Court Opinion

ID: 9788905
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 01:21:55.039524+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:37:17.366539
License: Public Domain

Marquardt, J.,
dissenting: I respectfully dissent from the majority holding.
Under K.S.A. 75-6104(m),
“[a] governmental entity or an employee acting within the scope of the employee’s employment shall not be liable for damages resulting from:
“(m) the plan or design for the construction of or an improvement to public property, either in its original construction or any improvement thereto, if the plan or design is approved in advance of the construction or improvement by the governing body of the governmental entity or some other body or employee exercising discretionary authority to give such approval and if the plan or design was prepared in conformity with the generally recognized and prevailing standards in existence at the time such plan or design was prepared.”
The majority correctly stated that we have an unlimited review when considering statutory construction. We recognize that liability is the general rule; however, under K.S.A. 75-6104, immunity is granted in specific instances. It appears that the instant case falls squarely under the exception articulated in K.S.A. 75-6104(m).
The majority concludes that allowing immunity under K.S.A. 75-6104(m) “could lead to incredulous results .... Take for example a school built to code and approved by the state architect in 1890 but still in use today whose front concrete steps are crumbling. The school takes no action to warn of the danger or to replace *234the steps. A student slips and falls and is severely injured.” Such an example is in no way analogous to the facts of the instant case.
According to the school district policy, the school principal, student nurse, and building custodian conduct inspections of the school building once or twice a year to look for potential health and safety hazards. If hazards are found, the school principal orders that the hazard be removed or corrected. The interior door at the high school that had plate glass in it, and a panic bar in the middle was never cited as a safety hazard. Crumbling front concrete steps would be an obvious hazard that would have been noted in such an inspection.
In order for a plaintiff to recover for negligence, notwithstanding the governmental immunity statute, the plaintiff must prove the existence of a duty owed to him or her, a breach of that duty, injury, and a causal connection between the duty breached and the injuiy suffered. Whether a duty exists is a question of law. Whether the duty was breached is a question of fact. Honeycutt v. City of Wichita, 251 Kan. 451, 463, 836 P.2d 1128 (1992).
There is no question that a school has a duty to provide a suitable environment conducive to the general health, safety, and welfare of each student. Even though a school has such a duty, it cannot be an insurer against all accidents. The real question is whether the school breached its duty by having plate glass in the door. At the time of the accident, Dunn was 18 years old and Ballou was 17 years old. They both were seniors and had attended the school for almost 4 years. The accident happened when Ballou and Dunn were moving swiftly down tire hall. Ballou extended both of his hands toward the panic bar in the middle of the door and missed it. His right hand broke the glass. Ballou suffered injuries to his face, nose, scalp, and chest. Dunn suffered injuries to his wrist. The panic bar opens the door and acts as a barrier against physical contact with the door.
Dunn and Ballou presented examples of two other incidents where students put their hands through the glass doors located in the gymnasium. In 1985, Dennis Fenoughty put his hand through the gymnasium glass door as he was leaving for a football game. He did not know if the door had plate or safety glass. In the 1982-*23583 school year, William John Groth put his hand through a gymnasium glass door while running after his girlfriend. Groth testified that the door had plate glass in it.
Here, the glass door that was broken conformed to the building standards when it was constructed. The door never malfunctioned, and there is no evidence that the glass door had been previously broken.
The majority states: “We do not believe the legislature intended to preclude claims for injuries caused in part by the plan or design or a building and in part by other independent tortious acts.” Without specific expression of legislative intent, it is impossible to determine what was intended; however, because the legislature granted immunity under K.S.A. 75-6104(m), it also did not intend to require that all buildings be retrofitted to meet current standards as those standards are updated.
U.S.D. No. 367 did not owe a duty to Dunn and Ballou to replace all of the glass in the doors of the building with safety glass.
I would reverse the trial court’s ruling.