Williams v. City of Spokane
| Decision Date | 18 June 2020 |
| Docket Number | No. 36508-5-III,36508-5-III |
| Court | Washington Court of Appeals |
| Parties | CHRIS WILLIAMS, individually and on behalf of all similarly situated, Respondent, v. CITY OF SPOKANE; and AMERICAN TRAFFIC SOLUTIONS, INC, a foreign corporation, Petitioners. |
FEARING, J. — This case presents the principal question of whether a citizen may later challenge, in a superior court action, a ticket for allegedly speeding within a school zone when the citizen paid the traffic fine but later contends that he had not yet entered a lawful school zone. Appellant Chris Williams sues for money damages for the amount of the ticket and for declaratory and injunctive relief to preclude the City of Spokane from issuing speeding tickets outside the school zone. We reverse the superior court's denial of the City of Spokane's summary judgment motion to dismiss the lawsuit. We hold that, to obtain any monetary relief, Williams must seek to vacate the judgment for the ticketed amount in the municipal court. We further hold that, since Williams does not allege that he might drive near the school speed zone in the future, he lacks standing for declaratory and injunctive relief.
This appeal arises from respondent City of Spokane issuing a speeding infraction to appellant Chris Williams as a result of respondent American Traffic Solutions, Inc. (ATS) capturing Williams on a photograph while Williams allegedly sped in a school zone. Years of facts precede the issuance of the infraction.
On May 18, 1989, the City of Spokane established a 20 m.p.h. school speed limit zone along Nevada Street and adjacent to Longfellow Elementary School. The zone extended 300 feet north of the location of a marked school crosswalk on Empire Avenue near its intersection with Nevada Street.
In 2008, the City of Spokane obtained a grant to install seventy twenty-mile-per-hour school speed limit signs with blinking lights, known as flashing beacons, throughout Spokane. Spokane chose to erect two of the new flashing beacons at Longfellow Elementary School including one along Nevada Street north of the school. Instead of installing the new flashing sign at the spot of the previously posted sign 300 feet from thecrosswalk at Empire Avenue, Spokane positioned the flashing beacon 385 feet from the marked school crosswalk. As a result, Chris Williams claims the city extended the school speed limit zone eight-five feet beyond its lawful boundary.
Robert Turner, a City of Spokane traffic operations engineer, decided to locate the flashing beacon in its current location 385 feet beyond the crosswalk. The installation foreman for the flashing signs, Bob Horrocks, assisted Turner in erecting the beacon.
Robert Turner avowed that he relied on his engineering judgment to determine the location of the Longfellow Elementary School flashing beacon, and he conducted a traffic and engineering investigation before erecting the beacon. Turner based his decision on a number of considerations, including access to power, future installation of photo enforcement equipment, proximity to the curb catch basin, visual obstructions, property owner objections and interests, safety of children, stopping distances before the cross walk, the size of the sign base, and property lines and driveways. Turner did not record these considerations.
Bob Horrocks testified that Robert Turner and he discussed the location for placement of the Longfellow Elementary School flashing beacon sign. Horrocks agreed that Spokane could have erected the new flashing sign at the former location of the sign where the school speed zone began. According to Horrocks, Turner and he chose the current location for the flashing sign because a location closer to the prior sign would have required excavating a portion of the sidewalk. Horrocks declared that Spokaneemployees did not discuss other considerations for the location of the Longfellow Elementary School flashing sign.
In 2015, the City of Spokane installed photo-camera enforcement equipment operated by ATS at various locations throughout the city and in particular in school zones. The Spokane Police Department and ATS selected the sites of the cameras based on the number of violations in the speeding zones. Spokane located one of the cameras near the flashing beacon sign along Nevada Street north of Longfellow Elementary School.
On March 11, 2016, the City of Spokane issued Chris Williams a notice of infraction for speeding in the Longfellow Elementary School speed zone in violation of RCW 46.61.440. The notice alleged that, on March 1 at 3:16 p.m., Williams drove through the 20 m.p.h. school speed zone at 28 m.p.h. ATS' photo-camera enforcement equipment captured the purported infraction. Williams claims the photograph captured him driving within the eighty-five foot window, in which the City of Spokane unlawfully extended the school speed zone by reason of placing the flashing beacon sign beyond the three hundred foot zone.
