ST. LOUIS — Independent Taxi Drivers Association has lost a battle against the Metropolitan Taxicab Commission in a dispute over the issuance of taxi permits.
The Missouri Court of Appeals, Eastern District dismissed the taxi drivers' move for temporary and permanent injunctions and a temporary restraining order and granted the commission's move to enforce a settlement, which issued 76 of 100 potential permits.
According to background information in the ruling, the commission granted 76 permits in February 2016 because only that number was filed by the taxi drivers within a required 90-day time limit. Any unused permits would be forfeited if not filed for within that time period, the ruling states.
Following an evidentiary hearing in May in a restraint-of-trade suit filed by the taxi drivers, St. Louis Circuit Judge Dennis M. Schaumann found that plaintiffs were "fully advised and aware" that as holders of Certificate of Covenance and Necessity (CCN) they were required to apply for and have had approved by the commission individual vehicles for driver permits within the 90-day period.
The appeals panel, which included Presiding Judge Robert Clayton III and Judges Lisa Page and Mary Hoff, dismissed the appeal "as the record ... is insufficient to review the appeal, because Plaintiffs have failed to file a transcript of the trial court proceedings."
Citing precedent in City of St. Clair v. Cash, the ruling concludes: "This court is cognizant of our duty to provide a review upon the merits of a case when possible, but this principle 'presupposes a record upon which this court can act with some degree of confidence in the reasonableness of its review, without resort to speculation and conjecture as to the controlling facts of the case.
"'If an appellant fails to provide this court with a record containing everything necessary to determine all questions presented to this court, the appeal must be dismissed.'"