Knick Goes On and On
Posted: December 18, 2018 Filed under: Regulatory Takings Comments Off on Knick Goes On and OnIn the pending case of Knick v Township of Scott, the U.S. Supreme Court is reexamining its longstanding Williamson County rule that a property owner suing a local government for just compensation for a “taking” of private property must proceed initially in state rather than federal court. While the Knick case appears to present a relatively arcane procedural issue, the case may well produce one of the most important takings rulings from the Supreme Court in many years. Read the rest of this entry »
Reversal in St. Bernard Parish Case
Posted: April 23, 2018 Filed under: Regulatory Takings, Water Comments Off on Reversal in St. Bernard Parish CaseOn Friday, April 20, 2018, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit issued an important ruling in the case of St. Bernard Parish v. United States, reversing a judgment of the U.S. Court of Federal Claims that threatened to impose hundreds of millions of dollars of liability on U.S. taxpayers based on flood losses allegedly attributable to the construction and management of the Mississippi River-Gulf Outlet (MRGO) navigation channel. The decision represents a potential landmark precedent limiting the extent to which the government can be held financially responsible for flood damages, an already serious challenge for private landowners that will only get more serious with advancing climate change. Read the rest of this entry »
Water, the Public Range, and the Takings Clause: Here We Go Again!
Posted: November 22, 2017 Filed under: Regulatory Takings, Water Comments Off on Water, the Public Range, and the Takings Clause: Here We Go Again!The U.S. Court of Federal Claims in Washington D.C. recently issued a remarkable opinion in a case captioned Sacramento Grazing Association, Inc. v. United States. The court ruled that a cattle ranching corporation using U.S. Forest Service lands in New Mexico is entitled to a financial payment from the taxpayers because the agency’s efforts to control the damage the corporation’s cattle were doing to the public lands “took” private property rights in water in violation of the U.S. Constitution.
The remarkable nature of the opinion, authored by Chief Judge Susan Braden, begins with the first paragraph, which reads: “On January 2, 2016, several dozen ranchers, who unsuccessfully attempted to find common ground with environmental groups and officials from Oregon’s Malheur National Wildlife Refuge for over a decade, decided to take up arms to protest federal policy and regulations to prioritize migrating bird water habitat, by limiting the number of cattle that historically grazed and used water in that area–decades before it was subject to federal control. In contrast, the Sacramento Grazing Association, Inc. (“SGA”) filed a complaint in the United States Court of Federal Claims for an adjudication of its right to beneficial use of stock water sources within the Sacramento Allotment of the Lincoln National Forest, New Mexico.” Read the rest of this entry »
The Flood of Takings Cases After Hurricane Harvey
Posted: October 23, 2017 Filed under: Physical Takings, Water Comments Off on The Flood of Takings Cases After Hurricane HarveyOn August 27, as Hurricane Harvey blew through the Houston area, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers found itself between the proverbial rock and hard place. Since the 1940s, it had operated a flood control project to control the risk of flood damage to downtown Houston and the Houston Ship Channel. It had accomplished this by carefully controlling the release of flood waters from the project’s dams. Now, however, the Corps confronted Hurricane Harvey, a megastorm generating massive, unprecedented volumes of flood water.
The Corps faced the choice of either limiting water releases from the project to protect downstream properties at the cost of flooding upstream properties, or increasing project releases to protect upstream properties at the cost of flooding downstream properties. Not surprisingly, the Corps’ decision on August 27 and on the following days, to release up to 13,000 cubic feet per second from the project dams, which arguably contributed to the flooding of both downstream and upstream properties, left everyone unhappy. Read the rest of this entry »
Big Victory for State and Local Governments in Murr
Posted: June 26, 2017 Filed under: Meaning of Property, Regulatory Takings Comments Off on Big Victory for State and Local Governments in MurrOn June 23, 2017, the U.S. Supreme Court issued its decision in Murr v. State of Wisconsin, affirming the judgment of the Wisconsin Court of Appeals that enforcement of a “lot merger” provision in a county zoning ordinance did not result in a compensable taking under the Fifth Amendment. While seemingly narrow and technical, Murr represents the most significant takings decision from the Supreme Court in at least a decade. The Court’s opinion has particularly important implications for future takings litigation involving land use and environmental regulations. Here are the basic takeaways from Murr. (Full disclosure: I filed an amicus brief in Murr on behalf of a group of land economists urging the Court to embrace a more rigorous analysis of how land values are affected by regulation.) Read the rest of this entry »
Texas, Flooding, and Public Use
Posted: July 5, 2016 Filed under: Physical Takings, Water Comments Off on Texas, Flooding, and Public UseOn June 17, 2016, the Texas Supreme Court issued a decision in Harris County Flood Control District v. Kerr, available here, http://www.txcourts.gov/supreme/orders-opinions/2016/june/june-17,-2016.aspx, which should be of great interest to all those who follow major developments in takings doctrine.
