Wright v. City of Shelbyville Bd. of Zoning Appeals, M2011-01446-COA-R3-CV
| Decision Date | 31 October 2012 |
| Docket Number | No. M2011-01446-COA-R3-CV,M2011-01446-COA-R3-CV |
| Parties | TOMMY WRIGHT, ET AL. v. THE CITY OF SHELBYVILLE BOARD OF ZONING APPEALS, ET AL. |
| Court | Tennessee Court of Appeals |
Appeal from the Chancery Court for Bedford County
This case involves a prolonged dispute over a proposed stone quarry that the plaintiff landowners, the Wrights, wished to establish on their property. While their application was pending, the city changed the zoning ordinance to rezone the Wrights' property so that a quarry was no longer permitted as a conditional use. The Wrights filed suit, and on appeal this court held that the notice of the zoning amendment had been defective and that the zoning change was therefore void. The Wrights subsequently asked the Board of Zoning Appeals to consider their application under the property's original zoning, but the BZA refused to put the application on its meeting agenda. The Wrights filed a petition for writ of certiorari. The trial court found that the BZA's action was arbitrary and illegal, but ruled that the Wrights were nonetheless precluded from obtaining any relief because of the operation of res judicata. We reverse the trial court's dismissal of the petition on the basis of res judicata, because we find that doctrine inapplicable. We agree with the trial court that the BZA's actions were arbitrary and capricious.
Josh A. McCreary, Murfreesboro, Tennessee, for the appellants, Tommy Wright, Norma Wright, Wright Paving Company, Inc., and Custom Stone, LLC.
Ginger Bobo Shofner, Shelbyville, Tennessee; Robert M. Burns, Nashville, Tennessee, for the appellees, The City of Shelbyville Board of Zoning Appeals, The City of Shelbyville, Tennessee, and Ed Dodson, Director of the Shelbyville Planning and Codes Department.
OPINIONThis is the second time the parties have appeared before this court regarding a proposed quarry. The ruling generated from the first case can be read at Wright v. City of Shelbyville, M2009-00321-COA-R3-CV, 2009 WL 3631019 (Tenn. Ct. App. Nov. 3, 2009) (). A detailed account of the facts behind the parties' dispute is set out in that opinion. A brief factual summary is stated here.
On February 12, 2004, Tommy Wright and Norma Wright, and their businesses Wright Paving Company, Inc. and Custom Stone, LLC ("the Wrights"), sent a letter to the Shelbyville Board of Zoning Appeals ("the BZA") requesting approval of a conditional use permit to open a rock quarry on a 92 acre property that they owned within the Shelbyville city limits. Their property was zoned I-2, for industrial use, when they filed their permit application. The Shelbyville Zoning Ordinance included mining and quarrying as permitted uses in an I-2 zone, subject to approval as a conditional use.1
A hearing was scheduled, but before it was conducted, the Wrights requested by letter that the application be removed from the agenda of the February meeting so that additional engineering studies could be performed. In a subsequent letter from their engineers, the Wrights stated their intention that their application remain "pending." The letter also stated that the engineer could not find in the zoning regulations a time limit specified for keeping an application for special condition pending and concluded with "please notify me if, at any time, the application will need to be resubmitted to be considered, and we will initiate the appropriate actions."
The Wrights were never notified of a time limit for hearing of their application, but the Shelbyville City Council subsequently amended the city's zoning ordinance by passage of Ordinance 742 on July 8, 2004. Ordinance 742 removed mining and quarrying as a conditional use in an I-2 district and created a new industrial zoning district designated as I-3, which included mining and quarrying as a conditional use. The new district did not apply to any designated areas, but was characterized as a "floating" district that could be placed on property anywhere in the city.
The Wrights asked the Shelbyville Planning Commission to consider their earlier-filedapplication for a conditional use permit at its November 18, 2004, meeting. The Planning Commission advised them that it would not consider the plan unless it was submitted under the new I-3 zoning provisions. Plaintiffs filed an application to have their property rezoned to I-3, and the Commission denied the application.
