Redondo Improvement Co. v. City of Redondo Beach

THOMPSON, J.

The plaintiffs have appealed from that portion of a Judgment which was rendered against them following an order of the court sustaining the defendants’ objection to the introduction of evidence at the trial, on the ground that the complaint fails to state a cause of action. The plaintiffs’ application to amend their complaint was denied.

This is a suit for injunction to prohibit the City of Redondo Beach from interfering with the sinking of an oil well within the boundaries of that city. It is alleged that the plaintiff, Redondo Improvement Company, is the owner of 118 acres of land- in the extreme southerly portion of the City of Redondo Beach, which land is subdivided into lots and blocks; that this land is remote from the business and residential portion of the city, and is occupied and uséd only for Japanese truck gardening, except that a few temporary gardeners’ shacks have been constructed thereon; that an oil well was drilled on lot 24, block 10, of the Redondo Improvement Company’s land in 1921, which well ever since its completion has, and now does, produce 27 barrels of oil a day; that the owner of said property leased to the plaintiff, Chanslor-Canfield Midway Oil Company, lots 4 and 5 in block 11 of its property on December 19, 1922, for the purpose of sinking an oil well thereon; that the lessee of the last-mentioned lots is prepared to and is desirous of immediately sinking an oil well thereon, but

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that the City of Redondo Beach and its officers have prohibited it from doing so and threaten to enjoin the operations of the lessee and arrest its officers and employees if it attempts to proceed to sink the well; that the site of the proposed well is adjacent to the extreme southwesterly boundary of the city just beyond which other oil wells are located which are rapidly exhausting the plaintiffs’ supply of oil and gas; that in October, 1931, the City of Redondo Beach adopted two ordinances, which are attached to the complaint as exhibits, prohibiting the future sinking of oil wells within the district in which the plaintiffs’ property is situated, but that these ordinances 1 ‘ are invalid, unreasonable, arbitrary and discriminatory, . . . and are void and of no effect, . . . and each of them impair the obligation of the contract between the plaintiffs and deprive each of the plaintiffs of its property without compensation therefor and without due process of law”. The complaint then alleges that plaintiffs are without speedy or adequate remedy at law, and asks the court to declare the invalidity of the zoning ordinances with respect to the plaintiffs’ existing and proposed oil wells. An injunction is sought to prevent the defendants from interfering with the sinking of the proposed well.