Court Opinion

ID: 9523343
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 02:39:30.372808+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:04:56.576176
License: Public Domain

Concurring Opinion
Gonas, J.
Appellants herein are the owners of real estate in the immediate vicinity of certain real estate owned by St. Joseph County 4-H Fair, Inc., in St. Joseph County, Indiana.
On or about February 10, 1958, the St. Joseph County Plan Commission initiated a proposed amendment to Zoning Ordinance No. 5-A. This amendatory ordinance was adopted by the Plan Commission on March 10, 1958, and by the Board of Commissioners on March 17, 1958. The board is constituted by statute, a body politic in law, and as such, is invested with certain powers, and charged with the performance of certain public duties. These powers are to be exercised and the duties discharged in the mode prescribed by law. The legislature has authorized such boards to re-zone for the public use, property in a city or county.
On April 7, 1958, the appellants, petitioners below, filed a petition for writ of certiorari in the St. Joseph Circuit Court. The court issued an order to show cause why the writ should not issue; thereupon, appellees, respondents below, challenged the jurisdiction of the Circuit Court to review an act of the Plan Commission *76under the planning and zoning law of 1947 (Burns’ Ind. Stat. Anno. §§53-710 to 53-794). The St. Joseph Circuit Court ruled that it does not have jurisdiction and dismissed the action.
We recently held that there is no statutory authority for its review by certiorari and that the Circuit Court does not have jurisdiction of the subject matter of such an attempted review. Wright v. Marion County Plan Commission (1960), 130 Ind. App. 203, 163 N. E. 2d 259; McGraw et al. v. Marion County Plan Commission et al. (1961), 131 Ind. App. 686, 174 N. E. 2d 757.
I adhere to the holding of the Wright case, supra, and my concurring opinion in the McGraw case, supra.