Court Opinion

ID: 9589926
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-21 23:50:17.257881+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:07:22.822130
License: Public Domain

Beasley, Judge,
dissenting.
“A nuisance is anything that causes hurt, inconvenience, or damage to another, and the fact that the act done may otherwise be lawful shall not keep it from being a nuisance. The inconvenience complained of shall not be fanciful, or such as would affect only one of fastidious taste, but it shall be such as would affect an ordinary, reasonable man.” OCGA § 41-1-1. We have recognized that “[t]he classic definition of a private nuisance is such conduct as constitutes an unreasonable interference with the plaintiff’s interest in the use and enjoyment of his land.” Barrow v. Ga. &c. Aggregate Co., 103 Ga. App. 704, 711 (4) (120 SE2d 636) (1961), disapproved as to another proposition, OB-GYN Assoc. &c. v. Littleton, 259 Ga. 663, 667 (B) (386 SE2d 146) (1989). See also Prosser & Keeton, The Law of Torts, “Nuisance,” § 87, pp. 619, 622; Restatement of the Law, Torts 2d, § 82 ID.
*694In construing this Code provision, which is not intended to change the common-law definition of nuisance,2 the Supreme Court has held that in order to constitute a nuisance, “there must be the maintenance of a dangerous condition on a continuous or regular basis over a period of time in which no action or inadequate action is taken to correct the condition after knowledge thereof.” (Emphasis in original.) City of Bowman v. Gunnells, 243 Ga. 809, 810 (1) (256 SE2d 782) (1979). Although the Supreme Court in that case recognized that whether a complained-of condition constitutes a nuisance is ordinarily a question of fact, “under some factual situations it can be held as a matter of law that no nuisance exists.” Id. at 811. Gunnells was one of those situations, and Mrs. Hammond’s case is another. The superior court did not err in granting summary judgment to the municipality on her second restated amended complaint, as asserted on appeal.
The city landfill and the emanating methane gas which Mrs. Hammond alleges interfered with her right to use and enjoyment of her property were involved in the suit of her neighbor Holt. His house was adjacent to the landfill and there was evidence his property contained dangerous levels of methane gas from the landfill, rendering it uninhabitable or, if corrected, then unmarketable; the jury’s finding of a permanent nuisance was thus upheld. City of Warner Robins v. Holt, 220 Ga. App. 794 (470 SE2d 238) (1996). Mrs. Hammond’s house, located diagonally across the street from Holt’s, was not uninhabitable and actually was rented for the entire time in issue here, with somewhat escalating rent. Her case is not founded on “almost identical facts” as that of Mr. Holt, contrary to the majority’s analysis.
Mrs. Hammond encountered difficulty in refinancing the house in 1988. The lender refused because of the methane problems with the neighbors’ houses and the inability of the city engineer to guarantee that there would be no methane on Mrs. Hammond’s property for the life of the proposed loan, 15 years. No methane gas had been detected on her property at that time, and no methane gas has been detected despite various tests and periodic testing since that time, except for a small amount found once deep down by her expert in 1994. No subsequent test measured any. The amount found, 95 parts per million, is over 500 times below the lowest risk level of combustion, which is the only danger methane gas poses. The lowest level at which the gas will support combustion is approximately 50,000 parts per million. Except for its combustibility, methane gas poses no risk to health or safety and is not otherwise offensive, because it is *695odorless, colorless, and nontoxic, which Mrs. Hammond admits.
Moreover, “[a] single isolated occurrence or act, which if regularly repeated would constitute a nuisance, is not a nuisance until it is regularly repeated. [Cit.] . . . Assuming for the sake of argument that the evidence showed that this [single] occurrence was due to the negligence of the defendant in this case, it was wholly insufficient to authorize any finding that the defendant was creating or maintaining a nuisance so as to authorize the abatement thereof. . . .” Southeastern Liquid Fertilizer Co. v. Chapman, 103 Ga. App. 773, 775-776 (2) (120 SE2d 651) (1961). See Desprint Svcs. v. DeKalb County, 188 Ga. App. 218, 220 (2) (372 SE2d 488) (1988); compare DeKalb County v. Orwig, 261 Ga. 137, 138-139 (2) (402 SE2d 513) (1991).
The difficulties Mrs. Hammond experienced in refinancing her property, which she ultimately did refinance, despite the one instance of measured methane, were attributed not to the presence of the small amount on her property. That information was not conveyed to any lender and was obtained in June 1994, long after her 1988 initial efforts at refinancing. Nor was it conveyed to any renter or proposed renter, so the presence of a minuscule amount of methane gas many feet below the surface, detected once, did not affect marketability as either sale or rental property. Instead, the difficulties were founded on the perception that the property was worth less because of the methane problems of other nearby property owners and the lack of a guaranteed forecast.
