State ex rel. Close v. Meehan, 33670

• Decision Date: 18 October 1956
• Docket Number: No. 33670,33670
• Citation: 302 P.2d 194,49 Wn.2d 426
• Court: Washington Supreme Court
• Parties: The STATE of Washington, on the Relation of Ralph M. CLOSE, individually, and on behalf of approximately 7,200 Electors of the City of Spokane, Appellant, v. A. R. MEEHAN, W. N. Sproul, Willard Taft, Kenneth Lawson and Carl Canwell, as Commissioners of the City of Spokane, Respondents.

Page 426

49 Wn.2d 426

302 P.2d 194

The STATE of Washington, on the Relation of Ralph M. CLOSE individually, and on behalf of approximately 7,200 Electors of the City of Spokane, Appellant, v. A. R. MEEHAN, W. N. Sproul, Willard Taft, Kenneth Lawson and Carl Canwell, as Commissioners of the City of Spokane, Respondents.

No. 33670.

Supreme Court of Washington, Department 1.

Oct. 18, 1956.

Rice, Morrison & Lake, Spokane, for appellant.

B. A. Farley, Paul F. Schiffner, Roland C. Wightman, Spokane, for respondents.

SCHWELLENBACH, Justice.

Since its incorporation the City of Spokane has discharged its raw sewage into the Spokane river. The State Department of Health, by notice dated December 4, 1935, notified the city that a public nuisance existed in the Spokane and Columbia rivers resulting from such discharge of raw sewage, and ordered the city to abate the nuisance.

Subsequent thereto the legislature enacted Chapter 186 of the Laws of 1941, RCW 35.88.08, forbidding the city from depositing its sewage into the Spokane river, and providing that the same should become a public nuisance which might be summarily abated by any court of competent jurisdiction.

April 15, 1946, the city council adopted Ordinance No. C8500, consisting of eleven sections, which contained a comprehensive and detailed plan for the acquisition, construction and installation of a sewage disposal system, and the method of its financing. Section 1 provided:

'Section 1: That, subject to the approval by the qualified electors of Spokane of the Proposition hereinafter described at a special election hereinafter ordered, there shall be acquired, constructed, and installed, or caused to be constructed and installed by the City of Spokane, a municipal sewage disposal system and facilities, the works of which, upon such acquisition, construction, and installation, shall be owned, operated, and controlled by the City of Spokane; which will consist of the following as additions to, and connected with, the municipally owned sewage system of Spokane viz:

'A series of intercepting sewers, as specifically described hereinafter, shall be constructed in and along the areas, places and streets as designated hereinafter; which said sewers will receive the sanitary sewage originating in the various areas tributary thereto and which can be sewered into and drained through such intercepting sewers; and said intercepting sewers, being connected and joined as specified hereinafter, will be constructed and extended to and into a Primary Treatment Sewage Disposal plant. The Sewage Treatment Plant will include the necessary structures and equipment to provide for coarse screening, grit removal, preliminary sedimentation, disinfection with chlorine, separate sludge digestion, and vacuum drying of the sludge together with other necessary appurtenant work. Building space will be provided for administrative, laboratory, and repair work and storage for vehicles, tools, equipment, and materials, which plant will be constructed on the north side of the Spokane River in the Northeast Quarter (NE 1/4) of Section Three (3) and the Northwest Quarter (NW 1/4) of Section Two (2), Township Twenty-five (25) North, Range Forty-two (42), E.W.M., Spokane County, Washington.

'The sewage originating in the various areas and territory served by said intercepting sewers will flow into and through said intercepting sewers into said Primary Treatment Sewage Disposal Plant and there be disposed of. Said intercepting sewers will be constructed and located as follows: [Then follow descriptions.] * * *

'and in order to pay for the cost and expense to the City of Spokane of the foregoing plan, which is for, and shall include, capital purposes only, the City of Spokane shall sell and issue its general obligation negotiable serial coupon bonds in the principal amount of $1,700,000.00 and provide for the payment of the bond principal and interest by approximately equal annual tax levies in excess of the tax levy limitation upon Washington cities expressed in the statute and Constitution of the State of Washington.'

Section 2 provided that the estimated cost of the sewage disposal system was $3,700,000, to which cost would be allocated the sum of $1,048,320 by the state, the proceeds of the $1,700,000 bond issue, and a contribution by the city of $951,680 out of its available funds.

Section 3 provided that the bond issue should run for twenty-five years. Section 4 provided for the issuance of seventeen hundred bonds of the denomination of $1,000 each, provided for interest, and for the levying of taxes to meet the payments plus interest as they should fall due.

Section 5 provided for the calling of a special election at which the proposed bond issue would be submitted to the qualified electors. Section 6 contained the 'Ballot Title', submitting to the voters the proposal of the sale of bonds in the amount of $1,700,000, with interest, to construct a sewage disposal system, all as provided by Ordinance C8500.

At an election held June 4, 1946, the qualified electors adopted Ordinance No. C8500. Pursuant to the ordinance, general obligation bonds in the amount of $1,700,000 were issued and sold. Added to this sum were the contributions from the state and the city, making a total of $3,700,000, all of which was paid into the city Sewage Disposal Fund. The various sections of the system of sewage disposal, as described in Section 1 of the ordinance, have been completed and interconnected to a point on the selected site of the sewage treatment plant, at a cost of $2,640,295.86.

It then developed that a portion of the selected site of the plant is situated within Riverside State Park. The legislature, by the provisions of chapter 374 of the Session Laws of 1955, authorized the city to acquire one of two sites (one, the site selected in Ordinance No. C8500, and the other, a site 9,000 feet distant) for use in connection with the construction and development of a sewage disposal system, by condemnation in the superior court for Spokane county. Section 2 of the act provided:

'The site shall be selected by the city of Spokane only after notice and public hearing on the selection of said site.'

Notice of a public hearing was advertised, to be held in the council chamber on June 28, 1955, to determine which site was to be selected. Accoring to the minutes the discussion was somewhat heated. After the hearing the council selected the site which had been previously selected in Ordinance No. C8500. It is quite clear from the record that the proposed site would require an additional expenditure of either $2,268,400, or $1,881,500, depending upon which route would be taken, together with an annual cost of $18,000 for operating a pumping plant, and $35,000 for extending the necessary water main.

In the meantime there was prepared and...