Utah State Road Com'n v. Friberg
| Decision Date | 01 May 1984 |
| Docket Number | No. 17275,17275 |
| Citation | 687 P.2d 821 |
| Parties | UTAH STATE ROAD COMMISSION, Plaintiff and Respondent, v. Arnold FRIBERG and Hedve Friberg, his wife, and Tracy Collins Bank and Trust Company, Defendants and Appellants. |
| Court | Utah Supreme Court |
Robert S. Campbell, E. Barney Gesas, Roy B. Moore, Salt Lake City, for defendants and appellants.
David L. Wilkinson, Atty. Gen., Donald S. Coleman, Asst. Atty. Gen., Salt Lake City, for plaintiff and respondent.
The Utah State Road Commission (hereafter "the State") 1 commenced this action June 23, 1972, to condemn a part of real property owned by Arnold and Hedve Friberg. The property was to be used for construction of the southeast segment of I-215, a belt-loop freeway project in Salt Lake County. The trial court granted an order of immediate occupancy in December, 1972, but for various reasons discussed below, the completion of the condemnation proceedings was delayed, and the Fribergs remained in possession pursuant to a stipulation until approximately March 15, 1980. The defendants contend that after June, 1972, the value of the Fribergs' property appreciated substantially. Prior to a trial to determine compensation to be held in 1980, the Fribergs moved to have the property valued as of the date the State finally established its legal right to condemn, December 12, 1979. The trial court ruled that the property was to be valued when summons was served pursuant to U.C.A., 1953, § 78-34-11, some seven and one-half years earlier. Because of the importance of the question involved, this Court granted leave to file an interlocutory appeal.
The Fribergs' contention on appeal is that § 78-34-11, which states that the assessment of compensation and damages in a condemnation action shall be deemed to accrue as of the date of service of summons, does not necessarily fix the date of valuation as of that date when there has been a long delay in the entry of a final decree and the property has substantially appreciated in value in the intervening time. Alternatively, they argue that if § 78-34-11 does require valuation in all cases to be determined as of the date of service of summons, that section is unconstitutional as applied to the facts of this case. The State's position is threefold: (1) § 78-34-11 fixes valuation as of the date of service of summons irrespective of delay in the entry of a final decree; (2) the Fribergs' property should be valued as of that date in any event because the order for immediate occupancy, entered shortly after service of process, established the State's right to condemn and occupy the Fribergs' property; and (3) in any event, the Fribergs were responsible for the delay in prosecuting this action and should not be permitted to profit from that delay.
The Fribergs owned 5.33 acres located in the east Cottonwood area of the Salt Lake Valley, where they lived for some 20 years. In June, 1972, the State commenced judicial proceedings to condemn the westerly 2.58 acres of the Friberg property. In August, 1972, the Fribergs filed their answer, alleging that the State had failed to comply with statutory and jurisdictional requirements necessary to establish its right to condemn the Friberg property and therefore had no authority to condemn the property.
The parties by a stipulation dated December 6, 1972, agreed that an order of immediate occupancy could be entered, and on December 14, 1972, some three months after the Fribergs filed their answer, the district court entered an order granting the State immediate occupancy, pendente lite. The order also incorporated the terms of a stipulation between the parties which provided that (1) the State would deposit with the clerk of the district court $80,800 payable immediately to the plaintiffs; (2) the Fribergs could remain on the property rent-free until September 1, 1973, and thereafter on a month-to-month basis; and (3) the Fribergs were entitled to thirty days' notice before being required to vacate the property. The Fribergs left the funds on deposit with the court, and thereby preserved their right to challenge the authority of the State to condemn the property. 2
On August 14, 1973, after the federal lawsuit referred to below was filed, the State notified the Fribergs that they were to vacate the premises by October 1, 1973, but also indicated that the Fribergs could remain in possession under certain conditions. Apparently because of uncertainty that their property would in fact be utilized for the specified project, the Fribergs, in response to the notice to vacate, moved to dismiss the condemnation proceeding. The motion was denied when the State agreed that the Fribergs could remain in possession as long as possible.
