Yancoskie v. Delaware River Port Authority
| Citation | 478 Pa. 396,387 A.2d 41 |
| Parties | Lorraine YANCOSKIE, Administratrix, of the Estate of Francis J. Yancoskie and Jason Adam Yancoskie, by his mother and natural guardian, Lorraine Yancoskie and Lorraine Yancoskie in her own right, Appellants, v. DELAWARE RIVER PORT AUTHORITY. |
| Decision Date | 28 April 1978 |
| Court | Pennsylvania Supreme Court |
Elizabeth M. McKenna, Philadelphia, for appellee.
Before EAGEN, C. J., and O'BRIEN, ROBERTS, POMEROY, NIX and MANDERINO, JJ.
The central question for decision in this case is whether the Delaware River Port Authority is immune from suit in trespass in the courts of this State. We hold that it is not.
Appellant's husband died as a result of injuries sustained on August 16, 1972, while employed in the construction of the Admiral Barry Bridge from Chester, Pennsylvania, to Bridgeport, New Jersey. A wrongful death and survival action against the appellee Authority and other defendants was brought by the administratrix of Yancoskie's estate and by his widow and child. Under the heading of new matter in its amended answer the Authority claimed that it was "a public corporate agency or instrumentality of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania entitled to sovereign immunity" and that it was therefore immune from suit. 1 The Authority's subsequent motion for judgment on the pleadings was granted by the court, and the Superior Court affirmed. 235 Pa.Super. 263, 340 A.2d 533 (1975). The case is here upon our allowance of an appeal. 2 235 Pa.Super. xli.
The courts below, in upholding the Authority's claim of immunity, did not have the benefit of our decision in Specter v. Commonwealth, 462 Pa. 474, 341 A.2d 481 (1975). In Specter, it was held that an answer to the question of whether the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission was immune from suit depended upon whether the Commission was "part of the Commonwealth." 462 Pa. at 478, 341 A.2d 481. This issue in turn required "a scrutiny of (the entity's) status in the governmental framework of Pennsylvania" that focused on its " nature . . . and its relationship to other statewide governmental bodies." Id. at 479, 341 A.2d at 483. We believe that an analysis of the legislative acts defining the purposes and powers of the Delaware River Port Authority, together with the relevant judicial decisions, requires a conclusion that, like the Turnpike Commission in Specter, the Authority is not "an integral part of the Commonwealth," id. at 483, 341 A.2d at 486, and that it is therefore subject to suit, as are "political subdivisions or governmental entities other than the Commonwealth itself." Id. at 478, 341 A.2d at 482. See Ayala v. Philadelphia Bd. of Educ., 453 Pa. 584, 305 A.2d 877 (1973).
In considering the Authority's statutory status some historical background is useful. Pennsylvania's recent involvement in the spanning of the lower Delaware River begins with the Act of July 9, 1919, P.L. 814, as amended, 36 P.S. § 3421 et seq. (1961). Under this statute, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the City of Philadelphia undertook to provide one half of the cost of construction of what is now known as the Benjamin Franklin Bridge from Philadelphia to Camden. Id. § 1, 36 P.S. § 3421. A group known as the Pennsylvania Commission, consisting of four governmental and four non-governmental members, 3 was created to supervise (in conjunction with a similar commission created by the State of New Jersey) the design, construction, and operation of the planned bridge. Id. §§ 4-6, 10, 11, 36 P.S. §§ 3424-3426, 3430, 3431.
Although the Pennsylvania Commission was granted extensive powers, including that of eminent domain, id. §§ 5, 6, 36 P.S. §§ 3425, 3426, the General Assembly added important limitations. The enabling statute specifically provided:
"the . . . commission shall not proceed to exercise or carry out any authority or power herein or hereby given it to bind the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania beyond the extent to which the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania shall have appropriated or made available to said . . . commission the moneys hereinbefore stipulated as the share of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania." Id. § 4, 36 P.S. § 3424.
In addition, the appropriations to the Pennsylvania Commission were not grants but loans. The tolls agreed upon by the Pennsylvania Commission and its counterpart in New Jersey were to be collected at least "until such time as the State of New Jersey, the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the City of Philadelphia shall each have been fully reimbursed for all moneys expended to pay the cost of said bridge and the approaches thereto," with interest on such moneys to run at four per cent per annum. Id. § 10(a), 36 P.S. § 3430(a). Finally, it was intended that the Pennsylvania Commission was to have a limited life; upon reimbursement in full to the governments that provided the funding, the bridge was to be turned over to local authorities. Id. § 11, 36 P.S. § 3431. See also Act of July 13, 1923, P.L. 1093, § 9, 36 P.S. § 3459 (1961).
