Court Opinion

ID: 9514628
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-06 22:50:49.522322+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:06:19.549776
License: Public Domain

SABERS, Justice
(dissenting).
[¶ 46.] I dissent.
[¶ 47.] Under the Sanborn County Zoning and Subdivision Regulations, a special use permit is required for commercial feedlots. However, the County’s definition of commercial feedlot is quite broad and somewhat vague. It defines a commercial feedlot as:
[A] confinement of food or fur-bearing animals, for commercial purposes, in building lots, pens, pools, or ponds which normally are not used for raising crops or grazing animals.
[¶ 48.] Unlike other ordinances defining commercial feedlots, this ordinance does not state how many animals must be involved before an operation is considered a commercial feedlot. Therefore, the definition can reasonably be construed to apply to almost every farming operation involving the raising of animals for commercial purposes located in Sanborn County. However, the trial court heard testimony from several County Commissioners that Coyote Flats was the only operation required to obtain a special use permit.20
[¶ 49.] The trial court found that “the testimony at the hearing was clear in showing that no other farming operation within the county possessed a required special use permit. This included not only family owned farms, but several larger operations.” In addition, there was no intention to require other existing operations to obtain a permit, unless “there was a problem” with one of them.
Action is arbitrary and capricious if it is based on personal, selfish, or fraudulent motives, or on false information, and is characterized by a lack of relevant and competent evidence to support the action taken.
Tri County Landfill Ass’n, Inc. v. Brule County, 535 N.W.2d 760, 764 (S.D.1995) (citing Hendriks v. Anderson, 522 N.W.2d 499 (S.D.1994); Iversen v. Wall Bd. of Educ., 522 N.W.2d 188 (S.D.1994); Riter v. Woonsocket Sch. Dist., # 55-4, 504 N.W.2d 572 (S.D.1993)). The Sanborn County Zoning and Subdivision Regulations provides:
The regulations set by this ordinance within each district shall be minimum regulations and shall apply uniformly to each class or kind of structure or land, and particularly, except as hereinafter provided!)]
(Emphasis added). Here, the ordinance has not been uniformly applied. The trial court concluded that the Commission’s denial of the special use permit was arbitrary and capricious because of the broad definition of commercial feedlot and the fact that no other operation has been required to obtain a special use permit. I agree and we should affirm the trial court.
[¶ 50.] Therefore, I dissent.
[¶ 51.] AMUNDSON, Justice, joins this dissent.

. This ordinance has been in place since the 1970's.