ALVINA ANN RAVEN AND JOHN RAVEN, HER HUSBAND, APPELLANTS,
v.
NANCIE BOUGHNER COATES AND DAVID OWEN COATES, AND THE CITY OF HIALEAH, A MUNICIPAL CORPORATION, APPELLEES
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Plaintiffs appealed a dismissal of their negligence claim against the City of Hialeah for injuries sustained in a traffic collision allegedly caused by the absence of a stop sign. The court affirmed the dismissal, holding that the municipal failure to place or maintain a traffic control device constitutes a discretionary governmental function for which municipalities retain immunity under Florida law.
A municipality is not liable for damages resulting from the failure to place or maintain a traffic control device at a particular intersection. Such placement decisions constitute discretionary governmental functions for which municipalities retain immunity. While Hargrove established municipal liability for negligent operational acts by employees, it did not extend to liability for policy-level decisions regarding traffic control device placement.
“The placing of a policeman or a traffic control device at a particular intersection is a matter of judgment by city officers.”
Establishes that traffic control device placement is a discretionary governmental function not covered by the Hargrove exception to municipal immunity.
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceAlvina Ann Raven was injured in an intersectional collision allegedly caused by the absence of a stop sign at the intersection in question. The plaint…
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The plaintiffs appeal from a final judgment dismissing their complaint against the City of Hialeah. They claimed damages for personal injuries to the wife resulting from an intersectional collision allegedly caused by the failure of the city to maintain a stop sign at the intersection. The judgment is affirmed.
The specific allegation of negligence contained in appellants’ complaint was:
“ * * * The City of Hialeah, acting through its duly authorized and constituted agents, servants and/or employees, by the exercise of ordinary care, knew or should have known, that a Stop.Sign on the Southeast corner of the said intersection had been taken down, fallen down, or had collapsed, therefore endangering the lives and property-of all motor vehicle operators on East Third Avenue, in the City of Hialeah, Florida at this particular intersection and at this particular time.”
In Holton v. City of Bartow, Fla.1953, 68 So.2d 385, and Avey v. City of West Palm Beach, 152 Fla. 717, 12 So.2d 881, it was held that a municipality was not liable for the torts growing out of the maintenance of a traffic control system because such was a purely governmental function. Subsequently, the Supreme Court of Florida in Hargrove v. Town of Cocoa Beach, Fla.1957, 96 So.2d 130, 60 A.L.R.2d 1193, receded from its prior decisions which held that municipal corporations were immune from liability for torts of police officers and held that when an individual suffers a direct, personal injury proximately caused by the negligence of a municipal employee while acting within the scope of his employment, the injured individual is entitled to redress for the wrong done. The reasoning employed was that since the modern city is in substantial measure a large business institution, to continue to endow it with immunity in all of the activities formerly designated as governmental, is unjust.
Pursuant to the holding of the Supreme Court in the Hargrove case, supra, this court has held that where it was alleged that a municipality was negligent in the manual operation of a traffic control signal by and through its servants, agents or employees and that the negligent act of the city employee was committed within the scope of his employment and that the negligent act was the proximate cause of the damage suffered, a cause of action would be stated. Hewitt v. Venable, Fla.App.1959, 109 So.2d 185.
In the instant case damages were sought from the municipality for the failure of one or more municipal employees to place or replace a traffic control device at a particular intersection. Such a theory of liability is not within the' scope of the holding of the Supreme' Court of Florida in Hargrove v. .Town of Cocoa Beach, supra.The placing of a policeman or a traffic con---*772trol device at a particular intersection is a matter of judgment by city officers. We are constrained to note as in Hewitt v. Venable, supra, that even if the plaintiffs’ theory of liability were otherwise sound, the causal relation between the lack of a stop sign and their damages is more than doubtful in view of the fact that a person using a street is required to exercise his faculties to discover and avoid all dangers.
Affirmed.
HORTON, C. J., and CARROLL, CHAS., J., concur.
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Cited By (11 total)
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Gordon v. City OF W. Palm Beach, 321 So. 2d 78 (Fla. 4th DCA 1975)…lights, etc., is a governmental function in the exercise of which the municipality is not liable. Avey v. City of West Palm Beach, 152 Fla. 717, 12 So. 2d 881 (1943); Holton v. City of Bartow, Fla.1953, 68 So. 2d 385; Raven v. Coates, Fla.App.1961, 125 So. 2d 770. For reasons of harmony, the foregoing cases must be distinguished from the sort of case which demonstrates the existence of that privity or direct relationship between a plaintiff and a city officer which precludes application of the governmental i…
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Modlin v. Wash. Ave. Food Ctr., Inc., 178 So. 2d 596 (Fla. 3d DCA 1965)…s not liable for damages claimed to have been caused by the city’s failure to place a policeman or a traffic control device at a particular intersection because such decisions are a matter of judgment by city officials. Raven v. Coats, Fla.App.1961, 125 So. 2d 770. The State of New York has legislatively waived its immunity for the torts of State officers and employees. This loss of immunity by the State has been held to extend to all its subdivisions. In considering the possibility of municipal liability fo…
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Aurora Hernandez v. City OF Miami, 305 So. 2d 277 (Fla. 3d DCA 1974)…gence. Wong v. City of Miami, Fla.1970, 237 So. 2d 132. The dispatching of a traffic patrolman to the subject intersection in the case sub ju-dice was simply a matter of judgment on the part of the defendant City. See: Raven v. Coates, Fla.App.1961, 125 So. 2d 770. Thus, it follows that the alleged duty owed by the defendant City to the plaintiff’s deceased husband was no different at the time of the alleged negligence than that owed to every other member of the public and therefore, at most the duty breache…
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Join FLexlaw to unlock all legal intelligenceAuthorities Cited
- Ervine Hargrove v. Town OF Cocoa Beach, 96 So. 2d 130 (Fla. 1957)
- Avey v. City OF W. Paim Beach, 152 Fla. 717 (Fla. 1943)
- Hewitt v. Venable, 109 So. 2d 185 (Fla. 3d DCA 1959)
- Holton v. City of Bartow, 68 So. 2d 385 (Fla. 1953)