By 1931, more ambitious plans for interstate cooperation in the economic development of the lower Delaware Valley required extensive statutory change. Accordingly, Pennsylvania and New Jersey created, by means of an interstate compact, a successor to the previously existing interstate body. 4 That successor is now known as the Delaware River Port Authority, the appellee herein. 5 Its purpose was expanded from the operation of a single interstate bridge to embrace the development and improvement of the lower Delaware port district from Philadelphia south to the Delaware border. In addition to its power to operate and maintain the bridges across the Delaware River from Philadelphia south to the Pennsylvania-Delaware border, 36 P.S. § 3503, Arts. I(a), XII-A(1), XII-B(1), the Authority is charged with the development and improvement of port facilities in this area. Id. Art. I(c), (k).
The powers granted the Authority by the compact are commensurate with its broad purposes. The Authority is designated as a "public corporate instrumentality of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and the State of New Jersey . . . exercising an essential governmental function . . ." Id. Art. I. As such, it is granted power: to acquire, hold, use and sell real and personal property (id. Art. IV(g)-(h)); "to exercise the right of eminent domain" (id. Art. IV(k); see also id. Art. XII-B(3) (a)); to enter into contracts (id. Art. IV(f)); and to employ "counsel and such other officers, and such agents and employes, as it may require for the performance of its duties . . . and (to) fix and determine their qualifications, duties and compensation" (id. Art. IV(e)).
The powers granted to the Pennsylvania Turnpike Commission are similar in nature. See Specter, supra, 462 Pa., at 479-80, 341 A.2d 481. The Authority's implied powers, however, are considerably broader than those of the Commission. Unlike the Turnpike Commission, the Authority is permitted
". . . generally to exercise, in connection with its property and affairs and in connection with property within its control, any and all powers which might be exercised by a natural person or a private corporation in connection with similar property and affairs." 36 P.S. § 3503, Art. IV(n).
The Authority differs from the Turnpike Commission in another important respect. Although it is contemplated that when all the Commission's financial obligations are paid or provided for the Commission will be dissolved and its assets vested in the Commonwealth's Department of Transportation, which will then operate the Turnpike system, 6 the Authority is granted "perpetual succession." 36 P.S. § 3503, Art. IV(a).
In one critical particular, however, the Commission and the Authority possess precisely the same status, viz., both are financially independent of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania. The Authority, like the Commission, raises revenue by means of bonds and satisfies these obligations by toll and other user charges. 7 Moreover, and again like the Commission, the Authority's debts are not Commonwealth obligations. Article VII of the compact provides in full:
"Notwithstanding any provision of this agreement, the commission shall have no power to pledge the credit of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, or the credit of the State of New Jersey, or the credit of any county, city, borough, village, township or other municipality of said Commonwealth or said State, or to create any debt of said Commonwealth or of said State or of such municipality." 8
The interstate compact in question does not give an explicit answer to the question whether the Authority is an "integral part of the Commonwealth," Specter, supra, at 483, 341 A.2d 481, but the structure of the authority strongly indicates that it is not. The Authority is declared to be a "public corporate instrumentality," and it is vested with the powers usually granted to a corporation operated for profit, e.g., perpetual succession. Although the Authority does possess the governmental power of eminent domain, it lacks an essential attribute of a true governmental body, the taxing power. 36 P.S. § 3503, Art. IV(n). Moreover, there is no close connection, such as that between the Pennsylvania Department of Transportation and the Turnpike Commission, between the Authority and Commonwealth agencies, and the financially separate status of the Authority is expressly provided. In sum, as this Court observed some forty years ago, the compact agreed upon by Pennsylvania and New Jersey in 1931 had the effect of "relinquishing the control theretofore exercised severally by the two states (over the predecessor commissions' property) and in turning the property over to (a) two-state corporation . . ." Commonwealth ex rel. Smith v. Clark, 331 Pa. 405, 414-15, 200 A. 41, 46 (1938) (dictum). 9
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