Eminent Domain Report

Recently we've been reporting on redevelopment agencies' efforts to utilize redevelopment funds before they're no more under new proposed legislation.  Whether you agree or disagree with the existence of redevelopment agencies, sometimes those agencies acquire properties on behalf of other government entities for undisputed public purposes.  For example, the Redding Redevelopment Agency is currently acting on behalf of the State Administrative Office of the Courts to acquire property necessary to build a new Shasta County Courthouse.  If redevelopment agencies are ...

I wanted to alert people to two meetings coming up soon that may be of interest if you're in Southern California. 

• IRWA, Chapter 57 meeting on March 2:  Chapter 57 is holding its monthly meeting tomorrow in Riverside.  The speaker will be Chris Mazier from Lawyers Title and his subject will be Preliminary Title Reports and their Dreaded Schedule B Items!  As all eminent domain attorneys and right of way consultants know, navigating "Schedule B" issues is a huge part of the precondemnation planning process.  And having now spent a huge part of the last several months reviewing Schedule B items ...

Around California, agencies are scrambling to use or secure redevelopment funds in an effort to protect against anticipated legislation to abolish redevelopment agencies in California.  We've been following the story for weeks, but things are really heating up now. 

As just a few examples from the past couple of days:

• A City of Perris councilman, Mark Yarbrough, is asking the city staff to deplete existing redevelopment funds before the state can seize them.
• Tuesday night, the San Mateo City Council voted to use $34.2 million in redevelopment funds for local projects "effectively ...

They have been around for over 20 years.  Established at a time when state and federal governments were withdrawing from financing infrastructure projects, Infrastructure Financing Districts (IFDs) were developed as an alternative vehicle for local financing of those types of projects.  However, they are difficult to establish and have limited powers.  As a result, they have rarely been seen as an alternative to redevelopment agencies.  Now, a generation later, with the possible demise of redevelopment, cities and counties are once again casting about for alternative sources of ...

Some of my colleagues at Nossaman have prepared a pretty detailed nationwide summary of key transportation projects and their progress in 2010.  The piece, 2010 Transportation Infrastructure Year in Review, struck me as potentially being a helpful resource for any number of reasons, and it occurred to me that anyone else working in transportation infrastructure may also find it useful.  

They've included information about federal TIFIA grants, TIGER II grants, updates on efforts to implement public-private partnerships, and procurement of and milestones for some of the biggest ...

A new bill -- AB 238 -- is working its way through the State Assembly which would require a reduction in compensation payable to a successful plaintiff in an inverse condemnation action in direct proportion to the owner’s percentage of fault in causing damages to the owner’s property.  While the doctrine of comparative fault is one of the cornerstones of tort law, it is rarely applicable to inverse condemnation actions. 

Ever since the seminal decision in Albers v. County of Los Angeles (1965) 62 Cal.2d 250, there has been a more or less bright line distinction between the strict ...

Last week, we give a brief overview of the new published California Court of Appeal decision in City of Gardena v. Rikuo Corporation (Feb. 7, 2011).  For anyone interested in a more detailed explanation of the City of Gardena case, you can read our E-Alert, "Court Dismisses Appeal Arising From Stipulated Eminent Domain Judgment."

The case is probably worth a read for all of us in the right-of-way industry, as the decision serves as an important reminder for public agencies and property owners to carefully document eminent domain settlements, especially where additional actions ...

The Clean Water Act requires states to identify rivers and creeks that fall below specified water quality standards.  Those water bodies are thereafter designated as "impaired" by the Environmental Protection Agency, and certain standards are imposed to limit pollution and runoff. 

If a river or creek's designation results in a nearby property suffering a decrease in value, does the property owner have standing to seek removal of the designation?  In Barnum Timber Co. v. United States Environmental Protection Agency, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals held that ...

In a report issued in advance of today’s Senate Subcommittee hearing on the issue, the Legislative Analyst's Office reiterated its support for the Governor’s call for an end to redevelopment in California.  While acknowledging that redevelopment does lead to economic development within redevelopment project areas, the report asserts that there is no reliable evidence that it attracts business to the state or increases overall regional economic development. 

This may all be well and good, but analyzing the issues this way creates a subtle - but important -shift in the ...

Most eminent domain cases don't proceed to a full-blown jury trial.  Rather, most get settled somewhere along the way, and those settlements often come in the form of a stipulated judgment.  In most of those cases, nothing more happens.  The agency pays the judgment, obtains a final order of condemnation, and all parties move on with their lives.

But sometimes, the judgment itself isn't the end of the story.  And in City of Gardena v. Rikuo Corporation (Feb. 7, 2011), the parties still had to deal with ongoing environmental remediation issues long after their stipulated judgment was ...