City of Chehalis v. Robinson

Citations

• 87 Wash. 690
• 152 P. 696
• 1915 Wash. LEXIS 976

Syllabus

<p>Judgment—Res Judicata—Matters Concluded. The question of the amount due from a city to a contractor on a street improvement is not an issue in an action by the city against part of the property owners to foreclose an assessment, which was contested by the nonpaying owners on the ground that the contract was let for two and one-half times the estimated cost, where the foreclosure judgment simply limited the assessment against such owners to their pro rata share of the estimated cost.</p> <p>Municipal Corporations—Improvements — Assessments—Excess Payments—Rights of Contractor. A contract for an improvement, let in excess of the estimated cost, is valid, as between the city and the contractor, and the latter is entitled to a fund derived from paid-up assessments collected by the city in excess of the estimated costs to which the assessments should have been limited if objection had been made.</p> <p>Judgment—Res Judicata—Matters Concluded. The question of the amount due from a city to a contractor on a street improvement, by reason of collections made by the city in excess of the estimated costs, is not in issue or concluded in an action by the contractor in mandamus to compel the city to levy a reassessment to cover the deficiency in the fund by reason of the inability of the city to make all the collections assessed in excess of the estimates, where the mandamus proceeding was merely dismissed because of the want of power by the city to make any such reassessment.</p> <p>Municipal Corporations—Improvements—Reassessments—Limitations-—Statutes—What Law Governs. 3 Rem. & Bal. Code, §§ 7892-42 and 7892-43, authorizing reassessments or supplemental assessments to the amount of the benefits received, means the benefits as defined by the law existing at the time the improvement was made; hence a city of the third class, whose power to levy the original assessment was limited to the amount of the estimated cost, cannot make a reassessment in excess of such estimate.</p>