Case Title: Park County Bd. of County Com'rs v. Hodge

Citation: 

Docket Number: 89-190

State: wyoming

Court: Wyoming Supreme Court

Date: 1990-06-15T00:00:00Z

Document:
Park County Bd. of County Com'rs v. Hodge1990 WY 64792 P.2d 1390Case Number: 89-190Decided: 06/15/1990Supreme Court of Wyoming
PARK COUNTY BOARD OF 
COUNTY COMMISSIONERS, 

APPELLANT 
(DEFENDANT),

v.

DAN HODGE, 

APPELLEE 
(PLAINTIFF).

Appeal from the District 
Court, Park County, Hunter Patrick, J.

George L. 
Simonton of Simonton and Simonton, Cody, for appellant.

W.W. Reeves of 
Reeves & Murdock, Casper, for appellee.

Before 
CARDINE, C.J., and THOMAS, URBIGKIT, MACY and GOLDEN, JJ.

CARDINE, Chief 
Justice.

[¶1]      This was an 
action to recover the sum of $400 per month for the balance of Sheriff Dan 
Hodge's term. The Park County Board of County Commissioners (Board) appeals from 
a summary judgment in favor of Hodge.

[¶2]      The Board 
presents for our determination the following issues:

"A. Did appellee provide 
sufficient `record' to sustain the summary judgment?

"B. Did the court err in 
determining that the housing allowance was `salary'?"

[¶3]      We 
affirm.

[¶4]      Appellee Dan 
Hodge is the sheriff of Park County. From the beginning of his term, January 
1987, he was paid a housing allowance of $400 per month. On July 1, 1988, the 
Board ceased payment of the $400 per month housing allowance. Hodge sued the 
Board in district court, alleging that Art. 3, § 32 of the Wyoming Constitution 
prohibited the Board's action. Article 3, § 32 of the Wyoming Constitution 
provides:

"Except as otherwise 
provided in this constitution, no law shall extend the term of any public 
officer or increase or diminish his salary or emolument after his election or 
appointment * * *."

[¶5]      On review of 
summary judgment, we examine all of the information and material presented to 
the district court. Matthews v. Fetzner, 768 P.2d 590, 592 (Wyo. 1989). The 
record in this case consists of Hodge's complaint, motion for summary judgment, 
and affidavit with one of his pay stubs attached showing the payment of $400 per 
month.

[¶6]      The second 
paragraph of Hodge's complaint states:

"2. From the beginning of 
his term, until July 1, 1988, plaintiff received, as authorized by law, as part 
of his salary, a housing allowance of approximately $4,800 per 
year."

The Board's 
answer to paragraph 2 of the complaint states as follows:

"1. This Defendant admits 
paragraph * * * 2."

[¶7]      Having admitted 
that the $400 per month was salary, the Board now claims that Hodge failed to 
establish that the housing allowance was part of his salary. The Board also 
argues that Hodge did not establish that he was legally entitled to any 
salary.

[¶8]      The Board, in its 
answer, admitted the precise point it now seeks to dispute. A party is bound by 
its admissions. Board of County Comm'rs v. State ex rel. Miller, 369 P.2d 537, 
540 (Wyo. 1962). For purposes of this case, appellant's admissions conclusively 
establish that the monthly $400 payments were legally authorized and part of 
Hodge's salary. The Board is precluded from asserting now that they did not 
intend to make these admissions or that the admissions are incorrect. The Board 
made no attempt to amend their answer, and indeed filed nothing further until 
Hodge was granted the summary judgment. 

[¶9]      Since the Board 
has admitted that these payments were part of Hodge's salary, we do not reach 
the general question of whether a sheriff's housing allowance as provided in 
W.S. 18-3-603(b) is something other than "salary or emolument." The opinion 
dissenting and concurring in the result only is advisory. While the dissenting 
justice may believe he is writing for the future of the law, the reader should 
remember the thoughts are his alone and that a majority of this court would 
probably disagree, if it were inclined to issue an advisory opinion.

[¶10]   The only question here presented is 
whether the Board's action in terminating the monthly payments violated Art. 3, 
§ 32 of the Wyoming Constitution. The Board has admitted that the $400 per month 
payment to Hodge was salary. The cessation of this payment during his term was 
in violation of Art. 3, § 32 of the Wyoming Constitution. It was 
unconstitutional and void. The summary judgment, therefore, is 
affirmed.

