Weber City Sanitation Commission v. Craft

• Decision Date: 25 April 1955
• Docket Number: No. 4342,4342
• Citation: 196 Va. 1140,87 S.E.2d 153
• Court: Virginia Supreme Court
• Parties: THE WEBER CITY SANITATION COMMISSION v. R. G. CRAFT. Record

Page 153

87 S.E.2d 153

196 Va. 1140

THE WEBER CITY SANITATION COMMISSION v. R. G. CRAFT.

Record No. 4342.

Supreme Court of Appeals of Virginia

April 25, 1955.

Coleman & Coleman, for the appellant.

Quillen & Carter and E. Hagan Richmond, for the appellee.

JUDGE: WHITTLE

WHITTLE, J., delivered the opinion of the court.

The Weber City Sanitation Commission, hereinafter called Commission, filed its bill in the Circuit Court of Scott County against R. G. Craft, hereinafter called Craft, praying that a mandatory injunction be issued requiring Craft to connect with the water works system operated by the Commission and to pay the minimum rates from the time the water service was made available.

Craft filed a demurrer and answer contending that section 6(13) of Chapter 523, Acts of Assembly, 1948, under which the Commission was established and operated, and the resolution of June 16, 1950, adopted by the Commission pursuant thereto, were unconstitutional because they contravened and were 'repugnant to Amendment 5 of the Constitution of the United States, Amendment 14, section 1 of the Constitution of the United States, section 11 of the Constitution of * * * Virginia, and of section 170 of the Constitution * * * of Virginia.'

The judge of the Circuit Court of Scott County disqualified himself and transferred the cause to the Corporation Court of the City of Bristol, where, by decree entered February 26, 1954, the demurrer was overruled. The decree further held that the court having heard the case on the bill, exhibits, answer and depositions and the record at large was 'of the opinion that subsection 13 under section 6 of the Acts of the Assembly of 1948, under Chapter 523 thereof * * * is repugnant to and contravenes the Constitution of the Commonwealth of Virginia, and the Constitution of the United States; and * * * doth adjudge, order and decree that the said bill of complaint be, and the same hereby is dismissed * * *.'

From this decision we granted the Commission an appeal.

Several assignments of error are relied upon by the Commission, but both the Commission and Craft agree that 'the sole issue and question presented by the pleadings and evidence in this case is whether or not section 6(13) of Chapter 523 of the Acts of 1948 and the resolution of June 6, 1950, adopted pursuant thereto are unconstitutional or whether they constitute a valid exercise of the police power of the State.'

This act, passed under authority of section 147 of the Constitution of Virginia, created the Weber City Sanitation District, of which the Commission was the governing body. The declared purposes of the act were 'the prevention or reduction of the pollution of the waters of the State in the area hereinafter defined by the discharge of sewage and industrial waste therein, and the providing of an adequate water supply for the inhabitants therein * * * for the preservation of the health of the people of said area * * *. ' *tThe act provided that the Commission should function as a public instrumentality with the powers granted therein. It was authorized to own, operate and maintain waterworks, to acquire riparian rights and to erect and maintain necessary main and service lines for the distribution of water to consumers, and to charge and collect water rents therefor as provided in section 6(7).

The Commission was empowered to issue bonds 'to construct, erect, purchase, own, maintain and operate' the waterworks system, and the Circuit Court of Scott County, on August 4, 1948, entered an order requiring the regular election officials to open the polls and take the sense of the qualified voters of the district on the question of issuing said bonds for the purposes aforesaid. The election was held and the bond issue carried. On January 23, 1950, the court entered an order authorizing and empowering the Commission 'to prepare, issue and to sell or negotiate bonds * * * in the amount of $300,000. ' The bonds were duly issued and sold and a water system constructed.

