Court Opinion

ID: 9715624
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 06:10:29.6533+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:36.408669
License: Public Domain

REES, Justice.
This appeal is from the order of the trial court sustaining defendant’s motion for summary judgment.
The petition of the plaintiff alleges that plaintiff’s decedent was driving south on U. S. highway 275 approximately 2½ miles south of Sidney, at about 1:15 a. m. on April 1, 1969, when decedent’s automo*699bile collided with a deer, and was then forced into the path of an oncoming truck. Decedent was killed in the collision, and plaintiff brought the action against the State, asserting that the State and its employees and-agents .were negligent in failing to warn plaintiff’s decedent of the presence of deer on the highway, either by the placing of adequate signs or otherwise, or in failing to establish a reduced nighttime speed limit in the area because of the hazard of deer entering the highway, or in failing by means of fences, barriers or other means to prevent or reduce the hazard of deer entering the highway, and in propagating, increasing and maintaining deer in such numbers as to create a continuous danger and hazard to users of the highway.
The action is brought pursuant to the Tort Claims Act, chapter 2SA, Code of Iowa, 1966. Plaintiff’s petition asserts that claim had been filed pursuant to the provisions of the Tort Claims Act, but that the same was denied by the State Appeal Board.
Defendant-State answered, admitting the factual recitation set out in plaintiff’s petition, but denying all of the allegations of negligence and plaintiff’s claim of State’s liability. The State affirmatively alleged in answer that plaintiff’s decedent was familiar with the conditions prevailing on the highway at the point where the collision occurred; that deer are ferae naturae and have the inherent characteristic of roaming about at will, knowing no bounds; that the proximate cause of the accident was the negligent manner in which plaintiff’s decedent was operating his motor vehicle and that such contributory negligence barred any recovery by plaintiff.
Defendant-State further affirmatively alleged in answer that chapter 109, The Code, 1966, establishes title and ownership of all wild game and animals in the State, and that such ownership constitutes the State as trustee for the people of the State; that section 25A.14(1), The Code, 1966, precludes recovery of damages when a claim is based upon the exercise of a discretionary function, and that all decisions involving dealing with deer as to their number, location and so forth are decisions which necessarily involve the exercise of discretion, and that the placement of signs on the highways identifying certain locations as “deer crossings” also involves the exercise of discretion.
Defendant-State later filed its, motion for summary judgment, asserting- that section 25A.14(1) precludes plaintiff from maintaining his action, as all of the specifications of negligence set forth in plaintiff’s petition involve and fall within the discretionary function exception to the Act, which will be hereinafter referred to. The motion for summary judgment was supported by affidavit. After resistance to the motion for summary judgment was filed by plaintiff, hearing was had thereon and the motion was sustained.
In its order sustaining the defendant’s motion for summary judgment, the court found that each of the allegations of negligence advanced by plaintiff in his petition involve matters which are purely within the discretion of the State Highway Commission or the State Conservation Commission, and therefore come within the exceptions embraced in section 2SA.14 of the Tort Claims Act.
I. The form and content of plaintiff’s brief make it difficult for us to approach the exact errors which plaintiff relies upon for reversal. There is no statement of the case, no reference to the Record, no citations of authorities, and no arguments of errors. Defendant calls attention to the insufficiency of plaintiff’s brief in these particulars, and directs us to the pronouncements of this court in State v. Masters, 171 N.W.2d 255 (Iowa 1969), in which we held the brief and argument of appellant insufficient and declined to consider the appeal on the basis of such a brief. In view of the fact, however, that the matter before us was disposed of on a *700motion for summary judgment, we have elected to consider the matters inherent in this appeal.
II. Section 25A.14(1), The Code, 1966, provided:
“The provisions of this chapter shall not apply to:
“1. Any claim based upon an act or omission of an employee of the state, exercising due care, in the execution of a statute or regulation, whether or not such statute or regulation be valid, or based upon the exercise or performance or the failure to exercise or perform a discretionary function or duty on the part of a state agency or an employee of the state, whether or not the discretion be abused.”
We have no difficulty in reaching the conclusion that all of the specifications of negligence which the plaintiff alleges in his petition come within the discretionary function exclusion of section 25A.14(1), The Code. Succinctly stated, plaintiff’s action is based upon the propositions that the State should have either warned of the presence of deer or should have prevented deer from entering the highway.
The policy determination of the State Highway Commission not to post “deer crossing” signs on the highways of this State most certainly involves the exercise of discretion. Whatever correlated responsibility might have rested upon the Conservation Commission also involved a discretionary function.
We are cognizant of the fact that lines of demarcation have been drawn in governmental tort liability cases with regard to the “discretionary function” exception and the application of the “planning” and “operational” tests in reaching decisions under particular facts. An extensive discussion of the application of the discretionary function exclusion of section 25A.-14(1) by this court is found in Stanley v. State, 197 N.W.2d 599, 602 (Iowa 1972). In Stanley this court affirmed a judgment in favor of a claimant who sustained injury when a truck in which she was riding was forced off the road at a point where a 10- to 12-inch dropoff from the edge of the paving was permitted to exist during construction. Warning lights and signs had been placed along the edge of the highway under construction, and the court held the exercise of discretion had ceased before the commission of the acts which the trial court found to be negligent, namely: creating and maintaining a dangerous dropoff from 10 to 12 inches between the edge of the paving and the shoulder of the road. The decision to keep the highway open during construction, this court found, was within the proper discretionary function for which no liability would attach, but once that decision was made negligence in carrying out that policy could not be excused on the ground that negligent acts were performed in the exercise of discretion within the meaning of the statutory exemption.
We do not have such a situation confronting us here; the policy determination not to erect signs could not have been implemented in any sense. Unless it could be said that the policy determination was “operational” rather than a “planning” function, the discretionary aspects of section 25A.14(1) are entirely preclusive of plaintiff’s right to maintain this suit.
We conclude the policy determination not to erect signs along highways of this State, and particularly at the point in the public highway where plaintiff’s decedent’s automobile came into collision with a deer, involve the exercise of discretion at the planning stage and that the trial court properly sustained defendant’s motion.
We refer to the authorities cited in Stanley v. State, supra, as being supportive of our conclusion in this regard.
III. We deem it unnecessary to consider the other propositions or errors urged by plaintiff. Obviously, the Tort Claims Act did not create a new cause of *701action; it simply provided the jurisdictional foothold for pursuing rights or causes already existing. See Feres v. United States, 340 U.S. 135, 71 S.Ct. 153, 95 L.Ed. 152. So far as we have been able to determine, there is no statutory or common-law basis for such a cause of action as plaintiff asserts here. Such being true, no liability could attach as against the State in this case.
IV. We are satisfied the pleadings of the plaintiff presented no issue of fact to try and that the court’s order sustaining the defendant’s motion for summary judgment was correct.
This case is, therefore, affirmed.
Affirmed.
MOORE, C. J., and RAWLINGS, J. concur.
UHLENHOPP, MASON and Le-GRAND, JJ., concur specially.
REYNOLDSON and McCORMICK, JJ., dissent.
HARRIS, J., takes no part.