Shaw & Hodgins v. Waldron

Citations

• 55 Wash. 271
• 104 P. 272
• 1909 Wash. LEXIS 746

Syllabus

<p>Municipal Corporations — Local Improvements — Reassessments —Limitation oe Actions. An action by a holder of a warrant against - a special improvement fund to compel a reassessment cannot be maintained when the landowner could plead the statute of limitations against the reassessment.</p> <p>Same — Presumptions. Where the record does not show the exact date when an assessment became delinquent, it will be presumed that an action to compel a reassessment was commenced within the period limited by the statute of limitations, when the defense of the statute was not interposed and a reassessment was ordered.</p> <p>Same- — 'Suspension oe Statute — Judgments—'Res Judicata— Partees Bound. An action begun by a holder of a warrant against a special fund to compel a reassessment, he having no. other remedy, in which the city defends for the benefit of the landowners, arrests the running of the statute of limitations against the right to levy a reassessment, and is equivalent in law to a valid assessment, and is binding on the landowners.</p> <p>Municipal Corporations — Contracts — Officer Interested — Effect — Special Assessments — Defenses. The purchase of supplies by a contractor for city work, from the mayor, only avoids his contract with the city pro tanto, under Bal. Code, § 968, providing that any claim for supplies furnished, “in which any such officer is interested,” shall be void and that the officer shall forfeit his office; and does not bar an action by the contractor as holder of a warrant against a special fund to compel a reassessment to provide the fund.</p> <p>Fullerton, J., dissents.</p>