The Texas Supreme Court, by a vote of 5-4, rejected a takings claim based on the theory that Harris County should be held liable for property damage allegedly caused by the county’s prior approval of upstream development without adequate flood mitigation. The headline is that the Court’s recent decision supersedes the Court’s prior decision in this case, issued on June 12, 2015, http://www.txcourts.gov/media/996484/130303.pdf, supporting, again by a 5 to 4 vote, the plaintiffs’ takings theory. The change in outcome was explained by Justice Eva Guzman’s decision, in response to an application for rehearing, to switch her vote. Read the rest of this entry »
Tobacco, Takings and the TPP
Posted: October 2, 2015 Filed under: Uncategorized Comments Off on Tobacco, Takings and the TPPAs furious negotiations continue to try to complete a Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) trade agreement, for which Congress granted the Obama administration fast track authority a few months ago, a dispute has arisen over whether tobacco companies should be allowed to invoke the takings and other “investor protections” in the TPP to beat back efforts by developing countries to adopt regulations to protect their populations from the ravages of tobacco. The Coalition for Tobacco Free Kids has a done a nice job of documenting how tobacco companies have used international investor-state claims under international trade agreements to attack tobacco regulation. The Obama administration, under pressure from numerous public health groups, has proposed a provision in the TPP to protect member countries from “abusive” tobacco company investor-state claims
A major argument against this approach by the tobacco companies and their allies in Congress has been: “First they come for the tobacco companies . . . “ In other words, maybe tobacco will be denied the opportunity to exploit the investor-state process today, but who knows what other kinds of “abusive’ takings claims will be targeted next? Which is not a bad point. If tobacco companies should be denied the opportunity to exploit trade agreements to challenge tobacco regulations, why shouldn’t this good thinking be applied to protect all manner of lawful domestic environmental and social welfare legislation from abusive investor-state litigation?
Meanwhile, the Bloomberg and Bill and Melinda Gates foundations have set up a mufti-million dollar fund to provide advice to countries targeted by tobacco companies with investor-state litigation. Which is all well and good, but one would hope the foundations would also pay some attention to the root causes of this international litigation explosion in the out-of-control property rights ideology currently being promoted not only on the international scene but in our own domestic court system, including the U.S. Supreme Court.
Floodplain Regulation Not a Taking in South Carolina
Posted: August 13, 2015 Filed under: Regulatory Takings | Tags: flood protection Comments Off on Floodplain Regulation Not a Taking in South CarolinaYesterday the South Carolina Supreme Court produced an important ruling in a regulatory takings case involving floodplain management. In Columbia Venture, LLC v. Richland County, the Court issued a unanimous decision affirming a ruling by a Special Referee that county restrictions on development in a federally-designated floodway did not result in a taking. This ruling is consistent with an apparently unbroken string of precedent from around the country holding that floodplain development restrictions do not represent takings. Read the rest of this entry »
Looking for “Property” in 9th Circuit Workers Comp “Lien Activation” Case
Posted: July 14, 2015 Filed under: Meaning of Property Comments Off on Looking for “Property” in 9th Circuit Workers Comp “Lien Activation” CaseIn another demonstration of the challenges sometimes presented by the need to identify the relevant property interest in a takings case, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit recently ruled in Angelotti Chiropractic, Inc. v. Baker that a takings claim failed for lack of a predicate property interest. The case involved an alleged taking based on a California law requiring medical providers to pay an “activation fee” in order to enforce a “lien” covering payment for medical services. Read the rest of this entry »
Kelo Before the House Judiciary Committee (Again)
Posted: July 13, 2015 Filed under: Eminent Domain Comments Off on Kelo Before the House Judiciary Committee (Again)Kelo continues to provide fodder for political debate ten years after the decision, and the latest installment of this debate was a hearing last week before the U.S. House of Representatives Judiciary Commitee, Subcommittee on the Constitution and Civil Justice, entitled “The State of Property Rights in America Ten Years After Kelo v. City of New London.” My testimony is available here and other testimony is available on the subcommittee website. Read the rest of this entry »
Takings Litigation 