The Commission was also authorized and empowered to require abutting property owners to connect with any water system which might be owned or operated by it. (Section 6(13)) Pursuant to this section, 'for the preservation of the health and welfare of the inhabitants of said district', the Commission, on June 16, 1950, adopted and enacted the resolution here challenged, requiring the abutting property owners 'to connect with said waterworks for domestic uses and personal consumption of water upon such abutting premises and to abandon the use and consumption of any private subsurface water for such use and consumption' as and when water and water service were made available to the inhabitants within said district.

The bill alleged that it 'was necessary in said district to safeguard the public health and general welfare of the inhabitants of said district by providing an adequate supply of potable water and eliminating the public hazards of contaminated wells, which could only be accomplished by requiring all abutting property owners within said district to connect with said waterwords system.'

It was alleged that Craft, an abutting owner of several parcels of land within said district, refused to comply with the mandate of the resolution and refused to 'connect with said waterworks system and to pay for water and water service from the time that water and water service were made available', and that he continued to use water from his subsurface well for domestic uses and personal consumption.

Craft, in his answer challenging the constitutionality of the provisions of § 6(13) of the act, and the resolution of June 16, 1950, requiring him to connect with the system, asserted that before the Commission was established he had spent $2,500 in constructing a well on his property, which provided an adequate supply of water for his use. He further asserted that the enforcement of the provisions of the act and resolution would deprive him of his property without due process of law.

Depositions of witnesses for the Commission disclosed that the area embraced by the sanitation district is contiguous to the corporate limits of Gate City, within which area are located seven or eight hundred dwelling houses and fifty business establishments; that the town of Gate City has a population of two thousand or more inhabitants; that there are seven churches in the district; that the population of the district area is approximately 3,000; that there are over 400 school children living in the area who are transported to schools in Gate City where they mingle with approximately 1,000 other children from Gate City and surrounding territory; that a large part of the territory lies along U.S. Highway 23 between Gate City, Virginia, and Kingsport, Tennessee, along which there are practically no unoccupied lots for a distance of two miles to the Tennessee line, which condition prevails practically to Kingsport, a distance of six miles from the district boundary; that Kingsport is a city of 40,000 population; that between three and four hundred residents of the sanitation district are employed in Kingsport and commute daily; that there is no public sewerage system within the borders of the sanitation district, and the sewage from seven or eight hundred residences and fifty business establishments is disposed of by means of private septic tanks, cesspools and outdoor toilet facilities located on the same lots with the respective wells; that a great number of the deep wells located on the various lots were contaminated and the water was unfit for human consumption and had been condemned by the Virginia Department of Public Health; that the well on the premises of Craft had been condemned by the State Health Department during the construction period of the waterworks system although this well had been found uncontaminated and the water therein pure at the time of the taking of the depositions; that on the premises of Craft is located a dwelling house occupied by an employee, and also a service station operated by the tenant; that this service station does a large volume of business.

Depositions on behalf of Craft tended to show the facts alleged in his answer, that the water supply on his premises was adequate for his needs and that the water had been approved by the State Department of Health; that he had spent approximately $2,500 in constructing his private water system; that he did not need water service from the Commission and had never applied nor contracted for its use.

Craft challenged the Commission's assertion that section 6(13) and the resolution were enacted and adopted for the preservation of the general health and welfare of the inhabitants of the district, contending that the system was installed for the purpose of supplying adequate water to the inhabitants without any thought to the health and welfare of said inhabitants; that the Commission was set up by the act to supply water for convenience and that convenience alone was not sufficient to bring the section of the act or the resolution within the purview of the police power. He asserts that the resolution requiring abutting property owners to connect to the system was adopted without notice to the owners and without providing for a right of judicial review. He further asserts that an abutting property owner should not be required to pay for a service which 'he does not want or need, * * * and for which he has not contracted, and wholly against his will.'

If § 6(13) of the act and the resolution of June 16, 1950, were validly enacted and adopted in furtherance of the general police power of the State then in that event these contentions are untenable.

'At the outset of this consideration it must be remembered that every presumption is made in favor of the constitutionality of an act of the legislature. A reasonable doubt as to the constitutionality of a law must be resolved in favor of its validity. The...