Case Title: Brookside Memorials, Inc. v. Barre City

Citation: 167 Vt. 558, 702 A.2d 47

Docket Number: 

State: vermont

Court: Vermont Supreme Court

Date: 1997-06-13T00:00:00Z

Document:
Brookside Memorials v. Barre City  (96-429); 167 Vt. 558; 702 A.2d 47

[Opinion Filed 13-Jun-1997]

[Motion for Reargument Denied 14-Jul-1997]

                          ENTRY ORDER

                 SUPREME COURT DOCKET NO. 96-429

                         APRIL TERM, 1997

Brookside Memorials, Inc.       }     APPEALED FROM:
                                }
                                }
     v.                         }     Washington Superior Court
                                }
Barre City                      }
                                }     DOCKET NO. 209-4-95Wncv

               In the above-entitled cause, the Clerk will enter:

       Plaintiff Brookside Memorials, Inc., a granite manufacturer seeking a
  refund for sewer bill overpayments it made to defendant Barre City over a
  six-year period, appeals the superior court's order granting the City
  summary judgment.  We hold that under the facts and circumstances of this
  case, plaintiff is entitled to the requested refund; accordingly, we
  reverse the court's order and grant summary judgment to plaintiff.

       Plaintiff is a Barre City business engaged in the manufacture and
  distribution of granite memorials and other granite products.  The building
  in which plaintiff is located was operated as a granite shed for
  approximately seventy-five years, when, in 1977, it was sold to an
  insulation company.  Plaintiff took possession of the site in 1982, and
  since then has operated it as a granite manufacturing business.

       Barre City bills residents and businesses quarterly for water use and
  sewage disposal. Water bills are based on metered use.  For most residents
  and businesses, sewer bills are calculated as a percentage of the metered
  water use; however, for those manufacturing businesses that do not return
  all of the water that they use back into the sewer system, sewer bills are
  based on the number of workers employed at the site rather than on the
  amount of water used.  Granite manufacturers such as plaintiff are charged
  a flat rate based on the number of employees because the large volume of
  water that they use in the manufacturing process is discharged into sludge
  pits or lagoons rather than the city sewer system.

       Nevertheless, from 1982 to 1994, the City billed plaintiff for sewer
  disposal at the metered rate, which often exceeded $3500 per year, rather
  than the flat rate, which would have been only about $100 per year.  Thus,
  during the twelve-year period, plaintiff paid over $40,000 more than it was
  obligated to pay for sewage disposal.

       In 1994, plaintiff's owners learned that their business should have
  been billed at the flat rate.  They brought the matter to the attention of
  the City, which agreed to apply the lower rate in the future.  The City
  also offered to give plaintiff a refund for overpayments made during the
  most recent year, but refused plaintiff's demand that the City refund all
  overpayments made during the previous six years, the general limitations
  period for civil actions.  See 12 V.S.A. § 511.  Plaintiff then sued the
  City under theories of breach of contract and unjust enrichment.

       The superior court granted the City summary judgment, ruling that
  plaintiff bore the responsibility but failed to ascertain whether its sewer
  bills were reflective of and consistent with

 

  the use of its premises.  According to the court, regardless of whether the
  City knew that plaintiff was operating as a granite shed, plaintiff was not
  entitled to a refund because it had paid the sewer bills voluntarily
  without protest and could have discovered the problem through reasonable
  diligence, including examining the bills.

       On appeal, plaintiff contends that the law and facts of the case
  require the City to refund the overpayments.  The City concedes that
  plaintiff was entitled to pay the flat rate, and does not contend that the
  metered rate was reasonable or equitable as applied to plaintiff.  See
  Handy v. City of Rutland, 156 Vt. 397, 404, 598 A.2d 114, 118 (1990)
  ("Vermont law . . . requires that [sewer] rates be fair, equitable and
  reasonable.").  Rather, the City argues that plaintiff was in the best
  position to discover that it was being billed under the wrong rate, and
  thus bore the responsibility for informing the City of the mistake.

       Under a quasi-contract theory of unjust enrichment, the law implies a
  promise to pay when a party receives a benefit and retention of the benefit
  would be inequitable.  In re Estate of Elliott, 149 Vt. 248, 252,