The landfill itself cannot be a nuisance. It had been operated in years prior to 1977, when it was closed, and the residential subdivision in which Mrs. Hammond’s house is located was built thereafter.3 “[T]hose owning property in the vicinity of a public work, whose property values are depreciated thereby, are not entitled to compensation under the state constitutional provision that private property shall not be taken or damaged for public use without just compensation.” Evans v. Just Open Government, 242 Ga. 834, 837 (251 SE2d 546) (1979).4 In Evans, the plaintiffs alleged nuisance per se and nuisance per accidens. Id. at 836. But the Court relied on earlier authority in holding that the prisons at issue are a public necessity, are authorized by law, and thus are in no legal sense a nuisance. Id. at 839 (4). The same must be said of a public landfill. Moreover, the value of Mrs. Hammond’s property was established when the landfill was already in existence and closed. Of course, as recognized in Evans, the manner in which the facility is kept might become a nuisance.
Here, then, the question is whether the migration of methane *696gas onto others’ property, which Mrs. Hammond’s evidence tends to show affected the value of hers insofar as its refinancing and possibly its sale are concerned, can constitute a nuisance on her property right to enjoy her property. As held in Duffield v. DeKalb County, 242 Ga. 432, 433-434 (249 SE2d 235) (1978), where the property owners also claimed nuisance and inverse condemnation, “property” comprehends the thing possessed as well as the rights of the owner in relation to it; “the right of a person to possess, use, enjoy and dispose of it, and the corresponding right to exclude others from the use. [Cit.]” (Punctuation omitted.) There need not be a “physical invasion” damaging to the property; a nuisance may also be constituted of only “an unlawful interference with the right of the owner to enjoy his possession.” Id. at 434.
Here there was no health or safety nuisance connected to plaintiff’s property; there is only a claimed economic nuisance engendered by methane gas in such levels on other property such as Holt’s, and by the inability of defendant municipality to assure no future gas on Mrs. Hammond’s property. This cannot constitute an unlawful interference with Mrs. Hammond’s enjoyment of her property so as to constitute the maintenance of a nuisance by the municipality as to her. A problem on adjacent property, tending to devalue the plaintiff’s property, is not such inconvenience as to amount to a nuisance. Jillson v. Barton, 139 Ga. App. 767, 769 (1) (229 SE2d 476) (1976). Mere diminution in property value as a result of adjacent or nearby contamination, in and of itself, does not constitute an actionable nuisance because the creation of such losses is not a substantial and unreasonable interference by the municipality with the use and enjoyment of property. The contamination of the neighbors’ property did not spill over to constitute a nuisance on plaintiff’s property by way of the effect of the former on the market perception of the value of her property. It is damnum absque injuria, a loss without legal injury.
Other courts have referred to what Mrs. Hammond claims as injury as “stigma” and have refused compensation. See, e.g., In re Paoli R. Yard PCB Litigation, 811 FSupp. 1071, 1074 (E.D. Pa. 1992); Adkins v. Thomas Solvent Co., 487 NW2d 715 (Mich. 1992); City of Newport v. Emery, 559 SW2d 707 (Ark. 1977).
Anticipating a potential future nuisance is non-actionable because it requires a conclusion not based on existing facts. Kahn v. Standard Oil Co., 165 Ga. 575 (141 SE 643) (1928). “The whole idea of nuisance is that of either a continuous or regularly repetitious act or condition which causes the hurt, inconvenience or injury. To this end, it has long been recognized in Georgia that the mere apprehension of future injury from a nuisance which the complainant anticipates may be maintained in the future in the operation of a lawful *697business is not sufficient to authorize its abatement. If it be a nuisance, the consequences must be to a reasonable degree certain. [Cits.]” Chapman, supra at 775 (2).
Decided February 17, 1997
Decker & Hallman, F. Edwin Hallman, Jr., David C. Moss, Pamela M. Richards-Greenway, for appellant.
Jones, Cork & Miller, Hubert C. Lovein, Jr., Robert C. Norman, Jr., for appellee.
Kilpatrick & Cody, Edward A. Kazmarek, Troutman Sanders, John H. Johnson, Jr., Hollister A. Hill, Walter E. Sumner, Susan M. Pruett, James F. Grubiak, amici curiae.
Since plaintiff has no claim against the municipality for nuisance, even giving her the benefit of all evidence in her favor as must be done on summary judgment, she cannot recover on the theory of inverse condemnation either. Without the nuisance, there is no taking for which plaintiff would be entitled to compensation. See Prosser & Keeton, The Law of Torts, “Immunities,” p. 1054, § 131; Duffield, supra; Evans, supra. Diminution of value in and of itself does not constitute a constitutional deprivation of property rights so as to amount to a taking for which compensation is required. Gradous v. Bd. of Commrs. &c., 256 Ga. 469, 471 (349 SE2d 707) (1986). As a matter of law, no compensable taking of Mrs. Hammond’s property rights occurred. As to this being a question of law, see MARTA v. Fountain, 256 Ga. 732, 734 (352 SE2d 781) (1987).
The trial court’s grant of summary judgment to the City of Warner Robins should be affirmed.

 Hill v. McBurney Oil &c. Co., 112 Ga. 788, 793 (38 SE 42) (1901).

 “Coming to a nuisance” does not necessarily preclude recovery. See Prosser & Keeton, The Law of Torts, “Nuisance,” pp. 634-636.

 Present Constitution, Art. I, Sec. Ill, Par. I.