Municipal & Local Govt law

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Here’s the latest in a case we’ve been following.

In Hudson Valley Property Owners Ass’n v. City of Kingston, No. 59 (June 18, 2025), the New York Court of Appeals held that after a municipality declares a housing emergency allowing it to regulate the amount of rent, it has the power to order lessors to refund to tenants rent which exceeded the maximum allowed amount, even if those rents had been collected prior to the declaration of the emergency. 

At least that is how we read the opinion. Due to its somewhat unusual procedural posture, the court did not actually allow the city to nail property owners for retroactive “overcharges,” it merely rejected the owners’ claims that because the statute may allow it in particular cases, it isn’t facially unconstitutional.

This was a facial challenge by property owners to Kingston, New York’s declaration of a housing emergency during…

Continue Reading NY: In A Housing “Emergency,” City Can Retroactively Lower The Rent, Even Rent Collected Before The Emergency

Take a look at the New Jersey Appellate Division’s opinion in Johnson v. City of East Orange, No. A-2586-23 (June 27, 2025). 

The court vacated the dismissal of a property owner’s takings claim, holding that it was timely. We aren’t going into too much detail because this one is out of our shop. As the opinion notes:

Pacific Legal Foundation, plaintiff’s counsel in the instant matter, represented the plaintiff in Tyler, and appeared as amicus curiae in both the appellate, 257-261 20th Avenue Realty, LLC v. Roberto (Roberto I), 477 N.J. Super. 339 (App. Div. 2023), and state Supreme Court, 257-261 20th Avenue Realty, LLC v. Roberto (Roberto II), 259 N.J. 417 (2025), proceedings in what became the first published authority applying the holding in Tyler in this state.”

Slip op. at 2.  

But here are some of the highlights:

  • A takings claim does not accrue, and

…
Continue Reading NJ App: Takings Claim Accrues When Govt Keeps Property It Should Return To The Owner

Please add this one to your podcast listening queue: the latest episode of Bound by Oath, produced by John Ross at the Institute for Justice. BBO isn’t a typical podcast, but more of an audio documentary as we have noted before. If you aren’t a subscriber, you really should be. 

This episode focuses on regulatory takings, and the sleight-of-law that governments frequently employ to avoid the merits of takings claims, or perhaps worse yet to avoid paying compensation even after ordered to. Cases detailed include DeVillier, Agins, First English, Violet Dock Port, Ariyan. This episode is a great companion piece to BBO‘s episodes on Euclid (zoning), Pennsylvania Coal (reg takings), and Berman (Public Use). 

Put on your “self-executing” hat and take a listen! 

Here’s the description of the episode:

The Fifth Amendment says that the government must pay just compensation when it takes…

Continue Reading Must-Listen Podcast: “Neat Takings Tricks” (Bound by Oath, S3, E3)

In 2021, the Iowa Supreme Court held that a police search of garbage left at curbside for pickup was unconstitutional under the Iowa Constitution’s search and seizure clause. A local ordinance made scavenging through someone’s garbage illegal, which to the court meant that the garbage owner possessed a government-recognized property right in the trash, and the police search was similarly illegal.  

In Iowa v. Amble, No. 23-2114 (June 13, 2025), the Iowa Supreme Court concluded that that was then, this is now. In the aftermath of the 2021 case, the Iowa Legislature adopted a statute which deemed curbside garbage to be abandoned property. The statute also forbade municipalities from enacting ordinances or adopting regulations which would create a “reasonable expectation of privacy in garbage placed outside of the person’s residence for waste collection in a publicly accessible area.”

Flash forward to today: Des Moines police searched garbage bags which…

Continue Reading Iowa: Govt-Granted Property Rights Can Be Altered By The Legislature

A short one from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit.

In Couser v. Shelby County, No. 23-3758 (June 5, 2025), the court held that local ordinances which were adopted after a pipeline company announced plans to build a project to move carbon dioxide across several states (and presumably designed to make it harder, or impossible, to build the pipeline), were preempted by federal and state statutes. 

That’s it. You preemption/home rule mavens can read the opinion for the details which we won’t go into, except to point out what we think is the heart of the matter: 

This court holds that the Counties’ setbacks are safety standards. They apply alike to economically developed and remote areas. This blanket application undercuts aesthetic, land-use, and development rationales. It suggests the effect on safety is not incidental, but rather the “primary motivation.” Texas Midstream, 608 F.3d at 211.

