Farm landowners brought action against city seeking a declaratory judgment that the city was required to assume duties under statutes regulating partition fences on farming land, which required adjoining landowners to share costs and provided dispute resolution procedures under which a governmental entity resolves the dispute.
The Circuit Court entered judgment in favor of landowners. City appealed. The Court of Appeals affirmed. City petitioned for review.
The Supreme Court of Wisconsin held that a city is included in definition of “town” under statutory provisions setting out procedures for a town and town officials to quantify and allocate partition fence costs amongst adjoining property owners, and therefore city has authority to administer those procedures.