MOUNT VERNON – St. Clair County Circuit Judge Heinz Rudolf correctly dismissed a trust’s suit to pass part of its property tax to owners of a cell tower on its property, Fifth District appellate judges ruled on July 16.
Justice Judy Cates found no ambiguity in a lease that Sprint Spectrum and the Thomas G. Petroff and Jane Petroff Trust executed in 1996.
She found the trust’s interpretation would lead to an absurd result.
Justices Thomas Welch and Randy Moore concurred.
Sprint Spectrum placed a tower on property of the trust in Caseyville in 1996.
The fourth paragraph of the lease provided that Sprint Spectrum would pay rent including the trust’s reasonable costs for maintenance, insurance, and taxes.
It provided that Sprint Spectrum would reimburse the trust within 30 days after any increase in real estate taxes and insurance.
The eighth paragraph provided that Sprint Spectrum would reimburse the trust for any tax increase directly attributable to improvements it made.
Sprint Spectrum later assigned the lease to subsidiary STC Five, which granted a sublease to Global Signal Acquisitions.
In 2016, in St. Clair County circuit court, Petroff trustee Thomas Petroff demanded reimbursement from Crown Castle USA.
He claimed the lease’s fourth paragraph obligated Crown Castle USA to pay for all increases in real estate taxes regardless of the reason for the increase.
He later amended the complaint to add Sprint Spectrum, STC Five, and Global Signal Acquisitions as defendants.
According to Cates, the parties agreed that the trust had been paid for increases directly attributable to improvements of the defendants.
“Petroff was, however, seeking additional monetary amounts over and above those due to the placement of the cell tower,” she wrote.
Defendants moved to dismiss the complaint, arguing that the eighth paragraph required a connection between the increases and their improvements.
Rudolf granted the motion, and an appeal didn’t change the result.
Cates found the eighth paragraph’s specific limit on tax increases was entitled to more weight than general provisions of the fourth paragraph.
She wrote that by Petroff’s interpretation, “he could develop his entire parcel of land, separate and apart from the land used for the cell phone tower, and pass along the associated increases in real estate taxes to the defendants.”
“This example illustrates that such a result could not have been the intent of the parties and provides further support for the lack of ambiguity in the contract terms,” she wrote.
Plaintiff was represented by Thomas Maag of Wood River.
Defendant was represented by Ian Fisher of Chicago.