Court Opinion

ID: 9560168
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 17:44:33.875524+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:12:14.495699
License: Public Domain

Justice LOHR
specially concurring:
I join in parts I and IIB of the majority opinion and therefore join in the judgment of the court. I write separately to emphasize that section 13-80-127 is not a statute of limitations applicable to all activities of contractors, builders and others in connection with the construction of improvements to real property. Although I do not read the majority opinion to disagree with this conclusion, some uncertainty is introduced by the repeated description of the scope of “coverage” of section 13-80-127 as “comprehensive” in section IIA of the opinion. See maj. op. at 982, 983.
An action against a contractor who constructs any improvement to real property must be brought within two years after the claim for relief arises. § 13-80-127(l)(a), 6 C.R.S. (1984 Supp.).1 A claim for relief arises when “the damaged party discovers or in the exercise of reasonable diligence should have discovered the defect in the improvement which ultimately causes the injury, when such defect is of a substantial or significant nature.” § 13-80-127(l)(b). This statute of limitations applies to all types of actions for the recovery of damages for “[a]ny deficiency in the design, planning, supervision, inspection, construction, or observation of construction of any improvement to real property” or “[ijnjury to or wrongful death of a person caused by any such deficiency.” § 13-80-127(l)(c)(I) and (III). The statutory language plainly contemplates a connection between the injury for which damages are sought and a defect in the improvement being constructed. Cf. Stanske v. Wazee Elec. Co., 722 P.2d 402, 406 (Colo.1986) (“The plain terms of [section 13-80-127] require that the challenged building activity relate to an ‘improvement to real property.’ ”).
The necessity for such a connection provided the basis for decision in Irwin v. *985Elam Construction, Inc., 793 P.2d 609 (Colo.App.1990). In that case, homeowners brought an action beyond the limitations period of section 13-80-127 to recover damages for structural problems allegedly caused to their home by activities of a contractor engaged in improving and widening a road on other property. The homeowners alleged that the structural problems resulted from vibrations negligently created by the contractor’s heavy equipment traveling on a road adjacent to their home. The trial court granted summary judgment for the contractor based on section 13-80-127. The court of appeals reversed, stating that section 13-80-127
was intended to apply only to negligence in planning, design, construction, supervision, or inspection that results in a defect in an improvement to real property that, in turn, causes injury to a claimant. It was intended to limit actions against building professionals only for claims of injury arising from defects in the improvement they create, rather than to supplant the applicability of the general limitation statute for all injuries caused by their negligent conduct.
Id. at 611.
I believe that Irwin was correctly decided and that a “defect in the improvement” causing the injury and resulting from a “deficiency in the design, planning, supervision, inspection, construction, or observation of construction” of the improvement is essential to trigger the running of the limitations period of section 13-80-127. In Irwin there was no allegation that the injury to the home resulted from a defect in the improvement that was the subject of the construction project. In the present case, in contrast, a sprinkler system that was being constructed improperly sprayed water on a sidewalk in freezing weather. As the majority holds, “the trial court could properly find that the complaint in fact relied on an implicit allegation that the sprinkler system was defective_” Maj. op. at-. As a result, section 13-80-127 was correctly held by the trial court to bar the plaintiffs claim for slipping and falling on the icy sidewalk.
As Irwin and the present case illustrate, the application of section 13-80-127 necessarily is very fact specific. It cannot be doubted, however, that there is a range of activities by contractors and others engaged in pursuits leading to the construction of an improvement to real property that, while susceptible of causing injury to persons or property if negligently conducted, do not stem from a “defect in the improvement” within the meaning of section 13-80-127. I think it misleading, therefore, to describe and emphasize the scope of the statutory protections as comprehensive.
I concur in the judgment of the court.
KIRSHBAUM, J., joins in this special concurrence.

. As the majority notes, § 13-80-127 was repealed and reenacted in 1986 and is now codified at § 13-80-104, 6A C.R.S. (1987). See maj. op. at 980 n. 1. The revisions effected by this new legislation are not before us in this case.