Underwood Land & Development Co. v. Bradshaw

VAN DYKE, P. J. This is an appeal from an order in mandate setting aside orders made by the Board of Supervisors of Stanislaus County during proceedings for creation of a local hospital district. The court, having set aside the board’s orders, remanded the proceedings for further consideration. The board appealed and this court, upon request, granted supersedeas. Thereafter the election which had been ordered by the board was held, resulting in a vote favorable to the creation of the district and the board declared its creation.

It is the contention of appellants that the trial court erred in deciding, (1) that during the formation proceedings the board lost jurisdiction when it made orders excluding a sufficient area of land within the proposed boundaries so that the greater land mass then lay in the neighboring County of Merced, and, (2) in deciding that in refusing to exclude certain lands the board acted without sufficient evidence and was therefore guilty of an abuse of discretion. A consideration of these contentions requires a reference to the governing statutes. The controlling legislation is found in sections 58000 and following of the Government Code and in sections 32000 and following of the Health and Safety Code. The Government Code contains a general procedural scheme for the organization, operation, government, consolidation and dissolution of local districts. (Gov. Code, § 58001.) It is provided in section 58004 of that code that the words “supervising authority” mean the board of supervisors of the county in which is situated all or most of the land in a district or the body authorized by law to initiate or hear proceedings for the creation of a district. Sections 58030 and 58031 provide that if, as here, the principal act requires a petition, then formation proceedings shall be so commenced, and the petition shall be filed with “the supervising authority.” The local hospital district law does require such a petition and the petition by which these formation proceedings were initiated set forth and described the district boundaries as proposed by petitioners. Because by the boundaries so described the greater land area lay in Stanislaus County, the petition was properly filed with the respondent board as constituting the supervising authority. It is conceded that it must have been so filed. (Gov. Code, §§ 58004 and 58031.) Bespondent board, therefore, properly received and acted upon the petition and in due course noticed and held a hearing as required by sections 58060-58110 of the Government Code. At [657]that hearing the board acted upon written and oral protests by persons interested in the formation of the proposed district (Gov. Code, § 58097), acted upon written requests for exclusion of land from the proposed district, and finally determined the project to be feasible, economically sound and for the public interest. Having so acted, the board fixed the boundaries. (Gov. Code, § 58105.) During the hearing the board excluded a body of land. A number of requests for exclusion were denied. The result was that, when the boundaries were fixed by the board’s order at the conclusion of the hearing there was a greater area of district land within the county of Merced than within the county of Stanislaus.