Court Opinion

ID: 9729175
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 14:28:37.088945+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T13:20:54.033244
License: Public Domain

FRIEDMAN, Acting P. J.
I dissent from that portion of the majority opinion which denies the landowners’ claim for consequential damages described in Government Code section 7262. This court’s heavy workload militates against the luxury of a lengthy, citation-studded dissent. I do no more than sketch the bare bones of disagreement.
The decision of this appeal involves more that an isolated case of a retail establishment’s moving expenses. It involves the scope and application of the entire range of relocation expenses provided by the Government Code chapter entitled “Relocation Assistance.”
Article I, section 14, of the California Constitution declares that private property shall not be taken or damaged for use without just compensation to the owner. During most of the state’s history the Legislature indulged in little interpretation of the phrase “just compensation,” but left its interpretation to the judicial branch. The latter, by a process of inclusion and exclusion, established a body of case law defining the elements of just compensation. Generally, the California Supreme Court interpreted article I, section 14, to include loss of property values but not the landowner’s consequential damages. (See People v. Symons, 54 Cal.2d 855, 859-862 [9 Cal.Rptr. 363, 357 P.2d 451]; People v. Ricciardi, 23 Cal.2d 390, 401-402 [144 P.2d 799]; Bacich v. Board of Control, 23 Cal.2d 343, 349-356 [144 P.2d 818].) Consequential damages were denied even though as tangible and determinable as the property values congealed out of the airy opinions of real estate appraisers.
Over the years the Legislature supplied statutory authority for paying the condemnation caused relocation expenses of a few selected commercial enterprises. (See, e.g., Code Civ. Proc., §§ 1248a, 1248b.) In 1969 the Legislature adopted a new law authorizing “relocation assistance.” (Stats. 1969, ch. 1489.) The 1969 law confined relocation assistance to counties *433of 4,000,000 or more population, that is, Los Angeles County. (Gov. Code, § 7260.) The new enactment included Government Code section 7262, declaring that a government agency “may” pay family or business moving expenses. It also authorized other kinds of relocation costs for homeowners dispossessed by condemnation (Gov. Code, §§ 7263-7264) and for property owners damaged by contiguous projects (Gov. Code, §7265)-.
On April 6, 1970, the .present condemnation suit was filed. In that same year the Legislature amended the relocation law to eliminate the restriction to Los Angeles County. (Stats. 1970, ch. 983.) The 1970 amendment became effective November 23, 1970. The 1970 law did not amend Government Code section 7262, leaving intact its provision for permissive, that is, arbitrary, payment or withholding of moving expenses.
In May 1971 this case went to trial; the trial date became the “valuation date” for fixing the defendants’ compensation in damages. (Code Civ. Proc., § 1249.) Judgment was entered in July 1971 and notice of appeal was filed the following month. The 1971 Legislature amended Government Code sections 7262-7265 to substitute “shall” for “may” as the operative term for payment of the various kinds of consequential damage described in those sections. (Stats. 1971, ch. 1574.) The 1971 amendments became effective on March 4, 1972, while this case was pending on appeal. The 1971 amendments are not retroactive and have no application to this lawsuit. My concern here is with Government Code section 7262 in its pre-1971 form.
Were it so minded, the Legislature might by statute interpret article I, section 14, to embrace formerly excluded damages within the constitutional concept of “just compensation.” The decisions, on the other hand, have it that the allowance of relocation costs is extra-constitutional and wholly statutory. (See Klopping v. City of Whittier, 8 Cal.3d 39, 51 (fn. 4), 54 (fn. 7) [104 Cal.Rptr. 1, 500 P.2d 1345]; Town of Los Gatos v. Sund, 234 Cal.App.2d 24, 27-28 [44 Cal.Rptr. 181].) Whether the allowance is constitutional or statutory has little significance here. In my belief the Legislature has here violated two fundamental constitutional guarantees, both expressing the equality of all citizens before the law and both prohibiting discrimination under color of law.
Section 11 of article I of the California Constitution declares that all laws of a general nature shall have a uniform operation. Section 21 of the same article prohibits the Legislature from extending privileges and immunities to less than all citizens. In its 1970 version, Government Code *434section 7262 would grant relocation expenses to some condemnees and withhold them from others for no reason but the arbitrary choices of officialdom.1
Constitutional guarantees of equality and uniformity do not prevent statutory classifications reasonably related to a legitimate public purpose. (Hayes v. Superior Court, 6 Cal.3d 216, 223 [98 Cal.Rptr. 449, 490 P.2d 1137].) There is no intrinsic difference between a municipal utility district, for example, and a public parking district warranting diversity in the grant or denial of relocation expenses. There are no intrinsic differences among condemnees justifying discrimination by the litmus of the condemner’s benevolence or parsimony.