The notice of infraction issued to Chris Williams afforded him the options to pay the fine, request a hearing to contest or mitigate the infraction, or submit an affidavit of non-responsibility. Williams initially requested a hearing, and the Spokane Municipal Court scheduled a hearing. The court then scheduled a new hearing date. Thereafter,Williams paid the $234 fine established by the notice of infraction from fear of increased insurance premiums and worry about the revocation of his driver's license. As a result of Williams paying the fine, the Spokane Municipal Court entered a judgment against him.
On April 25, 2018, two years after the City of Spokane issued Chris Williams the notice of infraction, Williams filed a class action lawsuit in superior court against Spokane and ATS. He proposed a class of those issued speeding infractions, like himself, in the eighty-five foot area north of Longfellow Elementary School, beyond the three hundred foot limit permitted for school speed zones. He alleged that the infraction issued to him and others violated the law. Williams alleged:
Defendants have ticketed plaintiff and over 500 similarly situated individuals who received tickets for alleged speeding in a school zone even though the individuals were not in a designated school zone when the photo was taken upon which the notice of infraction for speeding was based.
Clerk's Papers (CP) at 4. Williams further alleged:
Defendants have engaged in, and continue to engage in, a common course of issuing notices of infraction to persons who are not speeding in a school zone when photographed by defendants' photo enforcement equipment.
CP at 7. He did not allege that he often travels in the Longfellow Elementary School speed zone or that he feared being ticketed again outside the confines of a three hundred foot zone.
Williams asserted a claim for unjust enrichment against the City and ATS for his $234 penalty payment, and he sought restitution of the payment. Williams also sought a judicial declaration that Spokane and ATS are unlawfully issuing speeding tickets in an area outside a school zone. Finally, Williams asked for an injunction precluding the unlawful conduct.
The City of Spokane and ATS filed a joint motion for summary judgment to dismiss all of Chris Williams' claims. The two defendants sought dismissal on four independent grounds. First, the superior court lacked subject matter jurisdiction because any refund must be sought from the Spokane Municipal Court. Second, the voluntary payment doctrine bars the claim for unjust enrichment. Third, the doctrine of res judicata bars all claims because Williams could have raised his contentions in the municipal court at the time of litigation over his infraction. Fourth, on the merits, Spokane acted lawfully when it extended the school speed zone beyond the three hundred foot line from the crosswalk because WAC 468-95-330 permitted a sign to be placed beyond three hundred feet "based on a traffic and engineering investigation." CP at 46. ATS asserted a fifth ground for summary judgment dismissal—that Williams' complaint failed to state a cause of action.
The superior court denied the City of Spokane's and ATS' summary judgment motion. The court ruled that it possessed subject matter jurisdiction over Chris Williams' claims. The court found an issue of fact existed as to whether Chris Williams voluntarilypaid his ticket. The court reasoned that the doctrine of res judicata did not preclude the superior court suit because the municipal court did not previously address the length of the speed zone and the propriety of the measurement or extension of zone. Finally, the trial court acknowledged that WAC 468-95-330 permitted a sign to be placed beyond three hundred feet "based on a traffic and engineering investigation." Nevertheless, the court questioned whether differences existed between an investigation and the engineering judgment exercised by Robert Turner for purposes of the regulation.
We granted discretionary review of the superior court's denial of the defendants' summary judgment motion. After granting review, the City of Spokane and ATS moved the court for an order taking judicial notice of Resolution No. 2019-0018, adopted by the Spokane City Council on March 11, 2019, after the denial of its summary judgment motion. The resolution confirmed twenty mile speed limit zones around numerous schools in Spokane, including Longfellow Elementary School. The resolution confirmed the Longfellow Elementary School limit as extending north on Nevada Street to the flashing beacon.
In an October 25, 2019 ruling, our court commissioner considered the motion for judicial notice to be a motion to supplement the record under RAP 9.11(a) and denied the motion. The city's motion did not seek to assert the defense of lack of standing, and the order did not preclude the City of Spokane or ATS from arguing lack of Chris Williams' standing on appeal.
We distinguish, in...
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