Haigh v. City of Los Angeles

SCOTT, J., pro tem. Plaintiff recovered judgment against the City of Los Angeles for damages to his property resulting from a street improvement. The trial court found that the work was fully and finally completed on or about September 21, 1927; that plaintiff made demand upon defendant on October 10, 1927, for payment of damages thereby sustained “in the form and manner provided by the city charter” and that the claim was rejected March 6, 192'9, whereupon plaintiff brought suit. The sole question to be determined on this appeal is whether plaintiff made his demand in the manner and within the time as required by the charter of the City of Los Angeles so as to entitle him to institute this action.

[597]Respondent filed bis demand against the city with the city council and appellant contends that it should have been filed with the board of public works. An analysis of the provisions of the city charter and of the decisions construing it supports respondent’s contention that his claim was filed with the proper body. The charter (art. XXVIII) provides in effect that demands against the city “shall be first presented to and approved in writing by the board, officer or employee authorized by this charter to incur the expenditure represented thereby” (sec. 363), and no suit can be brought until such demand has been presented and rejected; and that such claim for daamges must be presented “within six months after the occurrence from which the damages arose” (sec. 376). Without deeming it necessary to set out at length the provisions of section 37 of the charter, we must conclude that the powers of the city council as therein defined include the acts necessary to incur a liability such as this. The board of public works, on the other hand, has limited powers, as set out in article XXIII of the charter, which provides that it “shall have charge, superintendence and control” of construction, maintenance and improvements of streets (sec. 234) and shall have certain limited functions and powers as enumerated in said article XXIII, which by no reasonable interpretation could be said to include the power to incur the liability for damages such as is sued upon herein.

Appellant relies upon Spencer v. City of Los Angeles, 180 Cal. 103 [179 Pac. 163], which was an action brought by the city upon certain invalid assessments for a street opening. The assessments in that case had been paid by plaintiff to the board of public works as “collection agent” for the city and, as a matter incidental to the determination of other issues in that case, the court held that the demand required by the charter before plaintiff could bring suit was properly presented to the same board which had collected the money. By liaving such claims presented first to the board of public works the correctness of the amount which plaintiff claimed he paid could in this manner be checked by the same “collection agent” who had received the money in the first instance. The view expressed in the cited case was not inconsistent with the charter provisions