Court Opinion

ID: 9663843
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-23 23:53:05.141659+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:14:58.140950
License: Public Domain

LOUIS J. CECI, J.
(dissenting). I dissent because the case is not ripe for review. Without the final form of the insurance policy being available for review, the lease purchase agreement contains language which troubles me. The troubling language is as follows: "The District hereby agrees that it will reimburse the Certificate Insurer for the amounts, if any, paid by the Certificate Insurer under the Municipal Bond Insurance Policy." In addition, the "Municipal Bond Insurance Policy" is defined by the agreement as "insuring the payment of the principal and interest with respect to all or any of the Certificates in accordance with the terms of the Municipal Bond Insurance Policy."
*485The combination of these two parts of the Agreement, which is in final form and has been executed, appears to obligate the District to pay somebody, whether it be the Trust Company or the Certificate Insurer, for the entire amount of the purchase price of the school. The majority opinion ignores these parts of the agreement and instead focuses upon contradictory language in the agreement which states that "the District's obligations to any bond insurer are expressly restricted to annually appropriated rents." Majority op. at 467. The District's brief also ignored the troubling effect of the language which I have quoted above.
Controversies are ripe for adjudication when the facts are "sufficiently developed to avoid courts entangling themselves in abstract disagreements .... While this does not mean that all adjudicatory facts must be resolved as a prerequisite to a declaratory judgment, facts must not be 'so contingent and uncertain.' " Miller Brands-Milwaukee v. Case, 162 Wis. 2d 684, 694-95, 470 N.W.2d 290 (1991) (citations omitted). Here, the facts are fully developed but for the final forms of the insurance policy and the certificates of participation. However, the insurance policy is crucial to the case as it could destroy the legality of the entire transaction.
The insurance policy could, by its terms, restrict the District's obligation to something less than the full amount of the price of the school. But without the policy being in final form, we are forced to rely upon assertions by the District's attorneys that the final form of the policy will not create debt. The majority quotes from the District's brief where the District concedes that the language in the sample bond insurance policy, which was not part of the record, would create debt. The majority concludes this section of the opinion by instructing the District that the policy, when issued, "must not create *486binding future obligations . . .." Majority op. at 478. Such an instruction does not render an otherwise unripe dispute ripe for review.
Furthermore, it is obvious that for the past 20 years, the school board has been unable to obtain the support of the electorate of the school district for this expansive and expensive building project. This court should not become involved in the school board's innovative use of smoke and mirrors to thwart the will of the electorate by rendering this principally advisory opinion. See majority op. at 478-479, wherein the majority advises: "If the District executes a bond insurance policy, the District must not create binding future obligations without complying with applicable constitutional and statutory provisions."
For the reasons stated, I dissent.