Continue Reading CA8: Local Ordinances Regulating Pipelines Are Preempted By State And Federal Pipeline Law

In Bojorquez v. Florida, No. SC2023-0095 (June 5, 2025), the Florida Supreme Court reached a decision that a lot of other courts have reached: taxi licenses are not “private property” and therefore there’s no taking when the government does something to affect the value of those licenses. But this one has some interesting points, making the opinion worth a look. 

Between the 1976 and 2017, the State implemented a special municipal government — the Hillsborough County Public Transportation Commission — to regulate taxis in Hillsborough County. To operate a taxi, you needed a taxi certificate or permit. In 2012, to clarify that these certificates and permits were transferrable and were considered property, the Legislature declared that issued and future certificates and permits are “the private property of the holder of such certificate or permit[,]” which may be sold or assigned, or otherwise transferred to another. In 2017, the State…

Continue Reading Florida: Taxi Licenses May Have Been Declared “Private Property,” But They Aren’t Actually Private Property

One of the frustrations of challenging the power to take is … let’s say you win. Yay! You’ve stopped the taking!

So now what? Go back to your life safe in the belief that your property rights are secure? Maybe. If the government has had enough and says “no mas,” your win may be the end of it.

But what if the government really really wants your property? Can it come at you again, armed with with the blueprint your successful public use challenge just provided for how to do it right this time? Probably. There are few situations where the usual “one shot” principle in civil cases — also known as claim preclusion (res judicata to you traditionalists) — ties a condemnor’s hands and prevents it from taking a second, or third, or more shot.

So what about settling your public use challenge? If you…

Continue Reading CA8: You Believed The County When It Promised In The Settlement Agreement To Not Take Your Land In The Future? Shame On You!

In this order, the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Illinois temporarily enjoined enforcement of Chicago suburb Glen Ellyn‘s prohibition on renting property for less than 30 days.

Blakelick owns a five-bedroom single family home that when purchased was not located in Glen Ellyn. Since 2022, it has been offering the home for short-term rental on platforms like Airbnb. But in 2024, the property was annexed by the Village of Glen Ellyn. Blakelick continued to rent the property for less than 30 days. 

The dispute apparently began six months earlier when a neighbor began complaining about noise, culminating in the threat to “do everything in [his] capability to see to it that such use of property is banned in this area.” Slip op. at 2. Apparently he was successful, because in 2025, the Village, now having jurisdiction over the property, adopted an ordinance prohibiting owners from…

Continue Reading Property Owner Likely To Succeed On Claim That Prohibition Of Short-Term Rentals Is A Penn Central Taking

In Brady v. City of Myrtle Beach, No. 23-1847 (May 16, 2025), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit made short work of the takings claims brought by several business owners who claimed the city directly or indirectly shut them down because their businesses contributed to a rise in crime in the area.

Myrtle Beach’s “Superblock,” was one of those problem areas. As the Fourth Circuit put it:

In 2015 and 2016 alone, eleven people were shot in the Superblock. Dozens more were sexually assaulted, battered, or robbed. Because most of these crimes occurred in or around a small cluster of bars, the City increased its police presence in the area and began closely investigating the establishments for compliance with state and local safety regulations. Despite these measures, crime continued unabated.

Slip op. at 2.

Some of the details of those incidents:

The crime in…

Continue Reading CA4: No Property Right To Conduct A Business, So No Taking For Police Response To Area Crime Surge

Florida, like a lot of other jurisdictions, has an unclaimed property program whereby if an owner is deemed to have abandoned property (remember that old bank account you had in college years ago with a $2.50 balance?), the holder of that property may transfer it to the State, which keeps it until you come get it. In the meantime, however, under Florida’s scheme if that property is money (or is reduced to money), any interest which accrues is used by the State to pay for public schools. (That may not be constitutional, but at least funding schools with someone else’s money seems a better use of the interest than funding the State Fair.)

Florida had some of Maron’s money in its unclaimed property fund, a whopping $26.24. State law allowed her to get that money back, but as noted above, also prohibited her from getting the interest, so she…

Continue Reading CA11: State Can Be Ordered To Stop Withholding Just Compensation