Opinion ID: 1793194
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: duty and standard of care created by ordinance

Text: Even if no common law duty existed, the College claims that ordinance 23.04.185 placed a duty on the City to make the shut-off valve accessible. It states: Notwithstanding the provision of any other ordinance, the Water Division with funds from the Water Division, shall, by contract, or otherwise, expose, make street level, and make accessible stop boxes over shut off valves whenever the City of St. Louis, by contract or otherwise, is responsible for covering said stop boxes during street repair or resurfacing. Ord. 62836 sec. 1, 1993. This ordinance was passed five years after the street department paved over the fire line manhole cover. Here there is no question about whether the ordinance takes away some vested right of the City or imposes some external duty on it. It is the City's own ordinance that is at issue. In the ordinance, the City voluntarily undertook to state that its water division would, by contract or otherwise, expose and make street level and accessible stop boxes over shut-off valves whenever the City is responsible for covering them during street repair or resurfacing. The issue is simply the meaning of the ordinance passed by the City. The question boils down to whether the City intended by this ordinance to assume this duty on the part of its water division only as to current and future street repair and maintenance, or whether it also intended by this ordinance to undertake a duty to locate and make accessible and street level all previously paved-over stop boxes in the City. The ordinance does not expressly state that it is retrospective or prospective in application. Focusing on the ordinance's use of the word whenever, the College argues that ordinance 23.04.185 was intended to apply retroactively. But, the word whenever can be either temporal or conditional in nature. Its use is not particularly enlightening. Focusing on the use of the words  is responsible for covering said stop boxes rather than  was responsible for covering said stop boxes, the City argues that the ordinance clearly is applicable only to current or future repaving and repair and does not purport to require the City to examine all past repaving projects to determine whether stop boxes might have been paved over. This Court finds the resolution of this dispute lies in considering the context in which the ordinance was passed. When the City enacted the ordinance in question, it also left in force chapter 23.12 of the St. Louis City Revised Code. That chapter contains two ordinances relating to shut-off valves. Ordinance 23.12.010 specifically places the burden on the owner to keep stop boxes accessible. Ordinance 23.12.020 states that the water commissioner has the power to excavate and shut off water if the owner does not make his or her stop box accessible or keep it in repair after notification. Ord. 48646 sec. 11 (part), 1958: 1948 C. Ch. 55 sec. 24 (part): 1960 C. sec. 551.020. These two ordinances were last amended in 1960 and remain in effect. This suggests that an owner still has a duty to keep stop boxes and valves accessible and to pay for uncovering them when this duty is not fulfilled. Further, there is no evidence that, upon passage of the 1993 ordinance, the City undertook a program of locating and making accessible all shut-off valves and stop boxes that previously had been paved over. The City suggests that to do so would be a tremendous burden and one it did not intend to undertake by voluntarily adopting this ordinance. While the College states that it would be good public policy for the City to make all such stop boxes and valves accessible, the issue is not what would be good public policy, but what the City in fact intended when it adopted the ordinance. Given the language used and the enormity of the undertaking that would be imposed under the College's reading of the ordinance, and the meaning contemporaneously accorded the ordinance upon its passage, an intent to voluntarily adopt such a duty cannot be read into the use of the word whenever in the ordinance. The ordinance is intended to be prospective-only in application.