Walker v. City of Los Angeles

JAMES, J.

This action was brought by the owners of certain real property, which property was situated within

[635]

an assessment district intended to be created for the purposes of proceedings taken by the city of Los Angeles through' its board of public works. The design of the proceedings was to open Twelfth Street in said city for a distance of about three blocks. The judgment which was rendered in favor of plaintiffs determined that the assessments under which sales of plaintiffs’ properties were threatened to be made, were void by reason of the fact, as found by the trial court, that the description of the proposed assessment district as contained in the ordinance of intention was indefinite and uncertain. Defendants appealed from the judgment, and from an order of the trial court denying their motion for a new trial.

In the course of the description of the boundary lines of the assessment district as contained in the ordinance of intention, after a course had been traced to a point in the westerly line of Grand Avenue, the ordinance then proceeded: “Thence easterly in a direct line to the most westerly corner of lot 10 of Feldhauser’s subdivision of blocks 85 and 86, Ord’s survey, as per map recorded in book 5, at page 573, said miscellaneous records of Los Angeles County.” The map of Feldhauser’s subdivision of blocks 85 and 86, as introduced in evidence, showed that the lots of the subdivision in block 85 were numbered from 1 to 18, and the lots in block 86 were numbered in like manner. It therefore appeared from the map that there were two lots No. 10. in that subdivision and that both were located in an easterly direction from the point on Grand Avenue which was referred to in the ordinance. It was shown in evidence by the testimony of a surveyor that a line run due east from the point mentioned on the westerly side of Grand Avenue would intersect one of the lots No. 10, but that it would not intersect it at the most westerly corner of said lot, the point of intersection being about forty feet southeasterly from said westerly comer. In the case of

Fratt

v.

Woodward,

32 Cal. 219, [91 Am. Dec. 573], referring to terms of description of boundary lines of real property, it is said: “It is true, as claimed by counsel for appellants, that the word “easterly” when used alone will be construed to mean due east; but that is a rule of necessity, growing out of the indefiniteness of the term, and has no application where other words are used for the purpose of