If, conceivably, fertile imagination can conjure up a rational basis for these discriminations, the Legislature has not troubled to describe it. Not a word, not an implication, in any of these statutes explains why the Legislature gave condemning agencies a blank check to discriminate among landowners. In all deference, I suggest that the majority opinion stretches judicial notice past the breaking point in finding stressful conditions in Los Angeles County meriting special financial benefits for landowners in that county. A court cannot create “constitutional facts” in that manner. (U. S. v. Carolene Products Co., 304 U.S. 144, 153-154 [82 L.Ed. 1234, 1242-1243, 58 S.Ct. 778]; 16 C.J.S., Constitutional Law, § 97, p. 356.) I prefer to take “judicial notice” that a condemnee in San Joaquin or Del Norte County is no less damaged by a highway condemnation than'a Los Angeles landowner; that a condemnee displaced by a public parking facility is no different from one displaced by a state highway.
As the majority opinion points out, the 1971 Legislature expressed its intention against retroactivity of the 1971 law’s mandatory provisions. We should be less concerned with the Legislature’s intent than that it obey the Constitution. The question is not one of retroactivity at all, for the 1971 amendment to Government Code section 7262 was prospective only. The problem, rather, revolves around the statute’s 1970 version, for that was the law in effect on the valuation date in this lawsuit.
*435Contrary to the majority, collision with constitutional demands for equality and uniformity does not necessarily nullify the 1970 law. In the light of the purposes and history of a statute, a reviewing court may correct a discriminatory classification by invalidating the invidious exemptions and thus extending statutory benefits to those whom the Legislature unconstitutionally excluded. (Hayes v. Superior Court, supra, 6 Cal.3d at p. 224, and cases cited.) The relocation statutes are part of the Government Code. Section 23 of that code is a declaration of severability, calling for the salvage of any section of that code when, in application to particular persons or circumstances, it is found to be invalid. Section 23 manifests the Legislature’s desire that the relocation provisions of the Government Code apply to the full extent permitted by the Constitution. (Franklin Life Ins. Co. v. State Board of Equalization, 63 Cal.2d 222, 228 [45 Cal.Rptr. 869, 404 P.2d 477].)
Moreover, the word “may’’ in Government Code section 7262 is not inevitably permissive. Every statute must be construed in the light of constitutional restrictions on the legislative power. (County of Los Angeles v. Riley, 6 Cal.2d 625, 628 [59 P.2d 139, 106 A.L.R. 903].) The word “may” is not always permissive. “ ‘The conclusion to be adduced from the authorities is, that where power is given to public officers, in the language of the act before us, or in equivalent language—whenever the public interest or individual rights call for its exercise—the language used, though permissive in form, is in fact peremptory. What they are empowered to do for a third person the law requires shall be done. The power is given, not for their benefit, but for his. It is placed with the depositary to meet the demands of right, and to prevent a failure of justice. It is given as a remedy to those entitled to invoke its aid, and who would otherwise be remediless.’ ” (Supervisors, Rock Island Co. v. United States, 71 U.S. (4 Wall.) 435, 447 [18 L.Ed. 419, 423], quoted in Hayes v. County of Los Angeles, 99 Cal. 74, 80 [33 P. 766]; see also, Uhl v. Badaracco, 199 Cal. 270, 282 [248 P. 917]; Hofacker v. Board of Supervisors, 264 Cal.App.2d 290, 292-293 [70 Cal.Rptr. 374].)
Construed to avoid unconstitutionality, the relocation expense provisions of the Government Code, as amended in 1970, must be applied as a governing rule of damages in condemnation trials characterized by a valuation date following the effective date of the 1970 amendments, November 23, 1970. The trial court therefore erred in denying defendants the opportunity to adduce evidence of their moving expenses.
A petition for a rehearing was denied June 4, 1973, and appellants’ petition for a hearing by the Supreme, Court was denied July 12, 1973. Mosk, J., was of the opinion that the petition should be granted.

Although not directly involved here, the 1969 law’s limitation to Los Angeles County is a particular affront to constitutional demands for the equality of all California citizens before the law. If there was a rational basis for restricting relocation assistance to Los Angeles condemnees, the Legislature did not trouble to explain it. The shifts in legislative power created by the “one man, one vote” principle tend to funnel public benefits into areas most heavily represented in the Legislature. Now, more than ever, the courts must be vigilant to enforce constitutional guarantees of equality for all citizens. Territorial discriminations may be just as invidious as class discriminations.