THOMAS, J., filed a specially 
concurring opinion.

URBIGKIT, J., filed an opinion 
dissenting and concurring in the result only.

THOMAS, Justice, concurring 
specially.

[¶11]   I am in complete accord that this 
case should be affirmed, and I cannot disagree with the rationale for the 
majority opinion. The Park County Board of County Commissioners did admit in the 
pleadings that the amounts in issue were paid to the sheriff as salary. That 
admission justifies the decision of the district court that this court is 
affirming.

[¶12]   I believe that precision in the law 
is appropriate insofar as it can be achieved. The applicable constitutional 
provision states:

"Except as otherwise 
provided in this constitution, no law shall extend the term of any public 
officer or increase or diminish his salary or emolument after his election or 
appointment; * * *." Wyo. Const. art. 3, § 32.

In my judgment, 
the $400 per month that is in issue here should be identified as an emolument. 
In Taxpayers' League of Carbon County, Wyoming v. McPherson, 49 Wyo. 251, 54 P.2d 897 (1936), this court held that the statutory amount paid to a sheriff to 
reimburse him for the use of his automobile was neither salary nor an emolument. 
The court did, however, invoke these definitions:

"In Reals, County 
Treasurer v. Smith, 8 Wyo. 159, 56 P. 690, 692, where a statute separated the 
office of county assessor from that of treasurer, thus taking away the duty thus 
imposed upon the latter of appointing deputy assessors, his salary not being 
disturbed, it was held that this did not decrease the county treasurer's 
emoluments; the court saying:

"`"Emolument" is 
generally defined as "the profit arising from office or employment; that which 
is received as compensation for services, or which is annexed to the possession 
of office, as salary, fees, and perquisites; advantage; gain, public or 
private."' 10 Am. & Eng. Ency.L. (2d ed.), p. 1204.

"`The gain, profit, or 
advantage which is contemplated in the definition or significance of the word 
`emolument,' as applied to officers, at least as the word is employed in the 
constitutional provision aforesaid, clearly comprehends, we think, a gain, 
profit, or advantage which is pecuniary in character.'

"Webster's International 
Dictionary, Second Edition (1935), defines the word `emolument' as `profit from 
office, employment or labor; compensation, fees or salary.' The meaning, 
`advantage'; `benefit' is therein indicated as obsolete." McPherson, 49 Wyo. at 
263, 54 P.2d  at 901.

[¶13]   The court also adopted with 
approval the following language from Apple v. Crawford County, 105 Pa. 300, 303, 
51 Am.Rep. 205 (1884):

"`In Webster's Unabridged 
Dictionary the word "emolument" is thus defined: "The profit arising from office 
or employment; that which is received as a compensation for services, or which 
is annexed to the possession of office as salary, fees and perquisites; 
advantage; gain, public or private." We think the word imports more than the 
word salary or fees, and because it is contained in the Constitution in addition 
to the word "salary" we ought to give it the meaning which it bears in ordinary 
acceptation. By the definition above given it imports any perquisite, advantage, 
profit or gain arising from the possession of an office. The service which it 
compensates is official service and is compulsory.'" McPherson, 49 Wyo. at 
269, 54 P.2d  at 903 (emphasis in original).

[¶14]   If perchance the sheriff already 
was receiving the maximum salary provided by law, the additional amount could 
not be paid as salary. Yet, it so clearly fits within the definitions recited 
above that it must be an emolument, a term that is broader than the word salary. 
The same result pertains, and the federal statutes may well reach to withholding 
requirements for emoluments as well as salaries. Consequently, I agree with the 
disposition by this court and the trial court, but I would say that the 
constitutional provision is invoked because the sums in issue were 
emoluments.

URBIGKIT, Justice, dissenting and 
concurring in the result only.

[¶15]   I concur in the appellate 
resolution determined by the trial court pleadings. The admission of a 
characterization of the housing allowance as salary or emolument is dispositive. 
However, if it were necessary or appropriate to go beyond this admission as the 
law of the case, I would hold that the statute authorizing periodic housing 
reimbursement payments for the office of the sheriff does not involve emolument 
or salary and is constitutional within either defined amounts or upon allowance 
or discontinuance during the term of the sheriff.

