Nourse v. City of Los Angeles (1914) · DecisionDepot

Nourse v. City of Los Angeles

Name: California Superior Court Tentative Rulings
Creator: DecisionDepot
License: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/

California Court of Appeal Sep 8, 1914 No. Civ. No. 1575.Published

Before: Shaw

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Holding. The court held that a municipal ordinance requiring a new property owner to pay the delinquent water debts of a former occupant as a condition for receiving water service is unreasonable, discriminatory, and unenforceable in the absence of specific statutory authority.

Issues

Whether a city may require a new property owner to pay a former occupant's delinquent water charges as a condition for service.
Whether the ordinance in question is a reasonable regulation under the city's general incidental powers.

Disposition. reversed

Quotations verified verbatim against the opinion

“Our conclusion is that the regulation in question is unreasonable in that, without statutory authority therefor, it makes one person liable for the debts of another and contravenes the duty assumed by the city to serve all its inhabitants”

Synopsis

The facts are stated in the opinion of the court.

SHAW, J.

This is an appeal from a judgment of the trial court denying an application for a peremptory writ of man

[385]

date commanding the board of public service commissioners of the city of Los Angeles to furnish petitioner a supply of water for use at the premises designated as No. 147 West Avenue 31 in the city of Los Angeles.

At all the times in question the city of Los Angeles owned and operated a water system by means of which water was supplied to said city and its inhabitants, and with the pipes and mains of which system the said premises of petitioner were connected. Among other rules and regulations established by ordinance for the supplying of water to the inhabitants of the city, was a provision as follows:

“All water rates shall be charged against the property on which it is furnished, and against the owner thereof, and if for any cause any sums owing therefor become delinquent, the water shall be cut off, and in no case shall it be turned on to the same property until all such delinquencies shall have been paid in full. No change of ownership or occupation shall affeet the application of this section. ’ ’

On October 27, 1913, petitioner made demand upon respondents for a supply of water for use upon said premises, to be delivered through the pipes connecting same with the said water system, and in making the demand he complied with all the rules and regulations established therefor, save and except that he refused to pay respondents the sum of $1.50, conceded to be due for water theretofore supplied for use upon said premises by a former occupant thereof. The sole question here involved is the validity of the provision above set forth by reason of which respondents seek to exact payment of this arrearage due for water used upon the premises by the former occupant thereof as a condition of furnishing petitioner the supply of water so demanded.

Under its charter the city has assumed the duty of operating a water system for the purpose of supplying water to its inhabitants. In the performance of this duty it acts, not in its sovereign capacity, but in the capacity of a private corporation engaged in like business.

(Appeal of Brumm,

Nourse v. City of Los Angeles

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Synopsis

SHAW, J.

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