Court Opinion

ID: 9539766
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-07 16:09:49.254508+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T14:59:19.093855
License: Public Domain

CROCKETT, Justice
(concurring — dissenting in part).
I concur in the result arrived at by the main opinion. However, I desire to make this observation by way of reservation from full concurrence with it: I do not think the statute referred to necessarily means that a canal owner’s right to contribution must rest solely “upon the use or ownership of the water and not upon the proportion of the canal used.”
If given such an interpretation it requires little imagination to postulate circumstances where gross inequities would exist. For example, assume A has a canal SO miles long; B desires to develop water from a swampy area lying near the canal, but it must be transported a mite to arable land. Consistent with the policy of encouraging the development and use of water in the most economical manner, he should not be required to use land for a separate parallel canal; nor to dig one; nor to waste the water which conveyance in a separate canal would entail. For that reason Section 73-1-7, U.C.A.1953 entitles B to convey in the existing canal by making payment for doing so. Assume that his water bears any given ratio to the water already in the canal, such as one-fourth, one-third or one-half; it would shock one’s sense of reason and justice to say that B must share that proportion of the expense of maintaining the canal over its entire 50-mile length. It is obvious that such an interpretation of the statute could be extremely unfair and unrealistic and may be *161prohibitive of the development and use of water. I do not believe the legislature intended any such incongruity. Such a result should be avoided and when there is uncertainty as to how a statute should be interpreted, it is proper to resolve any doubt in favor of serving the acknowledged underlying purpose of our water law: that of providing the most feasible and economical means to develop and conserve our water resources.
It does no violence to the language of Sec. 73-1-9, U.C.A.1953, referred to in the main opinion, that when persons jointly use a canal: “each * * * shall be liable to the other for the reasonable expenses of maintaining, * * * the same, in proportion to the share in the use or ownership of the water * * to say that the sharing should be in proportion to the total water in the entire length of the canal. That is, in the example given above, if B has one-half of the water in the canal for only one mile and A has all of the water for 49 miles, plus one-half for one mile, the sharing in the expense would not be 50-50 based on the one mile segment. But it should be proportional to the water each owns in the canal along its entire length. Then they would be responsible in the ratio of 49j/£ miles for A and t/2 mile for B. If the statute is so interpreted and applied, it provides a basis for a fair, equitable and practical result consonant with the purpose of encouraging the development, transportation and use of water.
Further support of that interpretation is found in considering a closely related statute: the next section but one before the statute under discussion, Sec. 73-1-7, which contains the provision authorizing this very joint use of the canal, states that where canals or ditches exist, another may have the right of way to convey water therein by “paying an equitable proportion of the maintenance of the canal or ditch jointly used. * * * ” (emphasis added) It seems to the writer that this section makes it even clearer that the charge cannot properly be based upon the proportion of water owned and transported in a particular segment of the canal. It is much more logical and realistic to conclude that the charge, which the sections of the statute above referred to say must be “reasonable” and “equitable,” should be arrived at by giving some consideration to all pertinent circumstances: not only to the portion of water transported at any given point, but to the distance each person’s share must be transported, and perhaps to other factors from which the added water may cause greater expense in the maintenance of the canal, such as the nature of the terrain over which it passes, the original size of the canal and the amount of the enlargement required. And taking into consideration all of such matters, unless the charge made is such that it is clearly *162“unreasonable” or “inequitable” this court would not disturb it.
It is my opinion that this case can and should be decided upon the ground that the charge made to the defendant cannot be classified as “inequitable” or “unreasonable.” And for that reason the judgment should be affirmed except for the items indicated in the main opinion. But I do not think it proper to announce the law that the sharing in the canal expense should be solely on the basis of the proportion of the water used regardless of the distance it is transported.