Eminent Domain | Condemnation

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This opinion isn’t big news, but come on, it’s about two of our favorite topics (eminent domain and appellate jurisdiction), it’s short, and it’s from the Supreme Court of the Virgin Islands. How often do we get those? Plus, we’re just interested in how courts from fellow island jurisdictions rule.

Bottom line: in a quick-take action, a trial court’s order rejecting a property owner’s claim that the condemnor did not have the power of eminent domain is interlocutory, and is not immediately appealable. Go determine compensation, enter a final judgment, and then you can appeal the whole case. 

This doesn’t make much sense, practically. If the condemnor does not have the power to take the property, why should the parties incur the costs and delay in determining valuation? In our home island jurisdiction, a property owner is entitled by statute to calendar preference, and an immediate interlocutory appeal of…

Continue Reading USVI: No Appellate Jurisdiction For Quick-Take Ruling Until Eminent Domain Judgment Finalized

In North Carolina, a property owner has a right to direct access to adjacent highways, and “[i]f the State’s action eliminates all direct access to the abutting road, then the action is ‘a taking as a matter of law.'” Dep’t of Transportation v. Harkey, 301 S.E.2d 64, 71 (N.C. 1983). And it doesn’t matter if the parcel has alternative access to the road. Id. at 65.

Unless the abutting highway moves, according to the North Carolina Court of Appeals in Dep’t of Transportation v. BB&R, LLC, No. 14-1185 (July 7, 2015). 

In that case, there was no dispute that the DOT’s road project took a portion of BB&R’s land on which a convenience store/gas station was located, and that before the taking, the property enjoyed direct access to Dowdle Mountain Road along the property’s northern side.

However, the court concluded the DOT was not liable for a …

Continue Reading NC App: No Taking Even Though DOT Cut Off All Of Property’s Northern Access Because Parcel Gained Eastern Acess

Here’s an article by IJ’s Dana Berliner, a retrospective on public use in eminent domain and where the decade since Kelo has left us.  

It is a sign of the constitutional damage Kelo caused that these two related features of the opinion—blind deference and the refusal to engage with facts—have marked post-Kelo jurisprudence.

Berliner, Looking Back Ten Years After Kelo, 125 Yale L.J.F. 82 (2015). 

A quick and worthy read. 

Related articles
Cal Supreme Court: Affordable Housing Exaction Subject Only To Rational Basis Review
HAWSCT Again Clarifies When A Judgment Is “Final” And Appealable (They’re Serious About This Finality Thing)

Continue Reading Worth Reading: “Looking Back Ten Years After Kelo”

ALI-CLE-2016-masthead

ALI-CLE has posted the registration page for the 2016 ALI-CLE Eminent Domain and Land Valuation Conference, in Austin. Register now for a $200 discount off the tuition. Or you can sign up for notification when the full brochure is published. 

Save the spot on your calendar so you can join us in Austin. 

We’re still working on the agenda and faculty, but here are the details thus far:

Date: January 28-30, 2016 (Thursday – Saturday)

Location: Hotel Van Zandt, Austin Texas

Reserve your hotel room here. [link updated 7/8/2015]

More about the annual conferences — the premiere CLE programming on the subject, in our opinion — here. 

Stay tuned for more information. We’ll continue to keep you posted. 

Related articles
2016 ALI-CLE Eminent Domain Conference, Austin: Hotel Block Now Taking Reservations
2016 ALI-CLE Eminent Domain Conference Dates And Location Set: Join Us In Austin!

Continue Reading 2016 ALI-CLE Eminent Domain Conference (Austin) Early Registration Available

Donald Trump is garnering a lot of press these days for things not related to eminent domain. And there’s a lot of awareness of the high-profile eminent domain battle in New Jersey, in which he was the “B” in an attempted “A to B” taking. But not everyone is as aware of a later, similar controversy. 

So we dusted off our review of the 2011 documentary You’ve Been Trumped, and post it below. The film focuses on the property owners whose land is in the shadow of Trump’s golf course and luxury residential project in Aberdeenshire, on the west coast of Scotland. Compulsory Purchase Orders were threatened (but ultimately not issued), but the scenario presented the film will be familiar to anyone who follows eminent domain and property rights issues.

