Eminent Domain Report

In September 2014, the Court of Appeal for the Fourth Appellate District issued a surprising decision, finding that even if an applicant maintains that it is accepting imposed permit conditions "under protest" and expressly asserts that it plans to challenge those conditions in court, it waives any such challenge by building the approved project.  (Lynch v. California Coastal Commission (2014) 229 Cal.App.4th 658.)  In reaching this conclusion, the majority found that the protest procedure provided in the Mitigation Fee Act was inapplicable because that Act does not ...

Property owners typically have a lot on their minds when they find out that the government is going to be taking their property.  For residential owners, they need to worry about where they are going to live with their families once the agency takes possession of their home.  For business owners, they have to figure out how to run a business while planning for a forced relocation -- a relocation that may be coming at a terrible time or on a terrifyingly fast schedule.

The owners must also worry about whether they are receiving the right amount of money -- i.e., the "just compensation" the agency ...

The California Transportation Commission met in Riverside on Wednesday.  On the agenda was the allocation of $254 million in funding for transportation projects throughout the state.  You can read Caltrans' press release here.  Caltrans Director Malcolm Dougherty commented:

Investing in our infrastructure benefits Californians for generations to come and these projects will improve mobility for all users of the transportation system, whether they choose to travel by car, take transit or ride a bicycle.

Just under half of the money allocated came from Prop 1B funds.  ...

There has been a remarkable movement lately throughout California:  local government agencies are attempting to take over investor-owned, quasi-public utility companies in an effort to reduce utility bills to their constituents.  A number of electric and water utilities are facing pressure from agencies to sell their assets -- or face having them acquired through eminent domain.  Does this make sense?

As just one example, according to one recent article by Garth Stapley in the Modesto Bee, SSJID can boot PG&E from Ripon, Escalon, Manteca, the South San Joaquin Irrigation ...

On November 24, 2014, the Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) published a proposed rule that would amend the regulations governing how Federal grant recipients acquire, manage, and dispose of real property.  Thus, the proposed rule, if it becomes final, has the potential to impact the daily operations of transportation agencies all across the United States.  Some of the more notable proposed revisions include:

• Broader authority for public agencies to proceed with construction contract bidding when the agency has not acquired all real property interests needed for the ...

Agencies acquiring private property for a public project conduct thorough investigations to determine whether the property has environmental contamination.  If contamination is found, the question arises whether evidence of the contamination will be admissible in the eminent domain proceeding.  In California the answer is yes, based on a single case that involved evidence of remediation costs introduced by both sides without objection.  In Redevelopment Agency of Pomona v. Thrifty Oil Company, 4 Cal.App.4^th 469 (1992), the Agency sought to condemn a parcel owned by Thrifty that ...

On November 4, 2014, San Benito County voters went to the poles to vote on Measure J, the measure designed to prohibit hydraulic fracturing, known as fracking, and related gas and oil extraction activities, as well as other "high-intensity petroleum operations," including acid well stimulation and cyclic steam injection. The measure also banned any new gas or oil drilling activity - even conventional, low-intensity activity - in areas the county zoned for residential or rural land use.

With 59% of the vote, supporters approved Measure J in an effort to protect the local environment ...

According to Robin Richard’s article, "Needles May Exercise Eminent Domain to make way for Highway 95 Connector," the City of Needles is considering adopting Resolutions of Necessity to acquire 14 parcels for its long-planned I-40 connector project.   The City will be acquiring permanent road easements and temporary construction easements of various sizes.  The impacted properties include residential, commercial and motel uses.  Some of the acquisitions are fairly small, but as my colleague Brad Kuhn recently posted, even these sliver acquisitions can have impacts to the ...

The question now is, is the court's statement merely a bump in the road or a roadblock?  The United States filed the eminent domain action seeking to condemn certain access rights so it could increase its profitability when it sold vacant federal land in Alameda County, California.  In its complaint and declaration of taking, the United States alleged that it needed to condemn the property interest for the "continuing operations" of the Alameda Federal Center.  In support of the taking, the United States relied on the General Service Administration's general authority.  The federal ...

As traffic continues to increase and roadways become more congested, California's transportation infrastructure needs to keep up.  While there has been a concerted focus on alternative methods of transportation (such as rail, bikeways, etc.), street and highway widenings are still a major focus of local government agencies.  The County of Sacramento is no different, as it embarks on the Hazel Avenue and Fair Oaks Boulevard road widening projects.  These street improvement projects typically require right-of-way acquisition, and while the acquisitions are typically small ...