Court Opinion

ID: 9854659
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 06:11:10.50591+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:23:12.395304
License: Public Domain

NEELY, Justice
dissenting:
This is preeminently a case requiring the application of stare decisis. This case should be controlled by McCoy v. Sistersville, 120 W.Va. 471, 199 S.E. 260 (1938). In that case, we held the following: (1) the provision of the W.Va.Code (now Code, 8-13-13 [1971]) that allows cities to make separate charges for specific, enumerated services is constitutional; (2) cities may charge for fire protection under the authority of what is now Code, 8-13-13 [1971] on the basis of use; and (3) fees based on the value of improvements and personal property bear such a reasonable correlation to the actual use of fire protection that they *513are an appropriate basis on which to assess a user fee.1
Nothing has changed since McCoy was decided. Neither the statute nor the Constitution has been amended in any way relevant to this issue. Furthermore, the case of Hare v. City of Wheeling, 171 W.Va. 284, 298 S.E.2d 820 (1982) does not conflict with McCoy, supra, and does not mandate or even imply the result we have reached today. In Hare, as in McCoy, we held that a user fee based on a property value that bears no correlation to actual use is unconstitutional as an ad valorem tax. In McCoy, we struck the fee for street lighting tied to property values for exactly the same reason that we struck the fee for police protection tied to property values in Hare. In neither instance was there any correlation between the value of one’s property and the use of the service.
Fire protection is very different from street lighting or police service. Police services are largely directed to the protection of human life and the preservation of order. Fire service is directed to the protection of property. It follows, therefore, that while police service is often most needed in lower income areas where violence is prevalent, fire protection is most needed by those who have significant property interests to protect. Furthermore, the owners of improved property enjoy a direct cash benefit in the form of reduced fire insurance rates in a municipality with efficient fire protection.
The Fairmont ordinance is carefully drawn to reflect this reality. The fire protection assessment is not based simply on the total value of property; rather it is based on the value of buildings, other improvements and personal property. There is no correlation between the ownership of land per se and the need for fire protection; but there is an almost perfect correlation between ownership of buildings and personal property and the use of fire protection services.2 Of course, other variables effect the use of a fire department as well. Those who smoke in bed are more likely to be consumers of fire service; but it would require an intrusive government indeed to be able to base assessment of a user fee on evidence of such negligence. Government is the art of the possible, and the Fairmont ordinance does as much as is possible rationally to allocate fees for fire protection according to use.
Despite the rationality of the Fairmont ordinance, the majority now strike it down because they choose to label the assessment an ad valorem tax rather than a user fee. Since Fairmont property is already taxed to the constitutional limit set by W. Va. Const., art. 10 § 1, they argue that any additional assessment is unconstitutional. Brief examination shows this particular ruling to be seriously flawed.
The reason is simple. The majority opinion goes to considerable lengths to demonstrate that an assessment based on value is ad valorem. One need not be a Latin scholar to agree. Although Fairmont’s ordinance envisages an ad valorem system, it does not mandate a tax. “[A] tax is a pecuniary burden laid upon individuals, or, property, to support the government. ” In re Mytinger, 31 F.Supp. 977 (N.D.Texas, 1940). (Emphasis added). (How’s that for citing a little obscure, out-of-state precedent?) Any tax is money raised by the government for general governmental purposes regardless of whether the taxing statute “dedicates” the tax to a particular purpose. A fee differs from a tax not in its method of collection, but in the perfect correlation between use of government service and payment for the service.
Fairmont is not taxing property value. It is simply using property value as an *514accurate indirect measurement of the use of fire protection by members of that community. If individuals who paid the fire service fee could show that in fact some of the funds collected under that ordinance were used to support other public purposes —schools, police, street lights — then they could quite correctly argue the fee is an ad valorem tax in excess of the constitutional limit. Without such evidence, they are only arguing that fees charged for use are based on the value of what the fire department protects. Presumably, a private system of fire protection would also charge fees based on the value of what is protected. The only alternative would be to charge users a few thousand dollars every time they dial the local fire station. The absurdity of that approach serves to underline the rationality of the Fairmont ordinance.
No compelling public purpose is served by overruling McCoy, supra. In fact, this decision is certain to make a bad situation worse. Cities are being squeezed on all sides. At the same time that money from Washington is being cut, costs are rising and demands for services are increasing. The money to pay for municipal services will need to come from somewhere and the alternatives to the fire service fee are not overwhelmingly attractive. Is there a greater correlation between use of fire protection services and one’s taxable income (the income tax option) or the volume of total purchases (the sales tax option) than there is to one’s ownership of property? Is the current tax more regressive than alternatives? Do thousands of poor people own acres of valuable, improved municipal property while the rich escape the tax by living in hovels? The answers to all of these questions militate in favor of retaining the fire service fee.
It is amusing for a moment to contemplate some alternative means of assessing a user fee. If it is done on the basis of total square footage, then the owner of an entirely valueless but large warehouse pays more than the owner of a small jewelry store with a million dollar inventory. If the fee is assessed by frontage foot, then the owner of a long, low building pays more than the owner of a tall, skinny building. Furthermore, the raising of equal revenue by any other means of assessment siphons money away from the provision of services to costs related to the collection of the fee. Who measures square footage or front footage? If it is the taxpayer, who audits the results? Now all the administrative costs are borne by the assessor whose marginal costs for passing information to the city is negligible. And if the current user-based revenue source is replaced by an income tax, then we shall pay double the current fire protection fee: we shall still pay the City what we are paying now. Most of us, however, will also pay again as much in time and inconvenience when we fill out yet one more complicated form.
Most importantly, the structure of West Virginia taxation is predicated on the validity of the fire service fee. Municipalities are greatly limited in how they can tax.3 If this fire service fee option is removed, some alternative must be made available so that vital services can continue. Until our legislature convenes next January the cities will be left without their expected revenue, but must presumably continue to provide necessary services. That will be no mean feat and the majority opinion is notably silent on exactly how this legerdemain is to be accomplished.
Today’s surprising decision disturbs legitimate expectations. It tells local elected officials that the way they have been going about their business is not good enough; but it does not spell out the progressive reform that will lead to a better world for all of us. I am reminded in this regard of the chap who took the handlebars from the front of his bicycle and placed them over the rear wheel; he achieved change without effecting improvement. Perhaps such intellectual curiosity is to be welcomed in graduate students; but caution is a more *515necessary trait in the judiciary. Today’s decision is more notable for its sense of adventure than for its logic or consistency.

. We reaffirmed the constitutionality of the fire service fee in City of Charleston v. Board of Education, 158 W.Va. 141, 209 S.E.2d 55 (1974) in which we held that a "fee for service and protection is not a tax.” (Syllabus). That case is also noteworthy because it upheld charging the service fee to the Board of Education despite its tax exempt status.

. "Use” is a term of art here. I do not mean to imply that owners of valuable property have more fires. They "use" the existence of fire protection to obtain lower insurance premiums and to free assets which would otherwise have to be held in reserve to protect against the possibility of a destructive blaze. Because their original stake is larger, their use is greater.

. A municipality can levy taxes only by virtue of authority delegated to it by the legislature. Fairmont v. Bishop, 69 W.Va. 308, 69 S.E. 802 (1910). The limited powers of municipal corporations to tax are codified at the Code, 8-13-1 to 23 [1983].