On July 13, 1973, an action was commenced in the United States Federal District Court for the District of Utah by a group of citizens from the Cottonwood area in Salt Lake County who opposed the alignment of the proposed freeway through the suburban area in which they resided. The action sought to enjoin the State from further construction of the freeway until an Environmental Impact Statement (E.I.S.) was filed pursuant to the National Environmental Policy Act of 1969, § 2, et seq., 83 Stat. 852, 42 U.S.C. § 4321, et seq. (1976). The Fribergs were among the named plaintiffs who filed the federal action. The State admitted that it had not filed an E.I.S. In January, 1974, the federal court ordered the State to prepare and file an E.I.S. and enjoined the State, pending the filing of an E.I.S., from performing any further construction activities related to the belt-loop project. 3 Some four years later, the State filed an E.I.S., which was finally approved by the Federal Highway Administration on February 7, 1978, approximately five years and eight months after service of the summons and complaint in the instant case.
For more than a year following the approval of the E.I.S., the Commission did nothing to proceed with construction of I-215 in the area near the Friberg property and took no action to have the Fribergs vacate the property. Although the record is not entirely clear on the point, the reason for this delay appears to have been the lack of funds for the project. In any event, the delay was not attributable to the Fribergs, although they clearly wanted to remain in possession as long as possible.
On February 6, 1979, approximately ten months after approval of the E.I.S., a second federal action challenging the adequacy of the E.I.S. was commenced by Cottonwood, Inc., a neighborhood citizens' group from the same general area as the Fribergs. The Fribergs were neither members of Cottonwood, Inc., nor parties to the action, although they did donate funds to the organization. On May 7, 1979, the federal district court again enjoined the State from undertaking further actions with respect to the I-215 project pending a determination of the sufficiency of the E.I.S. The State did not oppose the issuance of the injunction. On October 31, 1979, that court held that the E.I.S. was legally sufficient and dissolved the injunction.
Notwithstanding the delays caused by the lawsuits, it was not until approximately mid-November, 1979, that the Utah Department of Transportation 4 completed the "details for the final design of the north-south segment of the Southeast Quadrant between 4500 South and 6400 South," the segment for which the Friberg property was needed.
On September 19, 1979, while the federal district court injunction was still in effect in the Cottonwood case, the Fribergs filed a motion in the instant case to dismiss the complaint based on the State's failure to prosecute. The Fribergs contended that the property had appreciated substantially in value during the long interval between the commencement of the condemnation action in June, 1972, and their filing of the motion to dismiss and that it would be unfair to fix compensation as of a time some seven years earlier. In October, 1979, the trial court denied the Fribergs' motion to dismiss on the ground that the delay in bringing the case to a conclusion had resulted from the Fribergs' direct and indirect support of the two federal lawsuits.
Shortly after that ruling, the State served the Fribergs with a notice to vacate the premises in compliance with the December 14, 1972 order of immediate occupancy. The Fribergs continued to resist and again asserted that the State had not proved the jurisdictional prerequisites necessary to empower the State to condemn the Fribergs' property. 5 Specifically, the Fribergs asserted that there had been no evidence relating to the public necessity for taking their property or the relative importance of the public good and private injury. The Fribergs also contended that resolution of the Cottonwood, Inc. case, which was at that time still pending in the federal district court, might result in the proposed highway project's not going forward and that any action by the state court should await the outcome of the federal court action.
In December, 1979, after the conclusion of the Cottonwood, Inc. case and the dissolution of the federal injunction, the parties entered into a stipulation that was incorporated into a court order dated December 12, 1979. That order established the State's right to condemn and reserved for later determination the amount of compensation to be awarded and the date for determining valuation. The order also directed the Fribergs to vacate the premises on or before March 15, 1980, and the disbursement to the Fribergs of the $80,800 the State had deposited with the court. The order specifically states that it was made without prejudice to the Fribergs' contentions as to the compensation issues.
The Fribergs' motion to fix the valuation date as of the date the right to condemn was established, December 12, 1979, rather than the date of service of process was denied by the trial court on the ground that § 78-34-11 required...
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