119 Cal. App. 2d 29 | Cal. Ct. App. | 1953
Petitioners below appeal from a judgment in certiorari affirming in all respects the proceedings taken before the Merced County Board of Supervisors to form the Central California Irrigation District. Miller & Lux Incorporated, a corporation, The San Joaquin Canal Company, a corporation, John N. Bettencourt, Manuel V. Bettencourt, George A. Zimmerman, William S. Koda and Edward K. Koda have dismissed their appeals.
Stated briefly, the Water Code, division 11, part 2, lays down the following requisites to the formation of an irrigation district. A petition for the formation of such a district must be prepared and circulated; the petition must contain, among other things, generally, a description of the land proposed to be included, a statement as to the source or sources of water supply and the signatures of the requisite number of qualified petitioners. (Wat. Code, § 20720 (a) and (b).) The requisite number of petitioners is either a majority in number and assessed value of the landowners or at least 500 petitioners, each of whom is an elector residing in the proposed district, or the holder of title to land therein, and who in the aggregate own not less than 20 per cent in assessed value of the land proposed to be included within the contemplated district. (Wat. Code, § 20700.) After the petition has been prepared, circulated and signed by the requisite
In the matter of the formation of Central California Irrigation District these procedural steps were taken, and the election having resulted favorably, the district was duly declared by the board to have been formed. Thereafter the trial court, responsive to petition for certiorari, rendered the decision from which this appeal is taken, affirming and approving in all matters the proceedings had in the formation of the district.
Appellants here contend for reversal of the judgment appealed from as follows: That there was no evidence before the
We will treat, first, of the matter of the sufficiency of the description. It appears that the San Joaquin Canal Company is and was at all times during the proceedings for the formation of the district a public utility engaged in supplying water to lands approximating 150,000 acres in extent and lying generally on the westerly side of the San Joaquin Valley within the counties of Fresno, Merced and Stanislaus. The petition stated 11 That a general description of the land proposed to be formed into a district is all that land embraced within the present service area of the San Joaquin Canal Company, a public utility, together with the land presently occupied by canal rights of way and head-works and lands immediately adjacent to said headworks, all of said public utility, but excluding from said service area the lands of Hamburg, et al., . . . , as having limited water service rights only.” The petition then stated that there followed a written description of the boundaries of the proposed district as sealed from a certain map entitled “The San Joaquin Canal Company, Map of Service Area,” said map being further identified by dates and by the name of the civil engineer who sponsored the map. The petition stated that the written description so prepared had been modified to show an exclusion of land from said service area which had been made by order of the Public Utilities Commission in a designated decision, and it was further stated that the map referred to had been filed for record in the offices of the county recorders of the three named counties, the recording
We think that the description of the proposed district was sufficiently definite to meet the requirements of the statute. Absolute accuracy, even by survey, was hardly to be expected when so large an area of land and so many varying courses and distances were involved. The statute does not require absolute accuracy, but by its very terms calls only for a “general” description of the land proposed to be included. The problem presented to the engineer employed to work out a description of the land was in this instance peculiarly difficult. In the main, and except for some inclusions and exclusions, it was the intent of petitioners, as shown by the petition itself, to form a district of all the land embraced within the existing service area of the canal company. But this service area did not coincide with the ownership of the various bodies of land, that is, as to owners whose lands lay along the perimeter the service line often crossed
Appellants contend that the board did not have before it any evidence as to the genuineness of signatures of persons signing the petition as landowners. At the preliminary hearing it was incumbent upon the board to determine whether or not the petition presented to it had been signed by the required number of electors residing within the proposed district and of owners of land owning not less than 20 per cent of the assessed value of all lands. (Miller & Lux v. Board of Supervisors, 189 Cal. 254 [208 P. 304].) Upon this matter the board took evidence, and we will summarize that of the principal witness, a Mr. Pearson. He testified that he had had considerable experience in title examination work and had been employed by the sponsors of the irrigation project to check the petition in the matter of signatures; that he and certain persons working under him had spent a period of four or five months in that work. He said that he first employed people familiar with the work in the assessors’ offices in the various counties involved to make the actual search of the records in their respective counties and through this work to arrive at the total assessed valuation of all the land within the proposed boundaries of the district; that when this result had been achieved he then undertook with the same aid to determine the assessed valuation of land belonging to those people who were landowners who had signed the petition; that he had been furnished with the maps referred to in the testimony of the engineer for the proponents (that testimony we have hereinbefore narrated),
