Thal v. County of Santa Cruz

CONLEY, J.* This case turns on the meaning and effect of the provisions of the Santa Cruz County Code relative to appeals from decisions of the Santa Cruz County Planning Commission (hereinafter referred to as the commission) to the Board of Supervisors of Santa Cruz County (hereinafter called the board). Originally, the commission, after a full hearing (§ 13.04.320, Santa Cruz County Code), granted a use permit to Warren Thai to allow him to install a memorial park cemetery on his land in the Seotts Valley area. This property had been zoned “unclassified,” and the proposed use [647]was allowable under the code section in question (§ 13.04.120 (b) (20), County Code), if a use permit were first secured.

Mrs. Agnes Lewis, a citizen-taxpayer living within a half-mile of the proposed memorial park and across the road from it, filed an appeal with the board after the denial of a rehearing by the commission. The board ruled that the commission had acted contrary to law in granting the application for a use permit, because it did not make findings of fact as allegedly required by section 13.04.320 (c) of the code, and that the board therefore had jurisdiction to set aside the commission’s action; the board conducted a second hearing at which additional testimony was received; it reversed the action of the commission and denied the use permit.

Respondent, Warren Thai, applied to the superior court for a writ of certiorari or an alternative writ of mandate; the action of the board was attacked on the ground that it did not have jurisdiction to grant a rehearing; the claim was made that the original award by the commission of a use permit had not been affected by the attempted appeal to the board and that the use permit should be restored again to full vigor by decree of the court. After completion of the hearing, the court held that the commission was not required to make findings of fact in support of its decision granting petitioner’s application for a use permit, but that notwithstanding the lack of such necessity, it did in fact make such findings and that the commission therefore did not act "contrary to law”; the court found that a full, fair and impartial hearing was held by the commission, that there was no newly discovered evidence, and finally, that Mrs. Lewis was not an aggrieved person as defined by section 13.04.350 (d) of the code and that she therefore had no right to appeal. The court vacated and set aside the board’s order and required the issuance of the use permit as applied for and approved by the commission. The members of the board and the other respondent county officers appealed from the judgment of the superior court.