Town of Bourne v. Plante

• Decision Date: 09 April 1999
• Citation: 708 N.E.2d 103,429 Mass. 329
• Court: United States State Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Supreme Court
• Parties: TOWN OF BOURNE & another 1 v. Ernest A. PLANTE, JR., & another, 2 trustees 3 ; Woods Hole, Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket Steamship Authority, intervener. Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts, Barnstable

Page 103

708 N.E.2d 103

429 Mass. 329

TOWN OF BOURNE & another ¹ v. Ernest A. PLANTE, JR., & another, ² trustees³; Woods Hole, Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket Steamship Authority, intervener Supreme Judicial Court of Massachusetts Barnstable.

Argued March 5, 1999.

Decided April 9, 1999.

Robert S. Troy, Sandwich (Brian J. Wall, with him) for the plaintiffs.

Richard M. Zielinski, Boston (Michael D. Vhay & Steven M. Sayers with him) for the intervener.

Alexander M. Joyce, Worcester, for the defendants, was present but did not argue.

Present: WILKINS, C.J., ABRAMS, LYNCH, GREANEY, FRIED, & IRELAND, JJ.

GREANEY, J.

We granted the plaintiffs' application for direct appellate review in this case to consider the propriety of a preliminary injunction entered in the Superior Court. The injunction enjoined the defendants, Ernest A. Plante, Jr., and Dolores A. Plante (defendants), and the intervener, the Woods Hole, Martha's Vineyard and Nantucket Steamship Authority (Authority), from using the property at 169 Clay Pond Road in Bourne under a lease to provide weekend parking for patrons using the Authority's services. We conclude that the preliminary injunction must be vacated.

The background of the case is as follows. The Authority was created by St.1960, c. 701, as a "public instrumentality" which is to "provide adequate transportation of persons and necessaries of life for the islands of Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard." St.1960, c. 701, §§ 1, 3. The Authority's principal offices are located in Woods Hole which is also the mainland terminal for its passenger services to Martha's Vineyard. Over the past thirty years, demand for the Authority's service to Martha's Vineyard has risen dramatically, from carrying 432,478 passengers, 82,897 automobiles, and 9,792 trucks in 1965, to carrying 2,139,599 passengers, 368,539 automobiles, and 64,777 trucks in 1995.

Providing adequate parking on the mainland for its patrons who do not take their motor vehicles to the islands has been a persistent problem for the Authority. When the Authority was created in 1960, it owned only one parking lot in Woods Hole. Over the years, as traffic and the number of patrons have dramatically increased, the Authority has purchased or leased additional property in Falmouth and has provided shuttle bus service for its passengers between its off-site parking lots and the Woods Hole terminal.

In 1995, the Authority found that its Woods Hole and Falmouth parking facilities were inadequate to meet its needs during the peak summer weekends. Patrons who were unable to park their vehicles at the Authority's lots left them on side roads or circled through the streets of Falmouth and Woods Hole. The problem came to a head during the 1995 Independence Day weekend, when all of the Authority's lots quickly filled up and passengers continued to arrive in unprecedented numbers. The principal route to the Woods Hole terminal, Woods Hole Road, became "an extended parking lot" and "bottlenecked traffic all but closed Water Street" as well. "Tempers flared early and often throughout the day," while passengers waited ninety minutes in shuttle buses to travel the final one-quarter mile to the terminal.

The Authority proceeded to take immediate steps to address its parking needs by searching for a suitable location on the outskirts of Falmouth where it could consolidate its "overflow" parking lots and add more parking spaces to accommodate expected traffic growth. The most acceptable consolidated site is at the Massachusetts Military Reservation (formerly Otis Air Force Base). The Authority has worked to secure an off-site parking facility at this site, but as of August, 1998, no final agreement had been reached to permit parking there.

Until the Authority obtains approval of a parking facility at the military reservation or somewhere else having similar location and size, it must use smaller parking facilities to satisfy the needs of its patrons. To this end, the Authority has leased two properties in Bourne for weekend overflow parking. On March 6, 1998, the Authority executed a lease with the defendant, Ernest A. Plante, Jr., for a term commencing on May 10, 1998, and ending on September 10, 1998, to use Plante's property at 169 Clay Pond Road in Bourne (comprising about six acres) for weekend overflow parking. ⁴ On July 9, 1998, the plaintiff, building inspector of Bourne, ordered Plante to cease and desist from using 169 Clay Pond Road "for commuter parking (i.e. steamship parking)" because the use was "in violation of the ... Bourne Zoning Bylaws."

Efforts to resolve the controversy were unsuccessful, and on July 31, 1998, the plaintiffs filed a verified complaint in the Superior Court alleging that the defendants had violated certain provisions of the Bourne zoning bylaw by leasing the site for an unlawful parking use, and by filling and clearing the lot in violation of the approved site plan. The Authority was permitted to intervene in the case. After hearing, a judge in the Superior Court entered a preliminary injunction enjoining the use of the leased property for parking. The Authority filed a petition for interlocutory relief from the preliminary injunction with the Appeals Court pursuant to G.L. c. 231, § 118, first par. After hearing, a single justice of the Appeals Court entered an order vacating the preliminary injunction. The plaintiffs filed a timely appeal from the order of the single justice, and we granted their application for direct appellate review.

The plaintiffs' arguments in support of the preliminary injunction are relatively straightforward. They concede that the Authority has seen a significant increase in demand for ferry service, that the level of service has expanded, and note that the Authority has increased the number of parking spaces available in response. The plaintiffs maintain, however, that the Authority's enabling legislation, St.1960, c. 701, allows it, in their words, "to authorize a ferry service and nothing more." Thus, the plaintiffs conclude that, because "[m]aintenance of a satellite parking lot system has never been part of the Authority's mission," the Authority cannot enter into parking arrangements that may violate local zoning ordinances or bylaws, and if the Authority attempts to do so, it is acting ultra vires. We are satisfied that the Authority need not comply with local zoning when it leases private property for parking. Consequently, there is no basis in law to support a preliminary injunction.

"[A]n entity or agency created by the Massachusetts Legislature is immune from municipal zoning regulations (absent statutory provision to the contrary) at least in so far as that entity or agency is performing an essential governmental function." County Comm'rs of Bristol v. Conservation Comm'n of Dartmouth, 380 Mass. 706, 710, 405 N.E.2d 637 (1980) (Bristol ). The scope of the immunity is broad and applies not only to property and facilities owned by the entity or agency, but also to leased property and facilities. Id. at 713, 405 N.E.2d 637. The immunity extends beyond the "essential governmental function" to cover "action reasonably related to that function" so that the agency's or entity's public mission is not "prevented by a zoning statute applicable to one municipality or by a local zoning ordinance or by-law." Village on the Hill, Inc. v. Massachusetts Turnpike Auth., 348 Mass. 107, 118, 202 N.E.2d 602 (1964), cert. denied, 380 U.S. 955, 85 S.Ct. 1089, 13 L.Ed.2d 971 (1965).

As mentioned, the Authority is a public instrumentality which has been directed by the Legislature "to provide adequate transportation of persons and necessaries of life for the islands of Nantucket and Martha's Vineyard." St.1960, c. 701, § 1. To this end, the Legislature has expressly granted the Authority the power to (1) "acquire, maintain, repair and operate a boat line," id. at § 4(a ), as amended by St.1965, c. 437; (2) "acquire, hold and dispose of real and personal property ... for its corporate purposes," id. at § 4(e ); (3) "make and enter into all contracts and agreements necessary or incidental to the performance of its duties and the execution of its powers under this act," id. at § 4(f ); and (4) "do all acts and things necessary or...