Pacific Gas & Electric Co. v. Mounteer

Opinion

DRAPER, P. J.

This appeal raises issues of the construction and validity of the statute (Pub. Util. Code, § 7952) fixing the measure of damages for injury to or destruction of poles supporting power transmission lines of certain public utilities.

Plaintiff-respondent alleged that defendants negligently caused their automobile to collide with a roadside utility pole which supported plaintiff’s transmission line. Replacement of the pole was required. Defendants admitted liability but contested the damage claim, asserting the right to credit for depreciation of the pole. Respondent alleged damage of $2,070.87, and the trial court awarded that amount. Defendants appealed. The appellate department, Contra Costa County, affirmed and certified the case to us to secure uniformity of decision in an area of the law in which many cases, each for moderate amount, aggregate a substantial sum each year.

Section 7952, so far as here applicable, provides: “Any person who injures or destroys, through want of proper care, any necessary or useful . . . facility or equipment of any telegraph, telephone, electrical, or gas corporation, is liable to the corporation for all damages sustained thereby. The measure of damages to the facility or equipment injured or destroyed shall be the cost to repair or replace the property injured or destroyed including direct and allocated costs for labor, materials, supervision, supplies, tools, taxes, transportation, administrative and general expense and other indirect or overhead expenses, less credit, if any, for salvage, as determined by such telegraph, telephone, electrical or gas corporations in conformity with a system of accounts established by the commission. The specifying of the measure of damages for the facility or equipment shall not preclude the recovery of such other damages occasioned thereby as may be authorized by law.”

[812]

Appellants contend that depreciation must be deducted from the value of the pole in computing damages to be awarded for its destruction.

They first argue that section 7952 does not exclude such deduction. But the first sentence of the section provides for recovery of the cost “to repair or replace” including both direct and indirect expenses, “less credit, if any, for salvage.” The specification of “cost to repair or replace” implies an intent to eliminate the issue of market value. The only expressed provision for deduction from the damage award is that for “salvage, if any.” This express exception invokes the doctrine of