Court Opinion

ID: 9683747
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 13:36:14.133439+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:17:50.112289
License: Public Domain

SUTTON, Justice
(dissenting).
I am unable to agree with the majority in the conclusion the City in this case was *164engaged in a governmental function. The spraying operations performed were purely optional and voluntary on the part of'individual citizens within the City and were made on request only for the service charge of $3.00.- The evidence discloses there was but a trifling profit earned from the charge and the City did not engage in the project for profit. There was no ordinance or law or regulation which required individuals to spray or otherwise rid their premises of insects or vermin thought to be detrimental to the public health, so far as the record discloses. The City did not undertake to determine whether or not there existed any need for the spraying, nor did it through any official advise or suggest it. The matter of whether premises were sprayed or not was left entirely to the determination of the individual. A comparatively small per cent of the entire number of private residences were sprayed. The evidence indicates the spraying was done in the better sections of the residential area of the City. It seems to me the spraying was primarily for the benefit of those individuals who requested it and if any benefit accrued to the public at large it was purely incidental. Partial spraying here and there could hardly result in any general benefit to the public, or result in any substantial protection to the public health, unless it were determined only those sprayed for some reason because of the presence of dangerous insects' or conditions necessitated the spraying. It is my conclusion this operation was not governmental in nature.
The rule stated by McQuillin on Municipal Corporations that a municipality is exempt from liability when it performs a duty imposed upon it as the arm or agent of the state in the exercise of a strictly (or purely) governmental function solely for the benefit of the public has been many times approved by the courts of this State. City of Amarillo v. Ware, 120 Tex. 456, 40 S.W.2d 57, at page 60, pars. (3-4) and the cases there cited, and the very late case of Dilley v. City of Houston, 148 Tex. 191, 222 S.W.2d 992 (T) and the authorities there cited. It is also settled law that the sanitation of a city is a governmental function and when it is thus engaged it is not liable for the negligence of its officers and agents, City of Wichita Falls v. Robison, 121 Tex. 133, 46 S.W.2d 965 and the authorities cited, but the function must be strictly governmental and solely for the benefit of the public. As is heretofore pointed out the spraying operation here is thought not to be strictly governmental and solely for the-benefit of the public, but primarily for the benefit of the limited number of citizens of the City, and if the public was served at all it was purely incidentally so. ■ It is thought to be obvious many activities of a city are in a way sanitary in their nature but the benefits local. The cutting of weeds and grass along a street works certain sanitary results but such an operation is not governmental and purely for the benefit of the public. As is suggested by the appellee in his brief if it were strictly public in its nature there could hardly be any justification for the service charge, because a limited number of individual inhabitants and citizens should not be required to defray the expense of a purely public service.
It is my conclusion this case should be reversed and remanded because of the failure of the court to submit to the jury appellant’s Special Requested Issue: “Do you find from a preponderance of the evidence that the fumigating fog exploded on The occasion in question?”
In my opinion it was essential to have the jury determine what it was. that exploded and caused the collapse and destruction of the house and the contents thereof, and that the evidence raises the issue as to whether or not the explosion of the fumigating fog was.