Tarrant County Water Control and Imp. Dist. No. One v. Wilson

• Citation: 163 Tex. 522,358 S.W.2d 368
• Decision Date: 13 June 1962
• Docket Number: No. A-8969,A-8969
• Parties: TARRANT COUNTY WATER CONTROL AND IMPROVEMENT DISTRICT NUMBER ONE, Petitioner, v. Will WILSON, Attorney General of Texas, Respondent.
• Court: Supreme Court of Texas

Page 368

358 S.W.2d 368

163 Tex. 522

TARRANT COUNTY WATER CONTROL AND IMPROVEMENT DISTRICT NUMBER

ONE, Petitioner, v. Will WILSON, Attorney General of Texas, Respondent.

No. A-8969.

Supreme Court of Texas.

June 13, 1962.

Brown, Herman, Scott & Young, Fort Worth, McCall, Parkhurst, Crowe, McCall & Horton, Dallas, for relator.

Howard Mays, Asst. Atty. Gen., Austin, for respondent.

CALVERT, Chief Justice.

Water District seeks in this proceeding to compel the Attorney General to approve an issue of its bonds.

The Attorney General has declined to approve the issue on the ground that issuance of the bonds and creation of the indebtedness evidenced thereby has not been authorized by vote of the qualified property tax-paying voters of the district as required by Section 59 of Article 16 of the Constitution of the State of Texas, Vernon's Texas Constitution. A brief re sume of the facts is essential to an understanding of the Attorney General's position.

Water District, situated entirely within Tarrant County, was created in 1924. On October 30, 1959, the district's Board of Directors ordered an election to determine whether the district should be authorized to issue its bonds in the sum of $55,000,000.00 for the construction of facilities, and whether it should be authorized to pledge revenues and levy and collect ad valorem taxes on all taxable property in the district for the payment of the bonds and interest thereon. The election was duly held on December 2, 1959, and the authority sought was granted. Under the authority given, the district issued its bonds in the sum of $6,000,000.00 on February 25, 1960. Those bonds were sold and delivered to purchasers and are now outstanding.

In 1957 the Legislature enacted a statute authorizing Water District to annex territory situated in Tarrant County and providing a procedure therefor. See Acts 1957, 55 Leg.Ch. 268, p. 569, Vernon's Ann.Civ.St. art. 828D-207. The Board of Directors in empowered to act on behalf of the district. If the Board finds that annexation of certain territory 'would be to the interest of the territory and the District,' it may request the Commissioners Court to annex such territory on such conditions, if any, as the Board may stipulate. The Act then provides for an annexation election to be held in the territory to be annexed, with authority to submit also at the election 'a proposition for the assumption of its (the annexed territory's) part of the tax-supported bonds of the District then outstanding and those theretofore voted but not yet sold, and for the levy of an ad valorem tax on taxable property in said territory along with the tax in the rest of the District for the payment thereof.'

Following the prescribed statutory procedure, an election was ordered and was held in the Village of Edgecliff on two propositions, summarized as follows: (1) Whether the territory constituting the Village of Edgecliff should be annexed to Tarrant County Water Control and improvement District No. 1, and (2) whether the annexed territory should assume its part of the outstanding tax-supported bonds and of those theretofore authorized by the voters of the District but not yet issued. There was a favorable vote on both propositions. Thereafter the Board of Directors of Water District directed issuance of its bonds aggregating $13,500,000.00. It is this issue the Attorney General has declined to approve. As heretofore indicated, declination is rested solely on the ground that the issue has not been authorized as required by Section 59, Article 16 of the Constitution.

Section 59 of Article 16 is the conservation amendment to the Constitution and was adopted in 1917. Paragraph (b) of the Section authorizes the creation of conservation and reclamation districts '(as) governmental agencies and bodies politic and corporate'. Paragraph (c) provides:

'The Legislature shall authorize all such indebtedness as may be necessary * * * and all such indebtedness may be evidence by bonds of such conservation and reclamation districts, to be issued under such regulations as amy (may) be prescribed by law * *...