We are at the ABA Annual meeting this week, so don’t have a lot of time to keep up a long-distance practice and write up comprehensive blog posts, so we’re going to keep it short.
Here’s the latest takings decision from the Federal Circuit in a case we’ve been following, Estate of Hage v. United States, No. 2011-5001 (Fed. Cir. July 26, 2012). The property owners filed their case in 1991 in the Court of Federal Claims seeking compensation for the federal government’s taking of water rights in Nevada. In 2008, the CFC ruled in favor of the property owners, but the Federal Circuit reversed on Williamson County grounds because the case wasn’t administratively ripe. The federal agency, you see, has not reached a final decision on what the property owners might do with the land, and just might issue a permit (even if other similar permit applications by the owners had all been denied). Is the property owner disappointed by this ruling? Likely not, since Mr. Hage died in 2006.
So there you have it: a 22-year old lawsuit in which the CFC after hearing evidence concluded was a “drama worthy of tragic opera with heroic characters” and awarded $4.2 million in just compensation, and in which the agency denied every application for a grazing permit (and in which the property owner has moved on to his final reward) isn’t yet ripe. Why? Because the agency just might issue a special use permit that might allow the use of the water the property owner’s estate alleges was taken.
Here’s more details, from Pacific Legal Foundation’s Liberty Blog.
Estate of Hage v. United States, No. 2011-5001 (Fed. Cir. July 26, 2012)