We think the foregoing testimony was sufficient to support the board’s findings that the petition had been signed by the requisite number of electors and landowners. To qualify as a signer the person must either be an elector within the district or a landowner therein. The witness ascertained that there were 672 signatures which included both classifications. This met the numerical requirement, assuming the witness properly reached his conclusion as to qualifications. This we think he did. These 672 were, as he said, for the most part electors and in those cases he checked their signatures on the petition with their signatures on the affidavits of registration. This was sufficient proof that the persons who signed the petition were also persons who were registered voters and whose affidavits of registration with their signatures were on file in the registrars’ offices of the various counties. Included in the list of electors were owners of land, and some signers, although not electors, were owners of land within the district and so qualified to sign. This latter fact was sufficiently shown by a comparison of the ownership plats of the assessors’ offices projected onto the district maps, it being competent for the board to conclude from the witness’ testimony that the names of these signers corresponded with the names on the ownership books, and that there was in fact identity of signer and owner. (Code Oiv. Proc., § 1963, subd. 25.) Thus there was substantial proof that 672 qualified persons had signed the petition and that included among them were the owners of land aggregating more than 20 per cent of the total assessed land value in the district, as reflected by the last equalized assessment roll appearing in the offices of the county assessors. The Water Code provides that for the purposes of a petition to form a district the county assessment roll of the county in which the land is situated last equalized at the time of the first publication of the petition is conclusive evidence of value and title. (§20569.) Appellants assert that although the uncanceled registration affidavits formed a proper basis for ascertaining that signatures on the petition were those of electors yet since no signatures appear upon the assessment rolls the persons purportedly signing as landowners were not identified nor in any way proved to be the actual persons of the same name owning land within the district. We do not agree. The witness sufficiently testified that while in such cases there was no chance to make a comparison of signatures, nevertheless sufficient names ap
Appellants contend that because the petition was not published in Madera County the board failed through want of the statutory notice to obtain jurisdiction to act. A sufficient answer to this contention is to be found in the description of the land proposed to be included as it appeared in the petition when correlated with the right of the board in passing upon the matter of jurisdiction to construe the description. Concededly the metes and bounds description included some 20 acres of land in Madera County but the metes and bounds description was in this respect in conflict with two other limiting descriptions contained in the petition. The petition stated: ‘ ‘ That a general description of the land proposed to be formed into a district is all that land embraced within the present service area of the San Joaquin Canal Company, a public utility, together with the land presently occupied by canal rights of way and headworks and lands immediately adjacent to said headworks.” There then followed the metes and bounds description, which concluded with the statement, “The said land is situated in the following three counties: Fresno, Merced and Stanislaus. ’ ’ Undoubtedly the metes and bounds description included some 20 acres of land in Madera County, but this 20 acres was without the service area of the San Joaquin Canal Company and within the area of another like utility. The description does not expressly describe any land as lying within Madera County, but at the point in question, the metes and bounds description states that it crosses the San Joaquin River from west to east and further on recrosses from east to west, embracing the 20 acres of land east of the river. The Madera County line is judicially known at this point to be the center line of the San Joaquin River. The most that can be said with respect to the claimed inclusion of Madera County land is that the metes and bounds description conflicts with the statements that all of the lands described are within the service area of the San Joaquin Canal Company and within the counties of Fresno, Merced and Stanislaus. The uncertainty thus created could be resolved by the board and from its finding we must assume
Finally, appellants contend that in sectionalizing those portions of the basic maps showing lands in Merced and Stanislaus Counties the sectionalized maps omitted a total of approximately 1,000 acres of land lying in those two counties and they argue that the witness Pearson, whose testimony we have narrated, did not take into his totals of assessed value the value of this omitted land, with the result, say appellants, that his calculations as to percentage of land value represented on the petition must be discarded. This contention involves an assumption that the witness arrived at his totals wholly from the sectionalized maps. While the testimony of the witness would support this assumption, it does not compel it. The witness testified that the proportion of the land and improvements included within the proposed district, the title to which was held by persons whose signatures were affixed to the petition, was approximately 24.20 per cent, and in any event not less than 23.09 per cent. When on cross-examination—and it is this testimony on which appellants rely—he said that he used the maps as a basis for determining the assessed valuation in each county, that he did not pay detailed attention to the metes and bounds description, that he assumed for the purpose of his work that the metes and bounds description contained the same area of land as shown on the maps, he did no more than to weaken, and not destroy, his testimony as to the total valuations and the percentage thereof represented in the petition. Appellants’ objection is, in reality, that it is impossible to ascertain 20 per cent of an unascertained whole. Mathematically speaking, appellants are correct. But the law must often be satisfied with approximations and we think that such is the situation
The judgment appealed from is affirmed.
Schottky, J., and Bedeau, J. pro tem., concurred.
Appellants’ petition for a hearing by the Supreme Court was denied August 27, 1953.