Title: Board of Riley County Comm'rs v. City of Junction City
Citation: 233 Kan. 947, 667 P.2d 868
Docket Number: 55,199
State: Kansas
Issuer: Kansas Supreme Court
Date: July 15, 1983

233 Kan. 947 (1983)
667 P.2d 868
THE BOARD OF COUNTY COMMISSIONERS OF RILEY COUNTY, KANSAS, et al., Plaintiffs/Appellees,
v.
THE CITY OF JUNCTION CITY, KANSAS, Defendant/Appellant.
No. 55,199

Supreme Court of Kansas.
Opinion filed July 15, 1983.
Richard A. Pinaire, city attorney, argued the cause and was on the brief for the appellant.
Dan H. Myers, of Myers and Pottroff, of Manhattan, argued the cause, and William L. Frost, of Morrison, Frost and Olsen, of Manhattan, was with him on the brief for the appellees.
The opinion of the court was delivered by
PRAGER, J.:
This is an action for a declaratory judgment which attacks the validity of a Junction City ordinance annexing the Fort Riley military reservation and other lands in Riley County. The plaintiffs are the Board of County Commissioners of Riley County, the city of Manhattan, and 22 individual landowners. The defendant is the city of Junction City. The district court entered summary judgment in favor of the plaintiffs, holding the *948 annexation to be null and void. The city of Junction City has appealed.
The undisputed facts, issues of law, contentions of the parties, and a decision on the issues are contained in a well written, comprehensive memorandum opinion by Judge Terry L. Bullock. Certain portions of the district court's opinion which contain the rationale of the district court in determining the issues will be referred to from time to time in this opinion.
The facts in the case are undisputed and essentially are as follows: On February 2, 1982, the city of Junction City, acting through its city commission, adopted resolution 975, which announced the commission's intent to annex, inter alia, Fort Riley, Kansas, a military reservation consisting of some 98,000 acres, situated in Geary and Riley Counties and adjacent to the city of Junction City. In the early morning hours of April 7, 1982, city ordinance S-2290 was adopted on second and final reading. No written notice of the proposed annexation, as required by K.S.A. 12-520a(c), was ever given other than to the government of the United States of America.
In adopting ordinance S-2290, the city commission apparently intended to annex only the Fort Riley military reservation. In fact, however, the legal description contained in the ordinance, a single continuous perimeter description circumscribing one single tract of land, encompassed not only the Fort Riley military reservation but, in addition, a 10.66 acre tract owned by Riley County, which was its Wilderness Park; a 10.58 acre tract owned by the city of Manhattan, which was its airport; and several tracts of land owned by the individual plaintiffs, which land was located in Riley County and totaled about 1,000 acres more or less. The tracts owned by Riley County, the city of Manhattan, and the individual plaintiffs did not adjoin the city boundary of Junction City as it existed prior to April 7, 1982.
It appears that, following passage of the resolution announcing the city's intent to annex Fort Riley, a great deal of activity in opposition to the annexation was generated in the Kansas legislature which was then in session in Topeka. On April 5, 1982, House Bill 3166 was introduced by the Ways and Means Committee. The following day, April 6, 1982, House Bill 3166 passed both the Kansas House and Senate. Five days later on April 13, 1982, Governor Carlin signed the bill into law. On April 15, *949 1982, House Bill 3166 was published in the Kansas Register. House Bill 3166 was enacted as Chapter 59 of the 1982 Session Laws and may now be found at K.S.A. 12-529. It provides as follows:
The plaintiffs commenced this action contesting the validity of the annexation on May 6, 1982, in the district court of Riley County. While the action was pending on August 17, 1982, ordinance G-546 was adopted by the city commission of Junction City, the same being its annual K.S.A. 12-517 ordinance declaring the boundary of the city. This ordinance purported to delete from the boundary of the city of Junction City all properties owned by the plaintiffs in this action. Defendant conceded, however, that no de-annexation proceeding had ever been had pursuant to K.S.A. 12-504.
In the district court, the plaintiffs contended that ordinance S-2290 was wholly invalid for three reasons:
(1) The ordinance was not enacted in compliance with K.S.A. 12-519 et seq.;
(2) The hearing at which the ordinance passed violated K.S.A. 12-3001 et seq. and K.S.A. 75-4317 et seq.; and
(3) The provisions of House Bill 3166 prohibited the annexation provided for in ordinance S-2290.
The defendant maintained that ordinance S-2290 was not invalid for the following reasons:
(1) The adoption of its August 15, 1982, boundary ordinance makes moot any issue pertaining to the annexation of plaintiffs' lands and deprives plaintiffs of standing to challenge the subject annexation;
(2) The inclusion of plaintiffs' land within the legal description contained in ordinance S-2290 was simple error of a trivial nature, constituting mere surplusage which should be ignored by the court;
(3) Even if the ordinance is invalid as to plaintiffs' lands, it *950 should nonetheless be declared valid as to the remaining lands constituting the Fort Riley military reservation;
(4) The court had no jurisdiction to consider alleged violations of the open meeting law (K.S.A. 75-4317 et seq.); and
(5) House Bill 3166 is unconstitutional and void. In sum, defendant contended that its annexation, insofar as it pertains to the Fort Riley military reservation alone, was valid and should be upheld.