[¶16]   We have before us for this appeal 
an explicit statute, W.S. 18-3-603, which, in addition to providing for 
responsibilities in subsection (a), provides in subsection (b):

The sheriff shall not be 
charged rent for any building owned or controlled by the county and occupied by 
him as a residence. If a residence is not furnished the sheriff by the county, 
the sheriff may be allowed an amount established annually by the board of county 
commissioners on or before July 1 of each calendar year. The amount shall be 
paid monthly and shall not exceed the prevailing rate of the municipality in 
which the sheriff resides.

[¶17]   At issue, if we were to avoid 
present disposition based on an admission by the pleadings, is whether the 
statutory housing allowance can only be granted before the elective term of the 
office holder commences and then when established, cannot be changed during the 
four year term. See Wyo. Const. art. 3, § 32 which prohibits increase or 
diminishment of the salary or emolument after the election and during the term 
of the office holder. State ex rel. Henderson v. Burdick, State Auditor, 4 Wyo. 
272, 33 P. 125 (1893). Cf. County Court Judges Ass'n v. Sidi, 752 P.2d 960 (Wyo. 
1988).

[¶18]   I find Wyoming precedent to clearly 
define a difference between the constitutional salary/emolument and reimbursed 
expense provisions. Taxpayers' League of Carbon County v. McPherson, 49 Wyo. 
251, 54 P.2d 897 (1936). Per diem allowances and reimbursed housing cost awards 
should be included in the category of the non-constitutional expense 
reimbursement and subject to legislative change during the term of office. 
McPherson, 54 P.2d 897.

[¶19]   The significance of the difference 
in Wyoming law reaches much broader than historical circumstances that 
frequently at one time, if not normally, sheriffs were provided housing by the 
county and then later, where no housing was available, they alternatively 
received a housing reimbursement payment. If reimbursement payments of this 
nature are constitutionally confined in commencement or change, the Wyoming 
legislator's per diem becomes anchored also to the constitutional prohibition. 
This conclusion would particularly reach members of the Laramie County 
legislative delegation who usually reside at home during the session and incur 
no additional housing costs. However, it would also be arguably applicable to 
the allowed per diem for out-of-town legislators whose room payments and actual 
expenditures for meals do not exceed the statutory allowance. See W.S. 
9-3-102.1 My construction of emolument is to 
include only "actual pecuniary gain" and not incidental contingent benefit, for 
example, retirement and per diem. See the explicit and logical review in Brown 
v. Meyer, 787 S.W.2d 42 (Tex. 1990).

[¶20]   This court should not now adopt the 
broadly inclusive definition of constitutionally confined salary and emolument 
which restricts governmental flexibility for budgetary adjustments. It is 
neither necessary nor appropriate to constitutionally invalidate on this record 
any provisions for annual change of reimbursement items such as the housing 
included in W.S. 18-3-603. Since appellant is limited in appeal by the 
admissions of its pleadings, we need venture no further than this record and 
certainly not to plumb the murky waters of what are constitutionally restricted 
salary and emolument payments. Otherwise, in this case, I could easily assess 
validity to the legislative determination that changes in a housing allowance or 
a per diem reimbursement do not fall into the two or four year term 
constitutional straitjacket. See State ex rel. Murane v. Jack, 52 Wyo. 173, 70 P.2d 888 (1937); McPherson, 54 P.2d 897; State ex rel. McPherren v. Carter, 30 
Wyo. 22, 215 P. 477 (1923); and Reals, County Treasurer v. Smith, 8 Wyo. 159, 56 P. 690 (1898). Cf. County Court Judges Ass'n, 752 P.2d 960, Urbigkit, J., 
specially concurring; and Burdick, State Auditor, 33 P. 125.

FOOTNOTES

1 Statutory expense 
allowances for legislators is not unnoticed in litigation. See Consumer Party of 
Pennsylvania v. Com., 510 Pa. 158, 507 A.2d 323 (1986). That court 
differentiated salary as compensation from expense allowance provided "to pay 
for expenses incurred in the performance of those services." Id. 507 A.2d  at 
336.