The film is available on DVD and streaming from a variety of sources. Definitely worth your time. Especially if…

Continue Reading If You Are Even Thinking About Voting For Trump …

The Solicitor General of South Carolina has issued this opinion letter, answering the following three questions about a state statute which “purports to confer all rights, powers, and privileges given to telegraph and telephone companies” to pipeline companies:

  • Since S.C. Code § 58-7-10 et seq. appears to mainly concern waterworks, sewage disposal, and natural gas lines, do its provisions also apply to oil and gasoline pipelines and extend to them the public power of eminent domain?

  • If your answer to Question 1 is “yes,” then why isn’t an extension of eminent domain power to a private, for-profit pipeline company unconstitutional under S.C. Article 1, § 13(A)?

  • If an oil and gas pipeline company has eminent domain authority, and this authority is not unconstitutional, must an oil or gasoline pipeline company follow all regulations, rules, legal requirements, or other policies or procedures that are applicable to telephone and telegraph companies

…
Continue Reading SC AG: Oil And Gas Pipelines Probably Can’t Exercise Eminent Domain Like Telephone Companies

LUI header

The Land Use Institute, a program that for many years has been planned by co-chairs Frank Schnidman and Gideon Kanner, has found a new home with the American Bar Association’s Section of State and Local Government Law as the main sponsor. It also has a new Planning co-chair, Dean Patty Salkin of Touro Law School, who has stepped in for Professor Kanner.

This program is designed for attorneys, professional planners, and government officials involved in land use planning, zoning, permitting, property development, conservation and environmental protection, and related litigation. It not only addresses and analyzes the state-of-the-art efforts by government to manage land use and development, but also presents the key issues faced by property owners and developers in obtaining necessary governmental approvals.

This year, the one-day program is being held in conjunction with the ABA Annual Meeting in Chicago. It will be held on Thursday, July 30, 2015…

Continue Reading Land Use Institute: Planning, Regulation, Litigation, Eminent Domain, and Compensation – 31st Annual Conference, Chicago, July 30, 2015

20150205_072910

The hotel reservations link for the 2016 ALI-CLE Eminent Domain and Land Valuation and Condemnation 101 Conference is now live.

Reserve your hotel room now, via this link to ensure that you have a spot in the conference hotel. [note: link updated 7/8/2015]

We’re still working on the agenda and faculty, but here are the details thus far:

Date: January 28-30, 2016 (Thursday – Saturday)

Location: Hotel Van Zandt, Austin Texas

The Hotel Van Zandt is a new hotel (not even opened as of the date of this post), but our Austin sources tell us that it’s centrally located, close to everything that Austin is known for. More about the annual conferences — the premiere CLE programming on the subject, in our opinion — here. 

Stay tuned for more information. We’ll continue to keep you posted, and when the registration page at ALI-CLE is up and ready to…

Continue Reading 2016 ALI-CLE Eminent Domain Conference, Austin: Hotel Now Taking Reservations

131996

In this Order, the Supreme Court has granted the cert petition in the case we’ve been following about the anti-eminent domain sign in Norfolk, Virginia. The Court vacated the Fourth Circuit judgment and sent the case back down for consideration in light of the recent ruling in Reed v. Town of Gilbert. Here’s the text of the Order:

CENTRAL RADIO COMPANY, ET AL. V. NORFOLK, VA

The motion of Six Law Professors, et al. for leave to file a brief as amici curiae is granted. The motion of Neighborhood Enterprises, Inc., et al. for leave to file a brief as amici Curiae is granted. The petition for a writ of certiorari is granted. The judgment is vacated, and the case is remanded to the United States Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit for further consideration in light of Reed v. Town of Gilbert, 576 U. S.

Continue Reading SCOTUS GVR’s Anti-Eminent Domain Sign Case

Attend any talk by a judge which includes legal writing tips, and there’s sure to be this one: keep it as short as is necessary to make your points. Justice Kennedy’s remark that “I never read a brief I couldn’t put down in the middle” and Chief Justice Roberts noting “I can’t recall ever being sorry to see a brief end,” for example. Good advice. But what judges may not realize is that it is very often a two way street, and we consumers of judicial opinions also appreciate brevity. (With the exception of opinions in cases we win; in those circumstances, please do drone on Your Honors.) 

Well, here’s one that is somewhat lengthy at 49 pages, but is the exception to the rule and that we think more than a few readers will enjoy for their weekend reading: the concurring opinion in a case decided …

Continue Reading Worth Reading: An “Economic Liberty” Decision From The Texas Supreme Court, With Lessons For Eminent Domain