Court Opinion

ID: 9852820
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-24 05:37:22.057237+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T09:22:35.101481
License: Public Domain

Benham, Justice,
concurring specially.
While I concur with the result reached by the majority opinion, I cannot agree with the reasoning by which that result was reached. The majority opinion purports to construe the statutory definition of “zoning decision” and concludes that the ordinance in question was not a “final legislative action.” However, there is no meaningful construction of the statute in the majority opinion. Instead, it recites several factors having no relation to the question of whether the moratorium was a “final legislative action,” and then invents a new category of legislation, “reasonable interim action,” which is “exempt” from the procedural requirements of the Zoning Procedures Law (ZPL). The ZPL contains no such exemption. The moratorium is either a zoning ordinance and is subject to the requirements of the ZPL, or it is not a zoning ordinance. Rather than develop new common law exceptions to the statute controlling zoning legislation, this Court should take a close look at the moratorium and at the subject of land use regulation and recognize that the moratorium at question is simply not zoning legislation and is not controlled by the ZPL for that reason.
The notice provisions of the ZPL are found in OCGA § 36-66-4 (a) and, by the terms of that section, come into play when a local government takes action resulting in a zoning decision. “ 'Zoning decision’ means final legislative action by a local government which results in: (A) The adoption of a zoning ordinance; . . .” OCGA § 36-66-3 (4). Therefore, if the moratorium at issue in this case is a zoning ordinance, the passage of the moratorium was a zoning decision and the notice provisions of the ZPL did apply; conversely, if the moratorium at issue in this case is not a zoning ordinance, then the passage of the moratorium was not a zoning decision and the notice provisions of the ZPL did not apply.
“ ‘Zoning ordinance’ means an ordinance or resolution of a local government establishing procedures and zones or districts within its respective territorial boundaries which regulate the uses and development standards of property within such zones or districts. . . .” (Emphasis supplied.) OCGA § 36-66-3 (5). The statutory definition having established as a requirement for zoning ordinances that they regulate uses and development of property by means of zones or districts, it follows that an ordinance or resolution which does not estab*133lish zones or districts or regulate land use with regard to those zones or districts is not a zoning ordinance. The resolution in question in the present case, a moratorium on the issuance of permits for a particular type of sign, does not distinguish between zones or districts within the City but applies to the territory of the City as a whole. Since the moratorium resolution does not regulate signs with regard to zones or districts, it is not a zoning ordinance within the meaning of the ZPL and the notice provisions of the ZPL were, therefore, inapplicable to its enactment.
The trial court’s contrary conclusion was based in part on its belief, expressed in its order, that all regulation of land use is zoning and, therefore, subject to the requirements of the ZPL. The trial court, like the dissent, takes too broad a view of zoning. In Pindar’s Georgia Real Estate Law, 5th ed. 1998, legislative forms of land use regulation are recognized as including building codes, sanitary ordinances, and zoning laws. Id. at § 3-2. Rather than including every form of land use regulation, zoning is only one method of achieving the goals of such regulation. “The very essence of zoning is the territorial division of land into use districts according to the character of the land and buildings, the suitability of land and buildings for particular uses, and uniformity of use.” 83 AmJur2d, § 2. Georgia statutory authority on zoning is in complete accord with that principle. As is clear from the ZPL, zoning is a type of land use regulation which involves dividing a governmental unit into zones or districts and applying different standards to such zones or districts. See OCGA § 36-66-3 (3). Since the moratorium at issue here did not create or distinguish between different zones or districts within the City, but applied uniformly to the whole City, it was not a zoning enactment.
The dissent’s suggestion that the ZPL’s definition of zoning is so inclusive as to include all land use regulation disregards the four references in that definition to zones and districts. Far from including all land use regulation, the definition plainly excludes from the concept of zoning any land use regulation which is not based on zones or districts. Also illogical is the suggestion in the dissent that the ZPL is the only possible source of due process in the field of land use regulation. Every legislative action must conform to certain standards, and every enactment is subject to attack in the courts on the basis of unconstitutionality. The section of the ZPL quoted by the dissent in support of its argument, OCGA § 36-66-2 (a), does not purport in and of itself to assure due process in all land use regulation contexts, but only when “local governments regulate the uses of property through the exercise of the zoning power.” Id. That is, the Zoning Procedures Law assures due process in zoning cases.
While a sign control ordinance is unquestionably a form of land use regulation, this Court has distinguished such ordinances from *134zoning ordinances.
Under its police power authority, a municipality can enact and enforce reasonable regulations governing the erection and maintenance of signs within its jurisdiction. [The] contention that [the sign control ordinance] is in fact a zoning ordinance, and that its enactment was procedurally defective, is without merit.
City of Doraville v. Turner Communications Corp., 236 Ga. 385, 387 (223 SE2d 798) (1976). Since this Court had plainly stated in City of Doraville, supra, that sign control ordinances are not zoning ordinances, the legislature’s failure to specifically include sign ordinances within the ambit of zoning indicates that it did not intend the limited definition of zoning ordinance to apply to such enactments.
Unfortunately, our own holdings on the subject have not been entirely uniform. The trial court here cited our decision in Outdoor West, Inc. of Georgia v. Coweta County, 270 Ga. 527 (512 SE2d 604) (1999), for the proposition that a case concerning the constitutionality of a sign ordinance is a zoning case. That citation was not inappropriate because we dismissed in that case a direct appeal from a judgment upholding a sign control ordinance against a constitutional attack, holding as follows: “As this is an appeal from a decision in a zoning case, appeal to this Court is by the application procedures of OCGA § 5-6-35.” Id. From that holding, it would be reasonable to conclude that the ordinance involved was a zoning ordinance. However, a review of the record in that case demonstrates that the ordinance involved was a general sign control ordinance which was applicable to the entire municipality, did not divide the municipality into zones or districts, and did not use zones or districts to regulate signs. The only reference to zoning in the sign control ordinance was a caution that the municipality’s zoning ordinance might be a source of additional restrictions. Thus, under the definitions set forth in the ZPL and this Court’s holding in City of Doraville, supra, the sign control ordinance was not a zoning ordinance. Accordingly, to the extent the decision in Outdoor West, Inc. of Georgia v. Coweta County, supra, can be read to hold that sign control ordinances are zoning ordinances, it should be overruled.
In summary, I conclude that since the moratorium at issue in this case did not involve the division of the City into zones or districts and did not regulate signs with regard to such a division, it was not a zoning ordinance within the meaning of that phrase in the ZPL. Consequently, the moratorium was not subject to the notice provisions of the ZPL and was not rendered void for failure to comply with those provisions. Rather than invent exemptions from the General Assem*135bly’s carefully crafted legislation regarding zoning, we should clarify the law of land use regulation by recognizing that zoning is only one of the tools available for that purpose, we should resolve the controversy in this case by holding that sign control ordinances such as the moratorium in question are not zoning ordinances because they do not involve zoning, and we should face our mistakes forthrightly and overrule Outdoor West, Inc. of Georgia v. Coweta County, supra. Because the majority opinion serves only to perpetuate error and obfuscate the law, I cannot join any part of it other than the judgment line.