Category: News & Events

Owners’ Counsel of America is pleased to announce the recent addition of Shane Rayman to its membership base. Shane Rayman is a founding partner of Rayman Beitchman LLP, a boutique litigation firm in Canada focused on expropriations law and property rights litigation which are also Shane’s primary practice areas. His practice also includes commercial litigation and defending professionals on liability issues relating to expropriations law. In addition to having appeared before all levels of Court in Ontario and the Federal Court of Canada, Shane has represented his clients in many significant cases relating to land compensation claims throughout Ontario, including the landmark decision of the Supreme Court of Canada in Antrim Truck Centre v. Ontario (Ministry of Transportation). This appeal resulted in a unanimous decision by the Supreme Court in favor of the Appellant owner and set a precedent relating to real property rights and the balance between public and private property interests in Canada. Shane has also been involved in major infrastructure projects throughout Ontario, including the 407 East, the TYSSE Subway extension, Metrolinx initiatives and LRT Projects.  Shane is a past president of the Ontario Expropriations Association and has been a director since 2006. This Association is made up of individuals from professions involved in the acquisition of land for public purposes and provides a forum for such professionals to educate one another on relevant issues. Shane is a member of the Ontario Bar Association, the Advocates’ Society and the Ontario Chapter of the International Right of Way Association. […]

Jacksonville, Florida, October 2, 2013 (Newswire.com) – Owners’ Counsel of America (OCA), a nationwide network of leading eminent domain attorneys, is pleased to announce the hiring of Leslie Fields as 
its new Executive Director, a person who brings a wealth of experience and knowledge to the task of helping to lead and grow the organization. Leslie Fields retired in 2014 from Faegre Baker Daniels, a law firm with national and international offices, where she served on the firm’s management board and became a renowned legal expert on eminent domain and property rights issues, co-chairing for many years the longest running ALI-CLE conference on eminent domain and land valuation and presenting on the subject of eminent domain in locales as distant as Tsinghua University in Beijing China as part of the Brigham- Kanner Property Rights Conference sponsored by William & Mary Law School. Over her 33 year legal career, Fields, a member of the American College of Trial Lawyers, argued numerous precedent setting cases that helped shape the law of eminent domain in Colorado and was involved in land acquisition matters for multiple major public works projects, including representation of the principle landowners for the construction of the Denver International Airport. In 2008 Fields wrote the textbook on Colorado Eminent Domain Law. In 2014 the Sam Cary Bar Association awarded Fields the King Trimble Lifetime Achievement Award for her professional achievements and in 2016 Fields was honored as a Law Star by Denver University Sturm College of Law for her alumni […]

Several members of Owners’ Counsel of America will be speaking at the 14th Annual Brigham-Kanner Property Rights Conference at the William and Mary Law School in Williamsburg, Virginia on October 12-13, 2017. The Conference is honoring University of Hawaii Law School Professor David Callies (the 2015 Recipient of OCA’s Crystal Eagle award), for his lifetime of work, both scholarly and practical, advancing the right of private property.  Please join us for this exciting event.  

Join Owners’ Counsel of America attorneys at the 34th annual American Law Institute Eminent Domain and Land Valuation Litigation course in San Diego, California. This live CLE program will take place Thursday – Saturday, January 26-28, 2017 at the Westin San Diego, in downtown San Diego, California.  

During a ceremony at The Peace Palace in The Hague on October 21, the 2016 the 2016 Brigham-Kanner Property Rights Prize was awarded to Peruvian economist Hernando de Soto, President of the Institute of Liberty and Democracy.  An advocate for the formal recognition of private property ownership as a solution to global poverty, de Soto has been recognized internationally for his work.  The Prize was awarded following the conclusion of the 13th Annual Brigham-Kanner International Property Rights Conference in which a number of OCA attorneys participated.

On August 22, the Supreme Court of Hawaii accepted the Application for Writ of Certiorari filed July 10, 2016 by the landowner in County of Kauai v. Hanalei River Holdings, Ltd., No. SCWC-14-0000828.  The Owners’ Counsel of America (OCA) joined with the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB) Small Business Legal Center to file an amici curiae brief in the case urging the Court to review and overturn the appellate court’s decision.  

The practice of eminent domain is becoming more and more dependent upon occurrences on the national level.  Now more than ever, eminent domain lawyers must be knowledgeable about activity outside their own jurisdictions. Join OCA attorneys from around the country in Las Vegas this September 29 and 30 for a two-day program presented by CLE International focused on helping attorneys to stay informed about the most important developments in eminent domain litigation all across the country.

Along our country’s shores, a historical legal principle known as the “public trust doctrine” allows members of the public to access the beach beyond either the mean high or low water mark, even where this section of the beach (as well as the land above the water mark) is private property. This is the law in most states; and, until recently, it was clear that the public trust doctrine did not – and was not intended to –provide local governments the authority to interfere with landowners’ rights in the “dry sand” areas of their private property.

The Owners’ Counsel of America wishes to congratulate eminent domain attorneys Joseph P. Suntum of Maryland and William G. Blake of Nebraska who were recently awarded the CRE® designation from the Counselors of Real Estate®. A Counselor of Real Estate (CRE) provides intelligent, unbiased real estate advice that achieves the best results for a client or employer. Joe and Bill join the more than 1,100 CREs worldwide, including 5 other OCA attorney-members (Casey Pipes – Alabama, Jack Sperber – Colorado, Dwight Merriam – Connecticut, Anthony DellaPelle – New Jersey, and Michael Rikon – New York). 

Beginning at 9:00 AM (Pacfic) today, the California Supreme Court will live-stream oral arguments in an important eminent domain and property rights case, Property Reserve, Inc. v. Superior Court, case number S217738.  This is the case in which the Third District Court of Appeal held that a request made by the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) to enter private property to undertake geological and environmental activities such as boring holes and installing permanent structures were not the “innocuous” or “superficial” activities permitted under California’s “entry statute.”  (See our previous post here.) The Court of Appeal found that the level of intrusion on private property requested by DWR would be a taking, and that in order to undertake those activities, the DWR must follow eminent domain procedures.  OCA together with the the National Federation of IndependentBusiness (NFIB) Small Business Legal Center filed an amici curiae brief in support of Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta property and business owners who objected to the DWR’s proposed testing and pre-condemnation activities. (The OCA-NFIB brief is linked below.)