Court Opinion

ID: 9626052
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-22 08:00:35.381185+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:06:20.219952
License: Public Domain

Mr. Chief Justice PARKER
(dissenting).
I am unable to agree with either the result or the reasoning in the majority opinion. The instant situation, although not complicated by a lack of opportunity for hearing, is reminiscent of other boundary board cases in recent years — -in two of which I found it necessary to speak. Bixby v. Cross, Wyo., 384 P.2d 710; Marathon Oil Company v. Welch, Wyo., 379 P.2d 832.
I am acutely aware of the needs of our citizens, and especially of our young people in the field of education, and agree generally with the statement of one of the principal witnesses in the present case that “School administrators, the Wyoming Education Association and the State Department of Education are on record as favoring a situation where all taxable property in Wyoming support twelve years of education,” but steps toward the effectuation of that thesis are within the province of the legislature to be accomplished only under a comprehensive plan, preferably submitted by the State Department of Education. It is not a matter for piecemeal judicial interpretation, even though this purports to grow out of a statute (§ 21-211, W.S.1957 (1963 Cumulative Supp.)), which has been interpreted as conferring legislative authority on district boundary boards.
It is the unchallenged law of this jurisdiction, supported by numerous cases, that the best interests of the people in the entire area affected must be considered by the boundary board. In Chicago, B. & Q. R. Co. v. Byron School Dist. No. 1, 37 Wyo. 259, 260 P. 537, 540, it was said:
“ * * * In these various matters, the welfare and interests of the district and of the people thereof as a whole must necessarily be the determining factor in order to make the organization of districts possible at all. We cannot see why a different principle should apply in making changes in districts already organized. * * * ”
In School District No. 9, in County of Fremont, v. District Boundary Board in and for Fremont County, Wyo., 351 P.2d 106, 111, it was announced:
“ * * * a district boundary board in making a change must have before it sufficient information upon which it may properly find that it is to the best interests of the people in both the annexed and the annexing areas. * ⅜ * »
This principle was approved in Marathon Oil Company v. Welch, supra. In Bixby v. Cross, supra, 384 P.2d at 712, this court stated :
“ * * * The board’s action must of course be considered an illegal exercise of discretion, if it did not have before it sufficient information upon which it might properly find the change to be *836in the best interests of the public. ⅜ * »
and speaking of the appellants’ unsuccessful contention, 384 P.2d at 713 :
“ * * * In other words, they agree the question boils down to whether the action of the board was in the best interest of all concerned.”
In Forest Oil Corporation v. Davis, Wyo., 384 P.2d 716, 718, it was said:
“In cases * * * where the same resolution was involved * * *, the district court has vacated and set aside this resolution for the reason that the board acted arbitrarily and did not have before it sufficient information upon which it could properly find the proposed change in boundaries to be in the best interests of the public generally. * ‡ -',⅛ >>
In Clear Creek Cattle Co. v. Davis, Wyo., 384 P.2d 719, 720, it was noted:
“This court, in the Fremont County case, *■ * * made it clear that a district boundary board must have before it sufficient information upon which it may properly find that a change is to the best interests of all the people concerned. * * * ”
A careful review of the record in the present controversy discloses that there was before the board no clear evidence of any benefit to the areas comprising the three districts which were in effect to be annexed by the boundary board’s action. Instead, there was evidence of the need of the high school district for finances and an enunciation by its school authorities of a philosophy adopted by the State Department of Education that all taxable property in Wyoming should support twelve years of education. Moreover, there was testimony from residents of the areas to be annexed protesting the requested action.
Tire crux of the present opinion arises from the statement that:
“The record gives no suggestion whatsoever or even the barest intimation that there was any fraud or collusion practiced by the board.
“No whit of evidence is found in the record to indicate the board’s action was arbitrary or capricious. * * * ”
Such a statement wholly ignores the fundamental concept that “Action of an administrative agency is arbitrary or capricious when it is without reasonable basis or not supported by substantial evidence * 2 Am.Jur.2d Administrative Law § 621; and see id. §§ 452, 650, 651.
In the Chicago Junction Case (Baltimore & O. R. Co. v. United States), 264 U.S. 258, 44 S.Ct. 317, 319-320, 68 L.Ed. 667, Mr. Justice Brandeis said:
“ * * * The provision for a hearing implies both the privilege of introducing evidence and the duty of deciding in accordance with it. To refuse to consider evidence introduced or to make an essential finding without supporting evidence is arbitrary action.
Inland Motor Freight v. United States, D. Idaho, 36 F.Supp. 885, repeated this principle. And see Annotation, 123 A.L.R. 1349. In Torrance v. Caddo Parish Police Jury, La.App., 119 So.2d 617, 619, it was said:
“Generally an abuse of discretion results from a conclusion reached capriciously or in an arbitrary manner. ‘Capriciously’ has been defined such as ‘a conclusion of a commission when the conclusion is announced with no substantial evidence to support it or a conclusion contrary to substantiated competent evidence.’ * * * "
And see Heaps v. Cobb, 185 Md. 372, 45 A.2d 73, 76. In Thurman v. Meridian Mutual Insurance Company, Ky., 345 S.W.2d 635, 639, it was said:
“ * * * By ‘arbitrary’ we mean clearly erroneous, and by ‘clearly erroneous’ we mean unsupported by substantial evidence. * * * ”
In J. Ray McDermott & Co. v. Hudson, Wyo., 370 P.2d 364, 370, we observed that the burden of showing action to be arbi*837trary, capricious, and a grave abuse of discretion, was discharged by evidence which showed that a material factor had received no consideration.
Although the chairman of the district boundary board inquired of the other members if they had read and were familiar with the transcript of the public hearing, the minutes do not purport to show that there was any evidence before the board which warranted the change of boundaries, and this despite a written admonition from its counsel of the ultimate question to be answered, “is it in the'best interests of the taxpayers and schools and students in both the present high school area and also in the area which is proposed to be included within the high school area that the change of boundaries be made.”
There is no basis for approving the board’s action, and the judgment of the trial court should be reversed.