Opinion ID: 447593
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Second Cause of Action

Text: 17 The City and URA characterize their second cause of action as one in negligence. Brief for Defendant and Third-Party Plaintiff-Appellant City at 16; Brief for Defendant and Third-Party Plaintiff-Appellant URA at 16-17. We agree, and it therefore is governed by the Federal Tort Claims Act, 28 U.S.C. Secs. 1346(b), 2671-2680 (1982). The district court dismissed the cause on the grounds that it fell either within the statutory exception for misrepresentation, 28 U.S.C. Sec. 2680(h) (1982); see United States v. Neustadt, 366 U.S. 696, 81 S.Ct. 1294, 6 L.Ed.2d 614 (1961), or within the exception for discretionary functions, 28 U.S.C. Sec. 2680(a) (1982); see Dalehite v. United States, 346 U.S. 15, 73 S.Ct. 956, 97 L.Ed. 1427 (1953). Since the only applicable grant of subject matter jurisdiction or waiver of sovereign immunity for such a claim is contained in the Tort Claims Act, the effect of either one of the district court's findings would be to deprive the court of power to adjudicate the cause. We find the record insufficiently complete, at this juncture, to justify dismissal on either of the grounds relied upon by the district court. 18 The third-party plaintiffs made no specification of negligence beyond the assertion in the third-party complaint that if they were found liable, HUD must be found negligent. While it may be that this claim is one for misrepresentation, compare United States v. Neustadt, 366 U.S. 696, 81 S.Ct. 1294, 6 L.Ed.2d 614 (1961) with Block v. Neal, 460 U.S. 289, 103 S.Ct. 1089, 75 L.Ed.2d 67 (1983), or involved a discretionary function within the teaching of Dalehite v. United States, 346 U.S. 15, 73 S.Ct. 956, 97 L.Ed. 1427 (1953), we view the record in the light most favorable to the parties opposing dismissal. See National Metropolitan Bank v. United States, 323 U.S. 454, 456-57, 65 S.Ct. 354, 355, 89 L.Ed. 383 (1945); Beal v. Missouri Pac. R.R., 312 U.S. 45, 51, 61 S.Ct. 418, 421, 85 L.Ed. 577 (1941); MacDonald v. DuMaurier, 144 F.2d 696, 700-01 (2d Cir.1944); 5 C. Wright & A. Miller, supra, Sec. 1368, at 690. The City and URA in the third-party complaint alleged only that HUD may have been negligent. HUD, in its motion to dismiss, stated in conclusory fashion that the negligence must have been misrepresentation and that the alleged misrepresentations are HUD's approval of the project without realizing the alleged loss of access to the subject property. Apparently nothing more was before the district court. On this limited record, it was error to dismiss the claim.