Court Opinion

ID: 9686217
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-24 15:33:53.601025+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:18:16.120217
License: Public Domain

ROBERTS, Presiding Judge
(dissenting in part).
I would reverse the judgment appealed from and remand the cause to The trial court with directions to dismiss the proceedings.
SDCL 13-6-34 contemplated initiation of proceedings to dissolve a school district and its combination with another district or districts by a sixty per cent vote cast at a special election. The proposal appearing on the ballot at the special election held in the Renberg Common School District on April 30, 1969, read as follows: “PROPOSITION TO BE VOTED *260UPON — To dissolve Renberg District #5 and to be attached to Brandon Independent District #150. Effective July 1, 1970.” The condition upon which the Renberg district sought dissolution was that it be attached by the county board of education to plaintiff district. Election statutes contemplate that when a special proposition is submitted to a vote, the recital on the ballot shall clearly state the substance of the proposition. 29 C.J.S. Elections §§ 170, 173 (2) g.
The statute undoubtedly conferred power upon a county board of education to dissolve a school district and to attach it to “another district and other districts” when authorized by a sixty per cent vote cast at a special election. The legislature prescribed the mode of procedure whereby the will of voters could be determined and defendant county board in the absence of proper and unconditional approval by the electorate could not dissolve Renberg school district and combine it with another district or districts.
In any event the remand of the proceedings to the defendant county board of education for further proceedings is, in my opinion, inconsistent with recently enacted statutes and the purpose of the legislature.
In the recent decision of this court in Vale Independent School District v. Smeenk, 85 S.D. 182, 179 N.W.2d 117, it is said:
“The legislature in the exercise of its plenary powers over the establishment and reorganization of school districts enacted a statute, Chap. 38, Laws 1967, creating the State Commission of Elementary and Secondary Education consisting of five members and provided comprehensive changes in requirements and limitations for reorganization. Chapter 38 was submitted at the general election in 1968 to a referendum vote and became effective when it was approved at such election by the electorate of the state.”
SDCL 13-6-4 was amended by Section 3, Chap. 38, supra, to read in part as follows:
*261“Requirements and limitations for reorganization. Reorganization of school districts by the electors, the county board of education, State Board of Education, or the State Commission on Elementary and Secondary Education must meet the following requirements:
(1) All territory or land area within the State of South Dakota shall on or before July 1, 1970, become a part of an independent school district offering an accredited school program and meeting the standards adopted by the State Board of Education, provided, however, that no superimposed high school district shall qualify except those in existence as of July 1, 1968.”
The legislature for the purpose of effectually and speedily carrying out the legislative purpose of including all land areas in the state within independent school districts and completing the unification of school districts enacted Chapter 94, Laws 1970 (SDCL Supp. 13-6-8.3). The provisions of this amendatory statute read in part as follows:
“If any land area within the state has not become a part of an approved independent school district in accordance with the provisions of 13-6-8 on or before January 1, 1969, or to be effective on July 1, 1970, or thereafter on the date designated by the state commission on elementary and secondary education or if any boundary changes or adjustments of land area are necessary, the state commission on elementary and secondary education shall provide for a hearing for the residents of any land area so involved and shall by resolution take one of the following courses of action: * * * (2) Combine, attach and make any boundary change or adjustment of land area as may be deemed necessary of a common or of an independent school district with another independent school district. * * *”
The legislature has prescribed a procedure applicable to the situation presented in this proceeding. Renberg school *262district is a “land area” that had not become a part of an approved independent school district before July 1, 1970. SDCL 13-6-37 merely applies to validation by the legislature of reorganization proceedings and this or other statutes contain no provision that can be construed to retroact and authorize the attachment of territory by a county board of education to an independent district on a date subsequent to July 1,1970, designated by such board.