Court Opinion

ID: 9772858
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-29 17:31:41.414034+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T07:31:48.880368
License: Public Domain

Tom Glaze, Justice, dissenting. The majority opinion contradicts this court’s long-settled rule that attorneys’ fees are not charged as costs in litigation unless specifically permitted by statute. See Millsap v. Lane, 288 Ark. 439, 706 S.W.2d 378 (1986). Here, the majority uses “bootstrap logic” in holding that Arkansas’s Horizontal Property Act authorizes attorneys’ fees. In its opinion, the majority says that, although the Act does not mention attorneys’ fees, the Act does authorize the collection of “the expenses of administration and of maintenance and repair of the common elements,” and further binds co-owners to contribute toward “any other expense lawfully agreed upon.” The majority surmises from this language in the Act that since the parties, in their bylaws, agreed that the association’s annual and special assessments should include attorneys’ fees, the trial court was authorized by law to award appellee such fees in this litigation wherein it sued appellants for their share of common-area expenses. Clearly, the Act makes no mention whatsoever of attorneys’ fees, and for that reason alone, the majority should have ended its inquiry and held the trial court was wrong in awarding fees to the appellee. Instead, the majority took the private bylaws that controlled the parties’ horizontal property regime, and construed those bylaws as being part of the Act. In doing so, the majority concludes that attorneys’ fees are “other expense(s) lawfully agreed upon.” By this engrafting process, the majority claims the language of the Act “expressly” authorizes the award of attorneys’ fees. If this logic controls, I see nothing to prevent parties from entering private agreements under which they agree attorneys’ fees are “costs” or “expenses” and awardable as such. However, such a practice would appear contrary to the rule that the term “costs” or “expenses” as used in a statute is not understood ordinarily to include attorneys’ fees. See 20 Am. Jur. 2d Costs § 72 (1965). In view of the position now taken by the majority, I would expect written contracts, leases and similar documents to provide that attorneys’ fees be allowable as costs or expenses even though no statute specifically mentions attorneys’ fees, but does contain language that costs (or expenses) are recoverable. Another reason I part with the majority’s logic is that the terminology “other expense,” as employed in the Act, in no way indicates the General Assembly intended that term to include attorneys’ fees. As pointed out in the majority opinion, Ark. Code Ann. § 18-13-116(a) (1987) — where the “other expense” language appears — concerns itself with an owner’s obligation to share in the expenses of the administration, maintenance and repair of the general common elements. That provision makes no reference as to costs or expenses incurred in collecting such common-area expenses. The appellee, in the present case, brought suit against the appellants for their pro-rata unpaid share of expenses actually incurred in maintaining the common areas. The statutory language in issue here offers no suggestion that it was intended to include attorneys’ fees incurred in the event action is required to collect common-area expenses from a horizontal-property owner. If this court now adheres to the rule that parties, by agreement or bylaws, may authorize attorneys’ fees as costs or expenses, we should plainly adopt that view. If not, the court should continue to deny attorneys’ fees as costs or expenses unless a statute exists that expressly or specifically provides such fees are recoverable.