In his memorandum opinion, Judge Bullock considered each of the contentions of the parties and entered judgment declaring ordinance S-2290 in its entirety to be null and void and of no force or effect.
We do not deem it necessary to consider all of the issues raised in the district court. We will determine this case on two issues presented by the city of Junction City on the appeal:
(1) Whether the trial court erred in holding the city ordinance was in violation of K.S.A. 12-519 et seq.; and
(2) Whether House Bill 3166 prohibiting the annexation is constitutional.
As noted above, the defendant contended in the trial court that the adoption of its August 15, 1982, boundary ordinance rendered moot any issue pertaining to the annexation of plaintiffs' lands and thus deprived plaintiffs of standing to challenge the annexation. In disposing of this issue, the trial court held that the issue was not moot and that the plaintiffs had standing, reasoning as follows:
In our judgment, the district court properly disposed of the mootness issue, and we adopt the trial court's rationale in that regard.
We turn now to the issue as to whether the trial court erred in holding that ordinance S-2290 was invalid for the reason that it was not enacted in compliance with K.S.A. 12-519 et seq. It is clear from the record, and the defendant concedes, that the plaintiffs did not receive any notice of the proposed annexation as required by K.S.A. 12-520a(c). Furthermore, none of the conditions permitting annexation by the city of Junction City applied to plaintiffs property. See K.S.A. 12-520 and 12-520c. There is no doubt that the annexation provided for in ordinance S-2290 was invalid insofar as it pertains to the plaintiffs' property. This leads us to the key issue in the case: Whether the ordinance is invalid only insofar as it pertains to plaintiffs' property or must it be found invalid in its entirety?
In its brief, the city states the issues to be determined in the following language:
(1) Whether Junction City ordinance S-2290 can be construed as annexing only a tract of land owned by the United States (Fort Riley military reservation), or whether it also annexed the separate tracts of land owned by plaintiffs;
(2) Assuming arguendo that plaintiffs are correct in alleging that Junction City ordinance S-2290 invalidly annexed their tracts, whether such invalidity affected the validity of annexation of the remaining tract owned by the federal government. The city argues that ordinance S-2290 should be construed as only annexing Fort Riley. It is undoubtedly true that the city never intended to annex the tracts of land owned by the plaintiffs. The problem arose because the property of the various plaintiffs was clearly included within the metes and bounds description of the area annexed. The city argues that the description of the property was obtained by the city from the federal government, that it was *952 obviously erroneous, and that the mistake in the metes and bounds description was no fault of the city, which made every effort to comply with the annexation statutes.
K.S.A. 12-520a(a) requires the city, in its resolution stating that the city is considering the annexation of land, to describe the boundaries of the land proposed to be annexed. The legal description contained in both the resolution and ordinance clearly but erroneously included the tracts of land owned by the various plaintiffs. The resolution and the ordinance were not ambiguous, for they clearly described the tracts of land owned by the plaintiffs as being included within the annexation. Although the legal description did not coincide with what the city suggested was the legislative intent, it nevertheless did include the plaintiffs' land. We cannot accept the contention of the city that the error in the boundary description was trivial and that it should be treated as mere surplusage, and the balance of the ordinance held valid. The annexed tracts of land owned by the various plaintiffs exceeded 1,000 acres. The trial court correctly held that the annexation provided for in ordinance S-2290 was invalid insofar as it pertained to plaintiffs' property.
We turn now to the issue whether the invalidity of the annexation as to plaintiffs' lands affected the validity of the annexation of the remaining tract of land owned by the federal government. In holding that ordinance S-2290 was invalid in toto, the court applied a doctrine of law followed in this state commonly described as the "all or nothing" rule. In its memorandum opinion, the district court reasoned as follows:
We agree with the decision of the district court that city ordinance S-2290 was invalid in toto, including the annexation of Fort Riley. The rationale of the district court set forth above is approved and adopted by this court.
The defendant city also contends on the appeal that House Bill 3166 is unconstitutional and has no force or effect because it violates the provisions of Article 12, § 5 and Article 2, § 17 of the Kansas Constitution. Article 12, § 5 provides:
Article 2, § 17 provides as follows:
*957 In holding that House Bill 3166 was constitutional and retroactively effective, the district court reasoned as follows in its memorandum decision:
"Further,
We have concluded that the district court did not err in holding that House Bill 3166 (K.S.A. 12-529) is valid and constitutional.
In view of our disposition of the case on these issues, we do not deem it necessary to consider the other issues raised on the appeal.
The judgment of the district court is affirmed.