Justia Zoning, Planning & Land Use Opinion Summaries

Teton LLC filed an application with the Grant County Board of Adjustment for a conditional use permit to construct a concentrated animal feeding operation. The Board ultimately approved Teton’s application. The circuit court concluded that the Board had jurisdiction over Teton’s application and pursued its authority in a regular manner. Grant County Concerned Citizens (GCCC) and Timothy Tyler appealed. Specifically, GCCC asserted that Teton’s proposed project violated the Zoning Ordinance for Grant County and, therefore, the Board’s decision was illegal. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding (1) the Board regularly pursued its authority in granting Teton’s application for a conditional use permit; and (2) the circuit court did not err in striking Tyler’s affidavit from the record. View "Grant County Concerned Citizens v. Grant County Bd. of Adjustment" on Justia Law

The trial court granted a peremptory writ of mandate directing the City to set aside a decision by the City’s planning commission that upheld a building permit allowing the restriping of a parking lot owned by Triangle Center and to reinstate a decision by the City’s zoning administrator that denied the permit. Triangle Center and the City appealed, raising a claim of equitable estoppel. The court concluded that, regardless of whether the elements of equitable estoppel are satisfied, the circumstances here do not justify an equitable estoppel against the City; this is not one of the rare and exceptional cases in which denying equitable estoppel would result in grave injustice; allowing Triangle Center to establish land use rights contrary to the zoning restrictions and despite its failure to comply with the normal land use approval process would adversely affect public policy and the public interest; and that adverse impact outweighs any unfairness to Triangle Center resulting from the failure to apply equitable estoppel. Accordingly, the court affirmed the judgment. View "Schafer v. City of LA" on Justia Law

At issue before the Supreme Court in this case was a circuit court's order upholding the validity of an ordinance amending respondent City of North Augusta's 1996 Tax Increment Financing District (TIF) ordinance, and a finding that the Mayor and City Council did not violate the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) between January to September 2013. In 1996, respondents adopted an ordinance creating a Redevelopment Plan to revitalize the City's riverfront and the adjacent areas. In 2013, City Council adopted an ordinance amending the Redevelopment Plan to allow the City to proceed with "Project Jackson," a development project of riverfront property for commercial activities ("minor league baseball stadium, a convention center, parking decks, a YMCA, a 200 room hotel, and assorted commercial buildings"). The ordinance both extended the duration of the Redevelopment Plan and the associated TIF Bonds, and increased the amount of the estimated Bond Issuance to finance the Plan. Appellant Stephen Donahue contended that the City did not comply with the statutory requirements of S.C. Code Ann. 31-6-80(F) (Supp. 2014). Appellant contends the final clause of 31-6-80(F)(2) required respondents to redetermine that the property affected by the amended ordinance met the criteria set forth in 31-6-80(A)(7) (Supp. 2014). He argued the City was required to hear evidence and then state their 31-6-80(A)(7) findings in Ord. No. 2013-19. Appellant subsequently made a FOIA request with regard to the the City's discussions of the ordinance amending the TIF Bonds. Appellant contends that the circuit court erred in finding that between January and September 2013 respondents complied with the FOIA's requirement that "the specific purpose of the executive session" be announced in open session. The circuit court held an announcement that the purpose of the executive session was the discussion of a "proposed contractual matter" satisfied the specific purpose requirement. The Supreme Court agree with the trial court that the ordinance at issue on appeal here was valid, but the Court agreed with appellant that the FOIA was violated. View "Donohue v. City of North Augusta" on Justia Law

Appellant sought to develop a subdivision consisting of forty-four single-family homes on property zoned R-1 residential. Appellant applied to Granger Township Board of Zoning Appeals (BZA) for variances for each of the forty-four proposed lots. The BZA denied the variance application. The county court of common pleas affirmed. Appellant filed a complaint for a declaratory judgment seeking a declaration that Granger’s zoning resolution establishing the R-1 zoning classification was unconstitutional and beyond Granger’s authority because Granger enacted the zoning resolution without enacting a separate comprehensive plan. The trial court denied Appellant’s claims, declaring that Granger had complied with Ohio Rev. Code 519.02’s requirement that a zoning resolution be adopted in accordance with a comprehensive plan. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that a comprehensive plan pursuant to section 519.02 may be included within a township’s zoning resolution and need not be a separate and distinct document. View "Apple Group, Ltd. v. Granger Twp. Bd. of Zoning Appeals" on Justia Law