Plaintiffs then sued the City claiming that there were numerous irregularities in the manner in which Ordinance 742 was adopted. The trial court granted partial summary judgment to Shelbyville, holding that Ordinance 742 was validly enacted and that Plaintiffs did not have a vested right to have their application considered under the zoning in effect prior to the enactment of that ordinance. On appeal, this court held that the challenged notice did not meet the standard of fair notice that can only be met if the content of the notice "gives the average reader reasonable warning that land in which he has an interest may be affected by the legislation proposed." Wright v. City of Shelbyville, 2009 WL 3631019, at *4. Accordingly, we held that Ordinance 742 was invalid. Id. The City of Shelbyville filed a Rule 11 Tenn. R. App. P. application for permission to appeal our decision to the Tennessee Supreme Court, which was denied on April 14, 2010.
Shortly after this court filed its opinion in the first case on November 3, 2009, the Wrights wrote the Codes Director to inform him that it was their intention to "have the application that has been pending for a Special Condition in the I-2 District heard at this time." The letter recounted the history of the application and stated that "in view of the recent Court of Appeals decision, the I-3 Zone no longer exists."
After the Tennessee Supreme Court denied the City permission to appeal our decision, on May 4, 2010, the Wrights' attorney wrote to City Codes Director, Ed Dodson, asking that their long-pending 2004 application for a conditional use in an I-2 zone be placed on the agenda for the next meeting of the Board of Zoning Appeals, since the decision of this court had rendered the I-3 zone invalid. They also announced that their engineering firm would be submitting an updated application. Shortly thereafter, the Wrights did file an updated application.
The city's response came in the form of a letter signed by Mr. Dodson and the City Attorney. It stated that the Wrights' 2004 application would not be placed on the agenda and set out two reasons for the decision. The City asserted that the Wrights had withdrawn that 2004 application and that a valid I-3 zoning district had since been added to the zoningordinance, thereby precluding any consideration of the proposed quarry in an I-2 zone.2 It also stated that because the new application included nine acres that were not part of the original plan, it was not identical to the 2004 application, and thus "has no claim to any benefit of previous law."
The Wrights appealed the City's administrative decision to the BZA, in accordance with that body's authority under Tenn. Code Ann. § 13-7-207(1). The BZA conducted a hearing on June 24, 2010. The members of the Board voted, without discussion, to uphold the decision of the planning director.
The Wrights filed a Petition for Writ of Certiorari in the Bedford County Chancery Court on July 23, 2010. Judge Russell, who had rendered the decision in the first case, recused himself, and Judge Stanley was appointed to sit by interchange. The court granted the writ and ordered the record to be sent up for review.
The court conducted a hearing on the merits of the Plaintiffs' petition for certiorari on May 2, 2011. The City Attorney argued that the petition was barred by the doctrine of res judicata and entered this court's 2009 opinion in Wright v. City of Shelbyville into the record. The trial court announced its decision in an order entered on May 13, 2011. The court dismissed the petition, agreeing with the city that it was barred by the doctrine of res judicata. However, the court also held that if it were not for the operation of res judicata, the actions of the BZA would be considered arbitrary and capricious and would have merited reversal under the standards for writ of certiorari. This appeal followed.
The trial court ruled that the Wrights were not entitled to relief because of the operation of res judicata. A trial court's decision that a subsequent lawsuit is barred by principles of res judicata presents a question of law which this court reviews de novo. In re Estate of Boote, 198 S.W.3d 699, 719 (Tenn. Ct. App. 2005).
The doctrine of res judicata bars a second suit between the same parties or their privies on the same cause of action with respect to all issues which were or could have been litigated in the former suit. Creech v. Addington, 281 S.W.3d 363, 376 (Tenn. 2009); Richardson v. Board of Dentistry, 913 S.W.2d 446, 459 (Tenn. 1995). The doctrine is based on the public policy favoring finality in litigation. It does not depend on the correctness orfairness of the first judgment, so long as that judgment was a valid one. Lee v. Hall, 790 S.W.2d 293, 294 (Tenn. Ct. App. 1990).
The BZA's arguments in the trial court and on appeal, as well as the trial court's order, clearly identify the holding that is at issue. The trial court explained the background and basis of the res judicata argument:
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