January 2020

Netflix just released the first season (or should we say “series” since this is a UK-based production?) of “The Stranger,” a thriller based on Harlan Coben’s novel, about “the lives of suburban families whose secrets and lies are made public by the appearance of a stranger.”

Why we’re posting notice here that you should watch it is because the main character is Adam Price, and the backdrop to the thriller is that he’s a lawyer who is fighting expropriation (what we Yanks call “takings”), and is knee-deep in a case involving the threatened taking of a retired police officer’s supposedly blighted home for the local council’s redevelopment project. We just started watching. 

What makes this story line especially compelling is that the legal aspects of the story are based on a real case in which our New Jersey colleague Tony Della Pelle represented the property owner. In that…

Continue Reading Netflix And Take: Expropriation And Redevelopment UK Style In “The Stranger”

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Having just wrapped the 2020 ALI-CLE Eminent Domain and Land Valuation Litigation Conference in Nashville (very successfully, but more on that later), we could not depart the area without paying a visit to the site of the late-and-not-so-great Williamson County case, in a nearby suburb (we’ll also have more on that later, once we’re back in the office). 

Driving into the infamous — at least in takings circles — Temple Hills subdivision, we came across this STOP sign at a key intersection, with some curious graffiti. Continue Reading Saw This Sign In Williamson County, Tennessee

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We’re in Nashville for the next three days, where we have record attendance (see above for the name-tag matrix), with nearly 300 attendees spread out over three rooms. 

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The Big Room, before. 

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The Big Room, during. Like we said, record attendance. 

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Thanks to the generosity of our sponsors, we have very good social events. Like the lunch, below.

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Clint Schumacher brought his Eminent Domain Podcast studio to Nashville to record future episodes.Continue Reading Greetings From The 37th Annual ALI-CLE Eminent Domain & Land Valuation Litigation Conference, Nashville

A very short one (4 pages and 1 line) from the South Carolina Court of Appeals. And a good thing, too, because we’re on the road this week at the 37th Annual ALI-CLE Eminent Domain and Land Valuation Litigation Conference. See you there! 

In Burke v. S.C. Dep’t of Transportation, No. 5709 (Jan. 15, 2020), the court concluded that the judge, not the jury, calculates statutory prejudgment interest in inverse cases the same way it does it straight takings. Although the court acknowledged the “considerable tension” in past decisions about the issue, it concluded the issue was actually one of first impression. 

In the end the court relied on the notion that inverse and straight takings should not be subject to different rules — see slip op. at 3 (“there is no good reason to treat the two differently”) — and held that because the rule in straight…

Continue Reading SC App: Judge, Not Jury, Calculates Prejudgment Interest In Inverse Condemnation Cases

The Virginia Supreme Court is set to consider a case that asks whether less than a total loss of access to a parcel is a taking, and is the government’s mere invocation of a “police power” rationale to cut off access is enough to insulate it from the payment of compensation. 

When Hooked proposed to develop its property, the City of Chesapeake closed Callison Drive, the street adjacent to Hooked’s property after the neighbors complained. This cut off Hooked’s direct access to Callison Drive, even though it still had access from its property from another street.

The trial court dismissed (demurred) Hooked’s inverse condemnation claim, concluding that the City was exercising its police power when it closed the street, and thus there was no taking as a matter of law. Hooked argued that Virginia property owners have a property right for direct access to adjacent roads, especially after the Virginia…

Continue Reading Virginia Supreme Court Asks: Must A Parcel Be Completely Cut Off For Loss Of Access To Be A Taking?

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Picture 1: how normal people see pie.

Picture 2: how you see pie if you’re coming to the
ALI-CLE Eminent Domain Conference. 

If you get the above, you probably are already set to join us next week for the 37th Annual ALI-CLE Eminent Domain and Land Valuation Litigation Conference in Nashville. (If not, shame on you!).

And having just reviewed the latest registration list, I can report that we have an all-time record attendance.  But there’s still room for those of you still not committed. Register here. Don’t miss out. There will be pie. Continue Reading Record Attendance (But There’s Still Time For You Last-Minute Filers) At Nashville ALI-CLE Eminent Domain Conference

Is a property owner entitled to compensation if the DOT closes off an intersection by which drivers entered a fast-food restaurant, and now can only get to the restaurant by circuitous access? In other words, if a public project limits access, but does not cut it off entirely? And is the answer the same if the state had in 1961, taken with compensation an easement from the current owner’s predecessor, and the former owner had agreed the compensation was for “all the land taken and resulting damages?” 

That’s the issue the Ohio Supreme Court split 4-3 on in State ex rel. New Wen, Inc. v. Marchbanks, No. 2020-Ohio-63 (Jan. 15, 2020):

{¶ 6} ODOT’s work did not directly affect the entrance to the Wendy’s parking lot from C.R. 128. But as a practical matter, the changes require drivers to travel a longer distance to access the Wendy’s from S.R.

Continue Reading Ohio: DOT Partially Cutting Off Access Is A Taking – Prior Condemnation Did Not Take Right To Direct Access To Highway

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If there’s one downside to the law school experience from the teacher’s side of the lectern, it’s grading. Especially at a law school like William and Mary that has a pretty strict mandatory curve.

In an upper-division course like “Eminent Domain and Property Rights Law,” where we’re dealing with some very high-level stuff and the quality of the students is uniformly excellent, that makes for some hard choices at this time of year. But we’ve wrapped up grading, and have submitted the official scores.

Although I cannot share with you all the papers themselves, I don’t think my students would mind if I give you a sampling of the topics and titles, just so you can see how the next generation of lawyers is thinking about this area of law: 

  • One Man’s Castle is Another Man’s Parking Lot: A Homeowner’s Theory of Eminent Domain
  • Native Title: Concept and

…
Continue Reading The Circle Is Now Complete: A Sampling Of Final Paper Topics From William and Mary Law’s Eminent Domain & Property Rights Course

Here’s the latest in a case (and issue) we’ve been following. 

In Puntenney v. Iowa Utilities Board, 928 N.W.2d 829 (Iowa 2019), the Iowa Supreme Court answered a question that has been making its way around: what “public” does the “public use” requirement cover? For the Iowa Constitution, for example, does a taking have to be of direct benefit to the people of Iowa?

The court there addressed the issue by not answering the the question directly, but by concluding that the Iowa public is indirectly served by the taking of private property for a pipeline, even though there are no “onramps” or “offramps” for the oil in Iowa. The taking would have the other, usual, butterfly effect Iowa benefits: some jobs, cheaper gas, and the like. Kentucky and West Virginia courts have reached the opposite conclusion (the taking must directly serve the people of the state), but Ohio and…

Continue Reading New Cert Petition: It’s Not Enough For A Condemnor To Invoke A “Classic” Public Use