{
  "id": 12168438,
  "name": "WHITECO METROCOM, INC. v. WILLIAM R. ROBERSON, JR., AS SECRETARY OF TRANSPORTATION OF THE STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA",
  "name_abbreviation": "Whiteco Metrocom, Inc. v. Roberson",
  "decision_date": "1987-02-03",
  "docket_number": "No. 8610SC458",
  "first_page": "305",
  "last_page": "307",
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    "name_abbreviation": "N.C. Ct. App.",
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    "name": "North Carolina Court of Appeals"
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      "category": "reporters:state_regional",
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        8561087
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      "category": "reporters:state_regional",
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      "year": 1978,
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    {
      "cite": "35 N.C. App. 226",
      "category": "reporters:state",
      "reporter": "N.C. App.",
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        8548242
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      "year": 1978,
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  "analysis": {
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  "last_updated": "2023-07-14T23:00:23.119892+00:00",
  "provenance": {
    "date_added": "2019-08-29",
    "source": "Harvard",
    "batch": "2018"
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  "casebody": {
    "judges": [
      "Judges Parker and COZORT concur."
    ],
    "parties": [
      "WHITECO METROCOM, INC. v. WILLIAM R. ROBERSON, JR., AS SECRETARY OF TRANSPORTATION OF THE STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA"
    ],
    "opinions": [
      {
        "text": "PHILLIPS, Judge.\nAppellant, who is engaged in the business of erecting and maintaining outdoor advertising signs, obtained a permit from the North Carolina Department of Transportation to erect and maintain an outdoor advertising sign near Interstate Highway 85 in this state. The permit was issued under the Outdoor Advertising Control Act, G.S. 136-126, et seq., which was enacted to protect the public by controlling outdoor advertising near interstate and other primary highways. Bracey Advertising Co. v. North Carolina Department of Transportation, 35 N.C. App. 226, 241 S.E. 2d 146, disc. rev. denied, 295 N.C. 89, 244 S.E. 2d 257 (1978). In addition to the Act the permit was also issued subject to the various regulations or ordinances that the Department of Transportation has promulgated thereunder. G.S. 136-130. One such regulation or ordinance so promulgated, Title 19A, N. C. Administrative Code, Sec. 02E.0210, requires the Department\u2019s district engineer to revoke a sign permit for any one of thirteen reasons, one of which is the \u201cunlawful violation of the control of access on interstate, freeway, and other controlled access facilities.\u201d So when two persons servicing petitioner\u2019s sign were seen to cross the controlled access for 1-85 in apparent violation of the ordinance the Department\u2019s district engineer revoked petitioner\u2019s permit. The revocation was appealed to the respondent Secretary, who affirmed it. This final agency decision, judicially reviewed in a hearing de novo pursuant to G.S. 136-134.1, was also affirmed as a matter of law.\nThe question presented by petitioner\u2019s appeal is quite narrow. The evidence pertinent to the revocation is not disputed here and was not disputed in any of the proceedings below. The dispute is, and has been, limited to the legal effect of the evidence, which indicates that: A controlled access area of 1-85 was crossed by persons servicing petitioner\u2019s sign; and the persons that did the crossing were not employees of the petitioner but were unsupervised, uncontrolled, independent sign maintenance subcontractors that petitioner engaged as and when its signs needed servicing. Petitioner concedes that the crossing of the designated controlled access area on the occasion involved would have violated the foregoing regulation and justified the revocation of its permit if the persons doing the crossing had been its employees; but it contends that its permit cannot be revoked since the delinquencies were those of an independent contractor. The fallaciousness of this contention is obvious and we reject it. This is not a negligence case where the one who engaged an independent contractor had no duty to either the injured person or the public. In this case, by obtaining the statutorily authorized permit, petitioner accepted the duty to follow the law in its exercise; and petitioner did not rid itself of this duty by hiring an independent substitute to act for it; for a duty imposed by statute cannot be delegated. Davis v. Summerfield, 133 N.C. 325, 45 S.E. 654 (1903).\nAffirmed.\nJudges Parker and COZORT concur.",
        "type": "majority",
        "author": "PHILLIPS, Judge."
      }
    ],
    "attorneys": [
      "Bailey, Dixon, Wooten, McDonald, Fountain & Walker, by Kenneth Wooten and Carolin Bakewell, for petitioner appellant.",
      "Attorney General Thornburg, by Assistant Attorney General Thomas H. Davis, Jr., for respondent appellee."
    ],
    "corrections": "",
    "head_matter": "WHITECO METROCOM, INC. v. WILLIAM R. ROBERSON, JR., AS SECRETARY OF TRANSPORTATION OF THE STATE OF NORTH CAROLINA\nNo. 8610SC458\n(Filed 3 February 1987)\nHighways and Cartways \u00a7 2.1\u2014 outdoor advertising sign\u2014violation of controlled access \u2014 employees of independent contractor\u2014revocation of permit\nA permit to erect and maintain an outdoor advertising sign near an interstate highway was properly revoked on the ground that two persons servicing the sign crossed the controlled access for the highway in violation of an administrative regulation promulgated under the Outdoor Advertising Control Act, notwithstanding such persons were not employees of the permittee but were employees of an independent contractor hired by the permittee to maintain the sign.\nAPPEAL by petitioner from Read, Judge. Order entered 10 December 1985 in Superior Court, WAKE County. Heard in the Court of Appeals 25 September 1986.\nBailey, Dixon, Wooten, McDonald, Fountain & Walker, by Kenneth Wooten and Carolin Bakewell, for petitioner appellant.\nAttorney General Thornburg, by Assistant Attorney General Thomas H. Davis, Jr., for respondent appellee."
  },
  "file_name": "0305-01",
  "first_page_order": 333,
  "last_page_order": 335
}