Plaintiff Richard Grabowsky filed a complaint against the Township of Montclair, challenging the validity of an ordinance adopted by the Township to permit the construction of an assisted living facility on a site located next to the Unitarian Universalist Congregation Church of Montclair. Plaintiff asserted that a statement made by Township Mayor Jerry Fried, a member of the Township Council and Planning Board, demonstrated that Fried had a direct personal interest in the development and that he should have been disqualified from voting on the zoning issue. He also alleged that Fried and a second member of the Council, Nick Lewis, shared a disqualifying indirect personal interest in the development project because of their membership in the Unitarian Church. The Township, its Planning Board and the developers seeking the opportunity to build the assisted living facility denied the existence of any conflict. Plaintiff sought a preliminary injunction barring the Township and Planning Board from considering or approving development applications for the assisted living facility. Although no party filed a motion for any form of dispositive relief, the trial court sua sponte granted summary disposition, and dismissed plaintiff's complaint with prejudice. An appellate panel concluded that the trial court's summary judgment was procedurally improper, but concurred with the court's determination that the two Township officials had no conflict of interest, and affirmed the trial court's dismissal of plaintiff s claims. Upon review, the Supreme Court agreed with the Appellate Division that the trial court improperly granted summary judgment, but did not concur with the panel's conclusion that, on the limited record developed in the trial court, plaintiff's claim was properly dismissed because the Unitarian Church was neither an applicant nor an objector in the redevelopment application at issue. The Court held that when a church or other organization owned property within 200 feet of a site that is the subject of a zoning application, public officials who currently serve in substantive leadership positions in the organization, or who will imminently assume such positions, are disqualified from voting on the application. View "Grabowsky v. Township of Montclair" on Justia Law

Oasis Goodtime Emporium I, Inc., d/b/a Oasis, described itself as a "restaurant featuring nude dance entertainment and alcohol service." Oasis appealed to the Supreme Court "to preserve those two pillars of its business – nudity and alcohol." Oasis argued that when its employees dance nude and serve alcohol, they were "clothed with constitutional free speech protection," which the City of Doraville's Code of Ordinances attempted to strip away. Oasis argued that it should not have been subject to the Doraville Code at all because the legislation making its land a part of Doraville was void due to an alleged statutory notice defect, and that various portions of the Code were unconstitutional. The Supreme Court concluded Oasis was properly subject to Doraville's Code and that the City's regulations did not violate the club's constitutional rights. The Court affirmed the trial court's order granting Doraville judgment on the pleadings. View "Oasis Goodtime Emporium I, Inc. v. City of Doraville" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs in this case were more than 400 residents and homeowners in the upper White Oak Bayou watershed in Harris County. From 1998 to 2002, most of Plaintiffs’ homes were inundated in three successive floods. Plaintiffs filed an inverse condemnation suit against several government entities, arguing that Defendants knew that harm was substantially certain to result to Plaintiffs’ homes when Defendants approved private development in the White Oak Bayou watershed without mitigating its consequences. Defendants responded with a combined plea to the jurisdiction and motion for summary judgment, contending that no genuine issue of material fact had been raised on the elements of the takings claim. The trial court denied the motion. The court of appeals affirmed the denial of the plea to the jurisdiction. The Supreme Court affirmed, holding that a fact question existed as to each element of Plaintiffs’ takings claim, and therefore, the government entities’ plea to the jurisdiction was properly denied. View "Harris County Flood Control Dist. v. Kerr" on Justia Law

Petitioner Stephen Forster, d/b/a Forster's Christmas Tree Farm & Gift Shoppe, appealed a superior court decision to uphold a zoning board of adjustment (ZBA) determination in favor of respondent the Town of Henniker that "weddings [and] like events are not accessory uses" to the petitioner's farm, and that hosting such events was not a permitted use in the farm's zoning district. Because the Supreme Court concluded that petitioner has not established, as he argued, that he had a right to conduct commercial weddings and similar events on his farm, without obtaining either a special exception or a variance, it affirmed. View "Forster v. Town of Henniker" on Justia Law

Defendant’s predecessor in title ("Wayne") owned two tracts of land (“Wayne Tracts”). Park Creek, LLC held adjacent land. Under a pre-approved plan, Wayne and the LLC began constructing a development plan for a residential subdivision using land owned by both Wayne and the LLC. When Wayne conveyed his property to Defendant, his revocable trust of which he was the trustee, future phases of the subdivision remained undeveloped. The Town of Midland later filed two condemnation actions against Defendant condemning three acres of Defendant’s property necessary for an easement. The trial court determined that no unity of ownership existed as to the contiguous tracts of land owned by Defendant and Park Creek, LLC. The Court of Appeals affirmed the trial court’s conclusion that no unity of ownership existed between the Wayne Tracts and the LLC Tract for the purpose of determining compensation. The Supreme Court reversed in part, holding that, where Defendant and the LLC had a vested right to complete the subdivision pursuant to the pre-approved plan, unity of ownership existed between the adjacent properties. View "Town of Midland v. Wayne" on Justia Law

Plaintiffs, a group of associations representing builders, contractors, and plumbers, filed suit against the city of Troy, claiming that the City's building department fees violated section 22 of the Single State Construction Code Act (CCA), MCL 125.1522, as well as a provision of the Headlee Amendment, Const 1963, art 9, section 31. The circuit court granted summary judgment to the City, holding that the court lacked jurisdiction over the matter because plaintiffs had failed to exhaust the administrative procedure outlined in section 9b of the CCA, MCL 125.1509b. After review, the Supreme Court reversed and remanded: the plain language of MCL 125.1509b provided that the director may conduct performance evaluations of defendant’s “enforcing agency” and did not provide any administrative procedure relative to the entity responsible for establishing fees pursuant to MCL 125.1522(1). Because the administrative proceedings in section 9b did not purport to provide the director with the authority to evaluate defendant’s legislative body, the circuit court erred by granting summary disposition to the City on the basis of plaintiffs’ failure to exhaust their administrative remedies. View "Michigan Ass'n of Home Builders v. City of Troy" on Justia Law