Court Opinion

ID: 9545320
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 17:10:15.29175+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T15:14:33.061778
License: Public Domain

BAKES, Justice,
concurring:
I concur in the opinion of the majority, but wish to add some comments to address statements found in the dissenting opinion of the Chief Justice. The import of the Chief Justice’s dissent is that the Court should look no farther than the terms of the zoning ordinance or the variance which was granted to determine Gordon Paving Company’s right to the continued operation of the asphalt plant. I emphatically disagree with that premise.
The right to continue a non-conforming use in existence at the time of enactment of a zoning ordinance does not depend upon the permission to continue such uses which zoning ordinances usually contain, but is instead a constitutionally protected right. Cole-Collister Fire Protection Dist. v. City of Boise, 93 Idaho 558, 561, 468 P.2d 290 (1970); O’Connor v. City of Moscow, 69 Idaho 37, 41, 202 P.2d 401 (1949). As this Court said in O’Connor:
“Zoning ordinances generally look to the future and while preventing the establishment of lawful businesses, yet avoid violations of the due process clauses of the State and Federal Constitutions by permitting existing non-dangerous businesses to remain. (Citations omitted).
“An ordinance which prohibits the continuation of existing lawful businesses within a zoned area is unconstitutional as taking property without due process of law and being an unreasonable exercise of the police power.” 69 Idaho at 41, 202 P.2d at 403.
The Moscow ordinance being considered in O’Connor effectively prohibited the continuation of a non-conforming use following the sale of the property and the business upon the property. This Court found that provision to be an unconstitutional taking of private property:
*733“The effect of the provision of the ordinance here complained of is to deprive respondents of their property by preventing the sale of their business and restricting their leasing of the real property for use in connection therewith.
“. . . The provision in question declaring a change in ownership to be a new business is an arbitrary and unreasonable exercise of the police power and violates the constitutional protection given by the due process clauses. . “Since lawful existing uses, although non-conforming, cannot be constitutionally eradicated because by so doing, the due process clauses are violated, it naturally follows in one logical step that the prevention of the sale of an existing business by such an ordinance has the same result, particularly since zoning ordinances are designed to deal with the use to which property may be put. . . . There is no reasonable relation between a provision in an ordinance which, as here, makes a change in ownership a new business, and the objects to be accomplished by the ordinance, when existing non-conforming uses of property are necessarily permitted to continue.” 69 Idaho at 43, 202 P.2d at 404.
O’Connor makes it clear that the Idaho Constitution protects the continued existence of non-conforming uses. This Court has continued to recognize the validity of O’Connor. In Cole-Collister, supra, it said:
“The continuation of non-conforming uses is permitted because not to allow them to continue would be a violation of the due process clauses, cf., O’Connor v. City of Moscow, 69 Idaho 37, 202 P.2d 401, 9 A.L.R.2d 1031 (1949).” 93 Idaho at 561, n. 3, 468 P.2d at 293.
Based upon the decisions of this Court in O’Connor and Cole-Collister, Gordon Paving had a right to continue the use of its property as an asphalt plant, at least during the reasonable life of the property, and any attempt in the ordinance to sooner eliminate that use would have been a violation of due process of law under Art. 1, § 13, of the Idaho Constitution, and the taking of private property for public use without just compensation in violation of Art. 1, § 14, of the Idaho Constitution. Gordon Paving needed no variance to continue its use of the property, and the fact that it mistakenly thought otherwise and made application for such a variance could in no way deprive it of the rights which inured to it as a result of ownership of the real property. Although I join in the opinion of the majority and believe the grounds discussed in that opinion to be sufficient to dispose of the case, I further believe that these constitutional grounds should also be mentioned to rebut the argument of the Chief Justice.