## Facts

- Richard Forrest, Sr. and other landowners (“Intervenors”) sought to annex their property outside the City of Carlsbad (the “Forrest property”) into the City.
- The Forrest property did not touch the existing city limits, but New Mexico’s annexation-by-petition statute required the territory to be “contiguous” to the municipality.
- To create contiguity, Intervenors included in the annexation petition an additional irregular, roughly 23-acre tract owned by Jean Daugherty and other landowners (“Plaintiffs”), which connected the Forrest property to the city limits.
- The combined territory described in the petition totaled about 141 acres and adjoined the Carlsbad city limits along a shared boundary.
- The annexation statute required signatures from only a majority of the owners of the acres within the territory to be annexed; Intervenors’ signatures constituted that majority even when Plaintiffs’ acreage was included.
- The Carlsbad City Council approved the petition and adopted Ordinance 93-16 annexing the described territory.
- Plaintiffs opposed annexation of their tract and filed affidavits from other owners of the connecting tract stating the annexation of that tract served no purpose.
- Plaintiffs challenged the ordinance in district court. All parties moved for summary judgment.
- The district court found no disputed issues of material fact and treated the dispositive legal question as whether the territory annexed by the ordinance was contiguous to the City; relying on evidence including a surveyor’s affidavit describing a shared boundary of at least 930.30 feet, it granted summary judgment for the City.
- Plaintiffs appealed to the New Mexico Court of Appeals.

## Issues

1. Whether territory is “contiguous” under New Mexico’s annexation-by-petition statute when contiguity is achieved by including a narrow connecting tract owned by opponents of annexation.
2. Whether a court may set aside a petition-based annexation as improper or a “sham” based on the tract’s shape, alleged lack of purpose, or claimed lack of municipal benefit to the connecting-tract owners.
3. Whether the annexation violated constitutional protections (including due process and equal protection) because Plaintiffs’ land was included to create contiguity and Plaintiffs claimed they would receive no meaningful municipal benefit.

## Decision

- The New Mexico Court of Appeals affirmed the district court’s summary judgment for the City and upheld Ordinance 93-16.
- The court held the annexed territory was contiguous as a matter of law because it physically shared a common boundary with the city limits, and the statute did not impose shape, compactness, or “community of interest” requirements.
- The court held judicial review of annexation by petition is limited: courts determine whether the municipality acted within authority granted by the Legislature and whether the annexation is constitutional; courts do not weigh policy arguments about the wisdom or fairness of the annexation.
- The court rejected Plaintiffs’ effort to invalidate the annexation based on alleged lack of purpose or lack of benefit to Plaintiffs’ tract where the statutory requirements were met.
- The court rejected Plaintiffs’ constitutional challenges under the deferential standard applied to legislative annexation decisions.
- A dissenting judge would have applied closer scrutiny to the use of a connecting strip and expressed concern about annexations that operate as a pretext to reach otherwise noncontiguous land.

## Legal Principles

- Under New Mexico’s annexation-by-petition statute, “contiguous” is satisfied by physical adjacency (a shared boundary) between the annexed territory and the municipality.
- Courts generally presume annexation ordinances are valid and will not add extra statutory conditions such as compactness, regular shape, municipal “purpose,” or a showing of individualized benefit to affected owners.
- In annexation-by-petition cases, judicial review is narrow: it focuses on (a) compliance with the authority and requirements set by the Legislature and (b) constitutional validity; courts do not second-guess the legislative choice to annex based on policy objections.
- Allegations that a connecting tract was included solely to create contiguity do not defeat annexation when the objective statutory conditions—such as physical contiguity and petition-signature requirements—are satisfied.
- Constitutional challenges to legislative annexations are reviewed deferentially; absent a showing that the annexation exceeds delegated authority or violates constitutional limits, the ordinance stands.

## Conclusion

The Court of Appeals upheld Carlsbad’s petition-based annexation because the combined territory described in Ordinance 93-16 physically touched the City along a shared boundary and otherwise met the annexation-by-petition statute’s requirements; the court declined to invalidate the ordinance based on the corridor-like configuration, asserted lack of purpose, or claimed lack of benefit to Plaintiffs, and it found no constitutional violation within the limited scope of judicial review.


Daugherty v. City of Carlsbad, 905 P.2d 1120 (1995)