Los Angeles Cemetery Ass'n v. City of Los Angeles
Before: Foote
Synopsis
Dedication of Street — Grant upon Conditions — Public User — Forfeiture — Neglect to Grade Street. •— Land granted to a city by a corporation, in pursuance of a resolution of the directors of the corporation granting it for a public road and highway, on the condition that a fence thereon be removed and reset on the line of the road at the expense of the city, and that the street be graded at the city’s expense, becomes a public street, subject to the conditions named, upon its acceptance and user by the city; and the city does not forfeit its right to use it as a public street simply because it does not grade it when required to do so by the corporation, but it must be apparent that the city will not grade it at its expense, or at all, before the corporation can reclaim the land.
Foote, C. This action was brought to quiet title to a strip of land in the city of Los Angeles.
[422]The plaintiff, a corporation formed for cemetery purposes, owned about seventy acres of land in the city aforesaid, which included that in controversy here. Its board of directors passed a resolution which ran thus: —
“ Aug. 25, 1885. The- board held a special meeting this date. All the directors, to wit, A. H. Judson, V. Ponet, I. W. Lord, Fred. Dobs and A. E. Pomeroy, being present. It was moved and carried that a strip of land forty feet in width off and along the south line of the present Evergreen Cemetery lands, and being the south line of lots 1 and 2 in block 73, Hancock’s survey, be granted for a public road and highway, on the condition that the fence be removed and reset on the line of the road, said work to be done at the expense of the city, and also that the street be graded at the city’s expense. On motion, meeting adjourned.
“ Attest: A. E. Pomeroy, Sec.”
The president of the corporation, A. H. Judson, on the 7th of September, 1885, made a conveyance of the land described in the resolution to the defendant, which, after describing the land, reads thus: “ Said piece of land being for the purpose of a street or highway; and in the event of its ceasing to be used as such public street or highway, the said land to revert to the said corporation grantor. Grantor reserving the right to remove the fence on said land at any time within six months from the date of the acceptance of this deed.”
The defendant, in pursuance of the resolution, removed the fence, and within a very short time after the 7th of September, 1885, the strip of land began to be and has been ever since used for public travel, and in the year 1887 the defendant, by its proper- officers, changed the name of this strip of land from Aliso Avenue Extension to First Street; it also appears that the property owners on the side of this strip, opposite the cemetery property from which it was taken, deeded to the city certain land which was also used as part of this public street.
It further appears that the city by ordinance estab[423]
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