipality by reason of being a "primarily urban political unit."

An additional obstacle to the interpretation of "municipality" as all encompassing is the fact that the legislature, in simultaneously amending § 71.012, pertaining to voluntary annexations, and § 71.015, pertaining to involuntary annexations, in 1980, utilized the word "municipality" in the former but referred to "any city, town or village" in the latter. Lake Saint Louis argues this variation in terminology precludes an interpretation of "municipality" in § 71.012 as inclusive of towns and villages. However whatever merit this argument may seem to have at first glance is dissipated by consideration of the historical background of the legislation. Mindful of the concept that "[t]he legislature is presumed to know the law that has been amended, and to have used particular words in light of prior judicial and legislative action," Statev. Davis, 675 S.W.2d 410, 415 (Mo.App.1984), we look to the history of annexation legislation in Missouri.

Since 1808, towns and villages have been authorized to extend their boundaries by annexing adjoining lands through the filing of a petition with the county court which determines the propriety of the action after public hearing. 1 Terr.Laws, p. 184,...