Case Title: Shelby Contracting Co. v. Pizitz

Citation: 231 So. 2d 743

Docket Number: 

State: alabama

Court: Alabama Supreme Court

Date: 1970-02-12T00:00:00Z

Document:
231 So. 2d 743 (1970)
SHELBY CONTRACTING CO., Inc., a Corp.
v.
Harold PIZITZ et al.
8 Div. 279.

Supreme Court of Alabama.
February 12, 1970.
*744 Bell, Richardson, Cleary, McLain & Tucker and James H. Porter, Huntsville, for appellant.
Speir, Robertson & Jackson, Birmingham, for appellees.
COLEMAN, Justice.
Complainant, a corporation, filed its bill of complaint seeking to establish and enforce a mechanic's lien. The court sustained a demurrer to the bill as amended and complainant moved to dismiss the bill as provided by § 755, Title 7, Code 1940, as amended by Act No. 72, approved September 15, 1961; 1961 Acts, Vol. II, page 1947.
From the decree granting complainant's motion to dismiss, complainant appeals. The error complained of is the decree of the court sustaining the demurrer to the bill.
The question for decision is whether the allegations of the bill show that complainant is entitled to enforce a lien, on certain contiguous lots in a subdivision in the City of Huntsville, for labor and material used by complainant to construct improvements on a street of the subdivision on which the lots abut. Complainant states the question as follows:
At the time complainant entered into the contract, the plat of the subdivision had been approved by the engineer of the City of Huntsville, although the dedication of the streets on the plat was not accepted by the city until after complainant had completed its work.
Complainant claims a lien under § 37, Title 33, Code 1940, which recites in part as follows:
*745 Both parties agree that there clearly exists a split of authority among the courts which have considered the question here presented. One court has observed:
The point on which the decision turns is whether or not an improvement, such as curbing, paving, or pipe, which is actually upon the street, is to be regarded as being upon the lot which abuts on the street.
Our statute (§ 37, Title 33) provides that the mechanic shall have a lien ". . . on such building or improvements ..." and "on the land on which the same is situated." Some courts have decided that the street is a part of the abutting lot and that the abutting lot is subject to a mechanic's lien for constructing an improvement on the street.
The Court of Civil Appeals of Texas enforced a lien on an abutting lot for construction of a sidewalk in front of the lot under a contract with the lot owners. The court said:
The Supreme Court of Arkansas, in holding that a materialman, who has furnished material for building a sidewalk, has a lien on the sidewalk and abutting lot, has this to say:
In Ladue Contracting Co. v. Land Development Co., (Mo.App.), 337 S.W.2d 578, the action was by a subcontractor to recover from the general contractor for labor and materials and to enforce a mechanic's lien against twelve contiguous residential lots in a subdivision. There were six residences on each side of the street. The subcontractor sought a lien against the buildings and the appurtenances, improvements, and land. The subcontractor alleged that the defendant general contractor was the original contractor for the erection of said buildings, appurtenances, and improvements and that the same were erected under one general contract. The St. Louis Court of Appeals held that the petition sufficiently asserted a claim by the subcontractor for a lien against the twelve lots and their owners. In reaching this conclusion, the court quoted from an earlier case, McDermott v. Claas, 104 Mo. 14, 15 S.W. 995, where the court had said:
The Supreme Court of New York, Erie County, in Application of Bradwood Realty, *746 Inc., 43 Misc.2d 374, 251 N.Y.S.2d 315, quoted at length from the Ladue opinion, supra, and held that a contractor was entitled to a lien for labor and material furnished in a subdivision for paving, storm and sanitary sewers, water mains, street curbing, rock excavation, and a sewer system. Relying on cited cases and the New York statute which provided that the mechanics' lien law should be liberally construed, the court, without stating further reasons, found ". . . that the work done by Respondent constituted an improvement to the lots and appurtenances to them was beneficial to said lots so that the lots were subjected to a mechanic's lien for such improvement." (251 N.Y.S.2d at 318)
All the cases cited by complainant thus appear to rest on the proposition that improvements constructed on the street entitle the mechanic or materialman to a lien because the street is a part of the abutting lot.
Complainant argues that we should follow the holding of the above cited cases because our cases hold that the abutting lot owner owns the fee in the street to the median line thereof, that the dedication of a street grants only an easement in the street and the fee remains in the owner of the abutting lot, citing: Cloverdale Homes v. Town of Cloverdale, 182 Ala. 419, 62 So. 712, 47 L.R.A.,N.S., 607; Snead v. Tatum, 247 Ala. 442, 25 So. 2d 162; Lybrand v. Town of Pell City, 260 Ala. 534, 71 So. 2d 797; Town of Citronelle v. Gulf Oil Corp., 270 Ala. 378, 119 So. 2d 180.
Respondents rely on the cases next discussed which hold that a mechanic or materialman is not entitled to a lien on a lot for improvements constructed on an abutting street.
In Coenen & Mentzer v. Staub, 74 Iowa 32, 36 N.W. 877, the plaintiff sought a lien against a lot in front of which he had constructed a sidewalk under a contract with the owner. The court said:
*747 In Seeman v. Schultze, supra, the owner of a lot made a contract with Steinacher to build two houses on the lot, and to build certain fences and sheds and to pave the sidewalk. The contract to build the fences, sheds, and sidewalk was subsequent to the contract to build the houses. Steinacher employed Schultze to pave the sidewalk. Schultze brought suit to enforce a lien. The trial court established the lien. The Supreme Court of Georgia reversed, saying:
In Fleming v. Prudential Ins. Co., 19 Colo.App. 126, 73 P. 752, 753, the court held that a lien on lots for construction of a sidewalk in the street in front of the lots was not authorized, saying:
In Cronin v. Tatge, 281 Ill. 336, 118 N.E. 35, the Supreme Court of Illinois denied a lien on certain premises "... for the paving of a street in front of said premises, providing ... gas and water mains in the street front, sewer and sewer connections extending inside the sidewalk line, and for the construction of a sidewalk... in front of the premises." The court held that the statute provided a lien only for work done or materials furnished for use on the lot.[1]
*748 In Pacific Rolling Mills Co. v. James Street Const. Co., 68 F. 966, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals, in applying the law of the State of Washington, held that one who furnished material for construction of tracks for a cable street railway acquired no lien on the power house from which the cable was operated, or the land on which the power house stood. The court said:
In Eufaula Water Co. v. Addyston Pipe and Steel Co., 89 Ala. 552, 8 So. 25, this court denied a lien on a one-acre lot, on which a pumping station was situated, for pipe furnished to be used in construction of a water system for the city. The pipe was laid between the pumping station and the reservoir about one-half mile distant. Only twenty-five feet was laid on the one-acre lot. This court said:
This court has expressed the following as a definition of the word "street":
In Cloverdale, this court said also:
It is noted that § 14, Title 56, Code 1940, recites that:
The lot owner's right in the surface and subsurface embraced in the street, *750 as defined above, is spoken of as "the ultimate fee" and as being "appurtenant to the attingent lots." We are not advised of the meaning of "ultimate fee" other than the ordinary sense that ultimate means last or final. It is true that upon abandonment of the street, absolute ownership thereof will then finally vest in the owner of abutting lot, and that such owner is entitled to the oil and minerals in that part of the land which lies under the "street," but so long as the "street" exists, the interest of the lot owner in the "street" is merely the right to enter it and to use it in common with the rest of the public. The lot owner cannot sell the "street" or lease it or control its use by other persons or control the height of the surface or the nature of objects or material to be placed in or on it so long as it remains a "street."
As to the surface of the street and so much of the depth under the surface as is or can be used not unfairly for ordinary street purposes, the lot owner's interest is, in reality, an interest in the nature of a possibility of reverter.
By whatever name called, the lot owner's interest in the street, at most, is a contingent expectancy dependent on an event which may never occur. We are of opinion that the better view is that the lot owner's interest in the "street" does not make the "street" a part of the abutting lot so that an improvement on the "street" is an improvement on the lot so as to make the lot subject to a lien for such improvement.
Complainant argues that this court has said that the mechanics' lien statute should receive a liberal construction; Mazel v. Bain, 272 Ala. 640, 133 So. 2d 44; and that we should construe the act to extend the lien on the lot to cover improvements on the street. Such a construction can result only from declaring that an improvement on the street is an improvement on the abutting lot, and we do not think this is so. It is the province of the legislature to so extend the statute if the legislature see fit to do so.
The decree of the trial court is in accord with these views and is due to be affirmed.
Affirmed.
[1]  The court said:

"The Mechanics' Lien Law has been amended from time to time, and the lien in the instant case is claimed under the provisions of section 1 of the act of 1903 (Laws 1903, p. 230). Such section, in substance, provides that any person who shall by contract furnish labor, materials, etc., on any house, walk, or sidewalk on the land or bordering thereon, or on or for any driveway, fence, or improvement or appurtenance thereto on such lot or tract of land or connected therewith, and upon, over, and under any walk or street adjoining, is entitled to a lien. This section only gives a lien for work done or materials furnished for use on a lot or tract of land or a sidewalk bordering thereon, or for work done on or materials furnished for any driveway, fence, or other improvement on the lands connected with any improvement on the land, being upon, over, or under any walk or street adjoining. While the section extends the lien to work done and materials furnished for an improvement in the street, such an improvement must be connected with an improvement on the lot or tract of land. It was expressly held in Smith v. Kennedy, supra [89 Ill. 485], that under the act of 1874 no lien existed for work done and material furnished for curbing, grading, and paving a street, and, while the act has several times been amended since that opinion was filed, the present act does not expressly give a lien in such case; but substantially the same words are employed in the present act as were used in the act of 1874. The amendments made in the law from time to time were made to meet various objections urged. Had the Legislature seen fit to extend the lien to cover the present state of facts, it could have used apt words in doing so. While perhaps, the wording of section 1 and meaning of the language used are not as clear as might be desired, it does not expressly nor by necessary implication extend the application of the lien, as claimed by appellees....
"While, as before stated, the statute expressly gives a lien for the contract price of work done or material furnished in building the sidewalk, here the bill of complaint alleges but one price for all the work. There was but one contract for all the work done, to a part of which, only, the lien attached. It could not be ascertained what part of the entire contract price was for building the sidewalk and what part was for the remainder of the work. For this reason the lien cannot be enforced for any part of the work done...." (118 N.E. at 36)