Opinion ID: 1203209
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The Local Government Function Distinction

Text: Limited immunity stemming from the need to protect public rights is premised, in some jurisdictions, on a determination of whether the local government is acting in a public or governmental capacity or whether it is asserting a public right or a private right. E.g., City of Shelbyville v. Shelbyville Restorium, Inc., 96 Ill.2d 457, 71 Ill. Dec. 720, 722-23, 451 N.E.2d 874, 876-77 (1983) ([T]he practice in Illinois has been to determine whether the right which the plaintiff governmental unit seeks to assert is in fact a right belonging to the general public or whether it belongs only to the government....). See discussion supra part III.A.; Oklahoma City Mun. Improvement Auth. v. HTB, Inc., 769 P.2d 131, 134 (Okla.1988) ([W]e must determine whether plaintiffs below acted in a sovereign capacity, and whether the rights at issue rise to the level of public rights.). The inquiries are intertwined insofar as a local government by definition will be acting in a public or governmental capacity when seeking to assert public or governmental rights. This court has never used a function distinction test, however, to ascertain whether a statute of limitations runs against a local government. We decline to do so now because such a test is fraught with inconsistencies in its application. See City and County of Denver v. Mountain States Tel. and Tel. Co., 754 P.2d 1172, 1173-76 (Colo.1988) (Cases and commentators have criticized the governmental/proprietary distinction as unhelpful, inherently unsound, and `probably one of the most unsatisfactory known to the law....'). [10] Since we reject the function distinction test that gives rise to limited immunity, we are constrained to either grant local governments full immunity from limitations or hold them accountable to statutes of limitations. Given our abrogation of sovereign immunity and the purposes served by limitations on actions, we find the latter course more appropriate.