Opinion
No. 27508.
December 3, 1928.
SCHOOLS AND SCHOOL DISTRICTS. County school board, after school building burns, may relocate site to better serve convenience and welfare of district; location of school building prior to issuance of bond for construction thereof did not prevent relocation of site after building burned.
Where a consolidated school building burns, the county school board may relocate the site of the school building, when it would better serve the convenience and welfare of the district; and this is true, although bonds were issued for the construction of the building that burned, and such location was made prior to such bond issue.
APPEAL from circuit court of De Soto county, HON. GREEK L. RICE, Judge.
Logan Barbee, for appellant.
The De Soto county school board, after having selected the location for the schoolhouse and buildings of the Lake Cormorant consolidated school district, and an election having been held to ascertain the will of the voters in the district whether bonds in the sum of twenty-five thousand dollars should be issued and sold, and the proceeds from the sale of bonds having been used in erecting school buildings upon the location selected, was without authority or power, after the school buildings were destroyed by fire within a few months after they had been erected, to select a new site for the schoolhouse and buildings, where there was objection on the part of any resident taxpayer, patron of the school and qualified elector in said district. See section 4512 of the Code of 1906; Trustees of Walton School et al. v. Board of Supervisors of Covington County, 115 Miss. 117, 75 So. 833.
We submit that the section just referred to has no application to a consolidated school district where it has become a taxing district. There can be a consolidation of rural schools without the district becoming a taxing district. Section 4512 of the Code of 1906, which had been the law for many years applies only to common rural school districts. It was the duty of the county school board to meet annually before August 1st to define the boundaries of the school districts of the county outside of the separate school districts, or to make alterations therein, and to designate the location of the schoolhouse in each district, if not already located. However, if the view is taken that section 4512 is applicable to the instant case, it cannot avail appellees anything for the reason that the location of the schoolhouse of the Lake Cormorant consolidated school district had been designated.
Section 4512, Code of 1906, read in connection with section 108, chapter 283, Laws of 1924, shows conclusively that section 4512 has no application to a consolidated school district which is a taxing district. Board of Supervisors of Marshall County v. Brown et al., 111 So. 831.
Counsel for appellees will probably call the attention of the court to Sellier v. Dedeaux et al., 99 So. 439, wherein it was held that under section 4512, Code of 1906, the county school board was vested with the power to locate school buildings and to arrange school districts, and that whenever it was necessary to change the location for the convenience and welfare of the patrons of the district, such board has the power to change said site. This case is not in point, however, in the instant case, because while the school involved in the Sellier-Dedeaux case, supra, was a consolidated school, the original record will disclose that it is silent as to whether the Delisle consolidated public school district was a taxing district or not. If a consolidated school district is not a taxing district but simply two or more rural districts joined together and consolidated, undoubtedly the county school board has the right under section 4512, Code of 1906, to locate and if necessary, to re-locate the schoolhouse of the district. But when the property owners are to be taxed, bonds are to be issued, taxes levied for maintenance, we submit that the county school board has not the wide discretion to change boundaries, locate and re-locate school buildings, etc., that it has in cases like the Delisle consolidated public school in the Sellier-Dedeaux case. Rodgers v. Independent School District of Colfax (Ia.), 69 N.W. 544.
Holmes Bowdre, for appellee.
Has the county school board authority to change the location of the schoolhouse of a consolidated school district after it has once been located by the school board, bonds issued, a schoolhouse built and occupied, and then destroyed by fire, when it is for the best interest, welfare and convenience of the district that the site be changed, said new location being made before other bonds are voted and issued to replace the destroyed building? Or must the new building be erected on the old site regardless of urgent reasons for having a new location?
Chapter 283 of the Laws of 1924, chapter 5, section 38, confers this authority on the school board of each county. This identical question was decided in Sellier v. Dedeaux et al., 134 Miss. 589, and is conclusive of the question involved in this case. See, also, Peets v. Martin, 135 Miss. 720.
Appellants undertake to minimize the decisive effect of the Sellier case, supra, by suggesting that the record is silent as to whether the consolidated district involved in that case had issued bonds. This is immaterial, the mere change in location of the site of a schoolhouse after it has been destroyed by fire does not harm anyone. The security for the bonds remain the same, and all qualified electors after a schoolhouse has once been located, vote for a bond issue, with knowledge and notice that if the building is later destroyed that the school board has authority to fix a new location for the new building.
