Category: Uncategorized

August 27th, 2019 — In Uncategorized

No Severance Damages for You, You Have a Special Benefit by OCA Member Mike Rikon

In his Condemnation and Tax Certiorari column, OCA New York Member Michael Rikon discusses partial acquisitions in condemnation cases and writes: “Within the area of consequential damages, we must explore, not only the loss in value suered by the remaining property, but the possible benefits to that remainder which are the result of the improvement for which the part taken was acquired. To further complicate things, the question arises,...

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August 23rd, 2019 — In Uncategorized

Nebraska Supreme Court Rules on Transcanada’s XL Pipeline Route by William Blake

The Nebraska Supreme Court has affirmed the decision of the Nebraska Public Service Commission’s (PSC) to approve a route through Nebraska for the XL Pipeline, completing one of the final steps before construction of the controversial project can begin. A copy of the full decision can be read here. The project plan is to bury a 36-inch crude oil pipeline from Alberta, Canada to Southern Nebraska. First announced in...

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August 8th, 2019 — In Uncategorized

Amicus Brief: State Takings Claims Are Constitutional (Not Torts) in Applying Applicable Statute of Limitations

OCA has asked leave to file an Amicus Brief in the case of DW Aina Lea Development vs. State of Hawaii Land Use, currently before the Hawaii Supreme Court.  The Brief, authored by OCA Member Robert Thomas, can be read in full here. The question presented before the Hawaii Supreme Court is the applicable statute of limitations for regulatory takings claims under the Hawaii Constitution’s “takings or damagings” clause....

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July 23rd, 2019 — In Uncategorized

Upcoming Webinar – Knick Picking Regulatory Takings: Did the Court Right a Wrong, or Wrong a Right?

On Friday, July 26th from 2:00 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. ET the Land Use Committee of the ABA’s Section of State and Local Government Law is sponsoring a free (for Section members) informal webinar about the latest in takings law:Knick Picking Regulatory Takings: Did the Court Right a Wrong, or Wrong a Right? OCA presenters Dwight Merriam (featured to the left) and Robert Thomas (featured below) will discuss reaction...

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July 23rd, 2019 — In Uncategorized

Knick v. Township of Scott, Pennsylvania: Federal Courthouse Doors Now Open to Taking Claimants by OCA Member James Masterman

On June 21, 2019, the U.S. Supreme Court, in a 5-4 majority opinion written by Chief Justice John Roberts “restor takings claims to the full-fledged constitutional status the Framers envisioned when they included the Clause among the other protections in the Bill of Rights.”Knick v. Township of Scott, 139 S. Ct. 2162 (2019). The Fifth Amendment’s “nor shall private property be taken without just compensation” is the clause Chief...

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July 18th, 2019 — In Uncategorized

The Nasty, Brutish, and Short Life of Agins v. City of Tiburon

By OCA Members Gideon Kanner and Michael Berger IF THE DUKE OF YORK’S MEN THOUGHT they were being made to perform useless, repetitive tasks to no worthwhile end, they were in about the same condition as the American lawyers who were practicing tak- ings law in the 1970s and 1980s. During that period of time, hordes of lawyers representing the competing sides in regulatory taking cases were sent, figuratively,...

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June 28th, 2019 — In Uncategorized

Changes Ahead For Property Owners: After More Than 30 Years, Supreme Court Reopens Federal Courthouse Door To Property Rights Claims

OCA Member Robert Thomas seeks to alert all property owners in his recent posting on the impact of the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent landmark decision in Knick v. Township of Scott: Heads up, property owners: last week the U.S. Supreme Court issued a landmark ruling changing the way property rights lawsuits have been handled for the last thirty years. In Knick v. Township of Scott, the Court allowed property...

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June 24th, 2019 — In Uncategorized

More than a ‘Knick’—SCOTUS Overrules ‘Williamson County’ in Stunning Victory for Property Owners

Read OCA Member Dwight Merriam’s fascinating article in the Connecticut Law Tribune on the impact of the recent Knick decision on landowner property rights here.

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June 21st, 2019 — In Uncategorized

U.S. Supreme Court Decides Knick v. Township of Scott, And In Doing so Overturns the Williamson Doctrine

Congratulations to the Pacific Legal Foundation for winning a big property rights case today! In 2013, Rose Knick was forced to allow public access to a suspected gravesite on her ranch. Ms. Knick  sued over the unconstitutional property taking, but a federal court refused to hear her federal claim citing the 1985 Supreme Court decision Williamson County. Ms. Knick went all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court  seeking...

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Thor Hearne

June 5th, 2019 — In Uncategorized

OCA Member Thor Hearne Files Another Rails to Trails Case

Thor Hearne, a parter at Larson O’Brien and perhaps the best known lawyer specializing in Rails to Trails litigation recently filed another lawsuit in the Federal Court of Claims on behalf of 150 landowners whose property is part of an eight-mile rail corridor that will be used to expand Sarasota’s “Legacy Trail.” Despite the fact that in the last 10 years the federal government has had to pay millions to...

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