Opinion
No. 20093
Opinion Filed March 25, 1930.
(Syllabus.)
1. Municipal Corporations — Municipally Owned Utilities — Rates and Disposition of Profits not Prescribed by Statute or Constitution.
Neither statute nor Constitution specifically prescribes rates to be charged by municipally owned utility; neither statute nor Constitution specifically prescribes purpose to which profits derived from municipally owned utility must be appropriated. (Const. art. 18, sec. 6; Comp. St. 1921, sec. 4507.)
2. Schools and School Districts — Property in District Annexed to Consolidated District not Subject to Taxation to Pay Existing Bonded Indebtedness of Latter.
Where a consolidated school district, whether it is classed as an independent school district or not, having an indebtedness evidenced by bonds, annexes an entire school district, the property comprising the school district annexed to the consolidated school district is not subject to an ad valorem tax levy for the purpose of paying the interest on or creating a sinking fund to retire the bonded indebtedness of the consolidated school district, existing at the time of the annexation.
Error from Court of Tax Review; T.G. Chambers, Hal Johnson, Harve L. Melton, Judges.
In the matter of the protest of the St. Louis-San Francisco Railway Company against certain tax levies for the fiscal year beginning July 1, 1928, and ending June 30, 1929, by the County Excise Board of Oklahoma County. Judgment for protestee, and protestant appeals. Affirmed in part and reversed in part.
E.T. Miller and Cruce Franklin, for protestant.
Geo. M. Callihan, Co. Atty., I.L. Harris, Asst. Co. Atty., and M.W. McKenzie, Municipal Counselor, for protestee.
This appeal is from judgment of the Court of Tax Review, created by Initiative Petition No. 100, adjudging to be valid two levies, one for the benefit of Oklahoma City for its sinking fund, the other for consolidated school district No. 4 of Oklahoma county, for its sinking fund, for the taxing year 1928.
Judgment was rendered by that court in favor of the respondent, and protestant appealed. The parties will be referred to as plaintiff and defendant.
This is a companion case to No. 19913, St. Louis-San Francisco Railway Co. v. Bonaparte, Co. Treas., 142 Okla. 177, 286 P. 343, and the issues involved here are identical with the first two issues involved in that case, except that there the tax levies were for the fiscal year commencing July 1, 1927, and here they are for the fiscal year commencing July 1, 1928.
The eleventh cause of action questioned the levy of Oklahoma City for its sinking fund on the theory that section 4507, C. O. S. 1921, requires an application of the excess in revenue derived by the city from the operation of its waterworks system in such a manner as to reduce the needs for sinking fund purposes for the retirement of the bonds issued for the construction and repair of the waterworks system.
The plaintiff, in its brief, states that this issue is directly involved in St. L.-S. F. Ry. Co. v. Andrews, 137 Okla. 222, 278 P. 617, Pitts v. Allen, 138 Okla. 295, 281 P. 126, and Perrine v. Bonaparte, 140 Okla. 165, 282 P. 332. Those cases have been decided adversely to the contention of the plaintiff in error since the filing of the briefs in this cause.
The Court of Tax Review rendered judgment on this contention in favor of the defendant, and, an the authority of those cases, that judgment is affirmed.
The ninth cause of action questioned the levy for the sinking fund of consolidated school district No. 4, Oklahoma county.
The Court of Tax Review rendered a judgment in favor of the defendant. That judgment is reversed, and the cause is remanded to the Court of Tax Review and that court is directed to cancel, vacate, set aside, and hold for naught the tax levy made for the purpose of paying interest and creating a sinking fund for the payment of the $20,000 bonded indebtedness of consolidated school district No. 4, in so far as it applies to that portion of consolidated school district No. 4, as it is now organized, that, comprised school district No. 34 prior to its annexation by consolidated school district No. 4.
MASON, C. J., and HUNT, CLARK, RILEY, CULLISON, and SWINDALL, JJ., concur. LESTER, V. C. J., and HEFNER, J., absent.
Note. — See "Municipal Corporations," 43 C. J. § 552, p. 421, n. 73.