The case of Rodgers v. Independence School District of Colfax, 69 N.W. 544, cited by appellants is not in point. In that case, it appears that the schoolhouse was located and bonds were issued to build a schoolhouse on a certain location, but that the school board, without any reason whatever, after the bonds had been voted, changed the location.
Argued orally by R.F.B. Logan, for appellant, and Paul Bowdre, for appellee.
This appeal involves the right of a county school board to relocate the site of the consolidated school district, after such site has been located and determined by an order of the county school board, and after an election has been held to determine whether bonds shall be issued and sold, and after bonds have been sold over the objection of the patrons of said consolidated school district and the taxpayers thereof.
Lake Cormorant consolidated school district of De Soto county was created by an order of the county school board on April 12, 1926. No question is raised on this appeal as to the validity of that order creating the district. Following the creation of the district, the board of supervisors entered an order declaring its intention of issuing bonds of the district and ordering an election therefor. No question is raised as to the validity of this order. The order of the county school board creating the district describes the territory composing the district and regulating the site. Thereafter the school building erected on said site was burned, and, the insurance being insufficient to construct a new school building, of suitable size and accommodation, the patrons of the said school petitioned for a relocation of the school building at another site, deemed more convenient and suitable to such petitioners, and also for an additional bond issue to provide the necessary funds for constructing the buildings. This petition for the relocation of the school site was resisted by certain patrons of the district, and a contest arose before the county school board in reference thereto.
The petition for the relocation of the school site recited that the school was located on Lake Cormorant Bayou; that there was danger of the children attending the school falling into the bayou and drowning; and that it was necessary for the children going to said school to cross a railroad track near said school, and that this, also, involved danger to the school children of said district. It was claimed that the new school site desired by the petitioners was more accessible and more convenient to the majority of the patrons of the school; that, being at the intersection of two leading highways of the county, it was more convenient to reach by transportation trucks, etc.; and that the site petitioned for would eliminate the objectionable features mentioned in the petition as to the original location. The county school board visited both sites and inspected them, and entered an order reciting that the new location was more convenient and would better serve the welfare of the district, and that it would eliminate certain dangers which they found to exist by reason of the bayou and railroad near the old school site, and passed an order relocating the school near the intersection of said highways, and from the said order this appeal is prosecuted.
In Sellier v. Dedeaux, 134 Miss. 589, 99 So. 439, we held that, where the school building in a consolidated school district burned and it was necessary to erect a new school building, the county school board had the power to relocate the school site to better serve the public interest, welfare, and convenience of the people of the district; that the power conferred upon the county school board with reference to locating schools and changing the boundaries thereof, and establishing school sites, contemplated an annual exercise of the judgment of the board acting for the public welfare and public interest. It is contended here that that case is not applicable to the present case, because the school bonds had been voted for the purpose of erecting the new school building, and had been used in building it; that the site of the school was located by the board at the time the bond issue was voted; that the building of the house at the designated point might have been the controlling influence in the voting of the bonds by the qualified voters of the district; and that this should be the governing distinction between this case and the case of Sellier v. Dedeaux, supra. See, also, Peets v. Martin, 135 Miss. 720, 101 So. 78.
We do not think the fact of the bond issue makes any difference in the power of the board to locate a school site. The law gives the board the power to define school districts and locate school sites within such districts, and, as stated in the Sellier case, it was contemplated that that power would be exercised at recurring periods. We must assume that, when bond issues are voted, the voters understand that the law confers power upon the school board to change the location of school buildings, and that such power cannot be controlled by bond issue votes, or by the patrons of the school, so as to restrict and seriously impair the existence of that power. We think the public welfare is best served by the legislative scheme of having the school board pass upon such questions whenever it is necessary to erect new school buildings. There might be such an abuse of discretion in abandoning good, suitable buildings, and erecting others, at the expense of the taxpayers, as would justify the courts in restraining arbitrary action; but we are not confronted with such a case now, and it is not necessary to decide that question until it shall arise in a proper case. The judgment of the court below will therefore be affirmed.
Affirmed.