City of Oroville v. Superior Court of Butte Cnty.
250 Cal. Rptr. 3d 803
Cal.2019Background
- In December 2009 raw sewage backed up from a City of Oroville sewer main into WGS Dental’s building, damaging the property. WGS sued the City for inverse condemnation; insurer TDIC intervened. The City cross‑complained alleging WGS failed to install a legally required backwater valve on its private lateral.
- The sewer is a gravity system designed to overflow at the upstream manhole if blocked; evidence showed a partial blockage between manholes JJ‑10 and JJ‑11.
- Oroville adopted the 1982 Uniform Plumbing Code by ordinance in 1984, requiring backwater valves where fixtures sit below the next upstream manhole; WGS acquired and occupied the building after that ordinance but had no backwater valve installed at the time of the backup.
- Experts for both sides agreed a properly installed, functioning backwater valve would likely have prevented the sewage entry; WGS’s expert acknowledged backwater valves can fail or be damaged.
- The trial court found the City liable in inverse condemnation (root intrusion in the main was primary cause; WGS’s missing valve a significant secondary cause). The Court of Appeal affirmed. The Supreme Court granted review.
Issues
| Issue | Plaintiff's Argument (WGS) | Defendant's Argument (City) | Held |
|---|---|---|---|
| Whether the City is liable in inverse condemnation for sewage backup into private property | Any causal contribution by the public sewer (blockage) suffices; the sewer "failed to function as intended" and is a concurrent cause | Liability requires that damage be substantially caused by inherent risks of the sewer as deliberately designed, constructed, or maintained; WGS’s failure to install required backwater valve breaks that causal chain | The City is not liable; plaintiff must show damage was substantially caused by an inherent risk of the public improvement and WGS failed to meet that test |
| Whether a property owner’s failure to follow a statutory/code requirement (no backwater valve) defeats inverse condemnation | Owner’s noncompliance is irrelevant if public improvement contributed to damage | Owner’s failure to install a legally required backwater valve materially contributed and would have prevented the loss, so the risk was not an inherent result of the City’s sewer design | Owner’s noncompliance defeats inverse condemnation here; absent the valve the damage was not the necessary or probable result of the sewer’s design |
| Standard for causation in inverse condemnation | Any concurrent cause by the public improvement is enough | Damage must be the probable or necessary result of an inherent risk in the improvement (substantial causation), not merely any causal link | Adopted substantial‑causation test: injury must be substantially caused by inherent risks of the improvement’s deliberate design, construction, or maintenance |
| Whether City of Palo Alto and Belair require liability when public improvement "failed to function as intended" regardless of owner acts | Reliance on Belair/City of Palo Alto: "failed to function" doctrine applies and supports liability | Those cases do not create automatic liability; Belair is context‑specific (levees) and ‘‘failed to function’’ cannot be mechanically applied to sewer cases where owners are required to take protective measures | Rejected broad application of City of Palo Alto and disapproved its extension of Belair; court requires analysis of inherent risk plus substantial causation |
Key Cases Cited
- Bunch v. Coachella Valley Water Dist., 15 Cal.4th 432 (1997) (discusses inverse condemnation principles and allocation of public improvement risks)
- Belair v. Riverside County Flood Control Dist., 47 Cal.3d 550 (1988) (levee failure; improvement that "failed to function as intended" was a substantial cause)
- Holtz v. Superior Court, 3 Cal.3d 296 (1970) (clarifies constitutional basis for inverse condemnation and cautions against conflating proximate cause with foreseeability)
- Albers v. Los Angeles County, 62 Cal.2d 250 (1965) (earlier strict‑liability approach and recognized exceptions)
- Customer Co. v. City of Sacramento, 10 Cal.4th 368 (1995) (application of "inherent dangers" concept and substantial causation)
- House v. Los Angeles County Flood Control Dist., 25 Cal.2d 384 (1944) (public improvement liability when damage arises from inherent dangers of the improvement)
- Youngblood v. Los Angeles County Flood Control Dist., 56 Cal.2d 603 (1961) (requires showing improvement "would necessarily or probably" cause damage)
- Pacific Bell v. City of San Diego, 81 Cal.App.4th 596 (2000) (maintenance choices can create inherent risks and trigger inverse condemnation)
- Bacich v. Board of Control, 23 Cal.2d 343 (1943) (policy considerations limiting overly broad compensation that would impede public works)
- California State Automobile Assn. v. City of Palo Alto, 138 Cal.App.4th 474 (2006) (applied "failed to function as intended" to sewer backup; court here disapproved its broad application)