Tropical Coach Lines, Inc. v. King

• Decision Date: 05 December 1962
• Docket Number: No. 31775,31775
• Citation: 147 So.2d 318
• Parties: TROPICAL COACH LINES, INC., Gray Line Sightseeing Tours, Inc., Greyhound Corporation, Southeastern Greyhound Division; Tamiami Trail Tours, Inc. and Coast Cities Coaches, Petitioners, v. Wilbur C. KING, Jerry W. Carter and Edwin L. Mason, as Members of and constituting the Florida Railroad and Public Utilities Commission, Respondents.
• Court: Florida Supreme Court

Page 318

147 So.2d 318

TROPICAL COACH LINES, INC., Gray Line Sightseeing Tours, Inc., Greyhound Corporation, Southeastern Greyhound Division; Tamiami Trail Tours, Inc. and Coast Cities Coaches, Petitioners, v. Wilbur C. KING, Jerry W. Carter and Edwin L. Mason, as Members of and constituting the Florida Railroad and Public Utilities Commission, Respondents.

No. 31775.

Supreme Court of Florida.

Dec. 5, 1962.

John T. Bond and Robert Stampfl, Miami, for petitioners.

Lewis W. Petteway and B. Kenneth Gatlin, Tallahassee, for Florida Railroad and Public Utilities Commossion.

Starr W. Horton, Miami, for applicant, White Bus Company, respondents.

THOMAS, Justice.

The petition for certiorari constitutes a challenge of respondent's order No. 5348 granting White Bus Company as a common carrier a certificate of Public Convenience and Necessity for the transportation by bus of school children between the ages of five and 13 among points in Dade, Broward and Palm Beach Counties over Sunshine State Parkway, U. S. Highway No. 1 and State Road No. 441. The authority was conditioned upon the applicant's submitting and obtaining the approval of schedules to be observed and rates to be charged.

The petitioners had protested the original application on the ground that it was obscure, but hearing was held on the application by an examiner who recommended that it be granted without 'charter rights' and subject to the restriction we have already mentioned which was imbedded in the final order. The recommendation, too, was attacked on the ground of vagueness. The Commission at first denied the application. then on reconsideration entered the final order we first described.

We understand that by the present attack the petitioners are claiming that the Commission wandered from the essential requirements of law on the way to their ultimate decision because the requirement in Sec. 323.03(1), Florida Statutes of 1961, F.S.A., that the application contain the proposed time schedule of operation was not followed, and no schedule was before the Commission at the time of decision. Absence of this information, insist petitioners, precluded the Commission from assuming jurisdiction of the matter.

In support of their petition for certiorari the petitioners cite the opinion of this court in Florida Motor Lines Corporation v. Douglass, 150 Fla. 1, 7 So.2d 843, in which it was held that although the jurisdiction of the Commission must be invoked, as the statute provides, the Commission was not 'entirely without jurisdiction' because of the failure of the applicant to incorporate in its application the proposed time schedule since the information was furnished during the hearing and was therefore before the Commission when it 'assumed to adjudicate the application.' The court commented that the lack of such intelligence had prejudiced no one. It would seem, then, that absence of the jurisdictional prerequisite at the outset may be cured by supplying it during the hearing.

The respondents dismiss this contention with the assertion that in the instant case the Commission did have before the determination of the application the time schedule required by the statute and direct us to the record of the testimony of the president of the applicant-corporation, White Bus Company, which, it is claimed, corrected the deficiency. He testified the company wished to take the school children to the Seaquarium, Crandon Park, the zoo, Parrott Jungle, Red Bird Farm, Monkey Jungle and Clyde Bailey Circus, all in Dade County and to Africa U.S.A. in Palm Beach County, the fartherest point from the base of operations. He stated that he proposed to make one trip a week to Africa U.S.A. 'to start off with' at a fare per person of $3.75 or $4. He was not certain about the frequency of the trips to points of interest within Dade County, although it was desired to make...