One of the problems with high-public-profile cases like the multiple challenges to the “Thirty Meter Telescope” up on the top of the Big Island’s Mauna Kea, is that when the court issues an opinion, the public focuses only on the result, mostly from a policy perspective. Who won? Did the court invalidate the TMT permits?
Administrative law
Fourth Circuit: Challenge To Natural Gas Act Delegation Of Eminent Domain Power Must Go Through Admin Process First
Here’s the opinion in a case we’ve been following. In Berkley v. Mountain Valley Pipeline, LLC, No. 18-1042 (July 25, 2018), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit held that the federal Natural Gas Act allows the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to delegate eminent domain authority to Mountain Valley, and that any challenges…
When An Agency Is Given Emergency Powers, Pretty Soon Everything Looks Like An “Emergency”
Stewart Yerton (a reporter who is also a lawyer) today published this report (“This Murky Law Could Give The Governor Broad New Powers“) in Honolulu Civil Beat about a new Hawaii statute that gives administrative agencies the power to adopt emergency rules to respond to court rulings.
Is the statute innocuous, merely a…
The (First?) Post-Oil States Shoe Drops In Patent Takings By Inter Partes Review
If you understand this post’s headline, congratulations: you are the nerdiest of law nerds, checking no less than two boxes in the obscure law category, takings and patent law.
But if you have been paying attention here, you know that recently, the Supreme Court, in Oil States Energy Services, LLC v. Greene’s Energy Group…
4th Cir Oral Arguments In Pipeline Takings Case: “Meaningful” Judicial Review, Or FERC Procedures?
Yesterday, the U.S. Court of Appeals heard arguments about the Mountain Valley Pipeline (which will run from northern West Virginia to southern Virginia), a situation receiving a lot of attention, and which has generated a number of lawsuits (go here for a list of the cases and a summary).
The question in Berkley…
Land Use Institute – Detroit
We’re in Detroit the rest of the week at the Mercy Law School for the venerable Land Use Institute, now in its 32nd iteration.
Planning Chair Frank Schnidman has assembled a great faculty including out Detroit colleague Alan Ackerman (above, talking about takings liability for flooding), and we’ll be spending the time talking inverse…
Department Of Precrime: HAWSCT Considers Cultural “Property” In Public Land
Remember the Tom Cruise/Steven Spielberg flick Minority Report? That’s the one based on Philip K. Dick’s short story in which the police force’s PreCrime unit can presage that a citizen will violate the law in the future, so they arrest him now even though he has committed no crime.
That’s the same vibe we…
April 19-20, 2018: Land Use Institute, Detroit (Printable Brochure)
Here’s the printable brochure with the details on the 32nd Annual Land Use Institute in Detroit, April 19-20, 2018. We’ve plugged the program before so we won’t do so again, except to say that you really should attend because (1) it’s a very good program that won’t take much of your time (fly in for …
32nd Annual Land Use Institute: Detroit, April 19-20, 2018
Mark your calendars, plan to come: Detroit, April 19-20, 2018. For what is perhaps the best deal in CLE (tuition as low as $400), the 32d Annual Land Use Institute, sponsored by our section of the ABA, the Section of State and Local Government Law.
The venue is the…
Indiana: Equal Footing Doctrine Means Public Owns Up To The Ordinary High Water Mark
Update: thanks to Daniel Lehmann for keying us in to this case, now being reviewed by the Supreme Court, involving the foundational question of whether title to Equal Footing Doctrine submerged lands is a question of state or federal law. Scheduled for the Court’s 2/16/2018 conference.
* * * *
In our experience, rationality…




