Thanks to Cameron Westbrook, President of the student chapter of the Denver Law Federalist Society for sponsoring a program today at the law school which put us together with Colorado Rep. Javier Mabrey in a “debate” on housing law and policy.
Continue Reading Why Is Rent So High? We Figured Out Why Today
Next week, we’ll be at the Denver Law School for the 2026 Rocky Mountain Land Use Institute’s “Western Places | Western Spaces” annual conference. Earlier in our career, we were a fairly regular attendee, but for mesne reasons (unrelated to the conference) our ability to attend kind of fell off. Recognizing that shortcoming, we attended the 2025 Conference last year. This convinced us that indeed, we were missing out. In short, the RMULI has returned as a featured event on our calendar.
Continue Reading Join Us At The Rocky Mountain Land Use Institute (Denver) To Talk Sheetz, And Housing
Here’s what’s on our radar screen today: Anthony Flint, How Zoning Won (Bloomberg) (“In 1926, the Supreme Court’s Euclid decision enshrined zoning in US cities. On its 100th anniversary, academics gathered to reflect on the landmark ruling’s mixed legacy.”)
Continue Reading Today’s Dirt Law Round-Up: Zoning, Public Use, and Penn Central History
Be sure to check out the North Carolina Court of Appeals’ recent opinion in LDI Shallotte 197 Holdings, LLC v. North Carolina, No. COA24-443 (Jan. 21, 2026), where the court held the plaintiff’s allegation that a two-year delay in the State issuing a permit adequately pleaded a temporary taking claim. The court reversed the dismissal of the complaint.
Continue Reading NC App: Two-Year Permit Delay Could Be A Temporary Taking
In Lifetime Communities, Ltd. v. City of Worthington, No. 25-3048 (Jan. 27, 2026), the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit held that the city’s refusal to upzone a vacant parcel from “S-1” (which permits only parks, hospitals, churches, and other similar institutional uses) to a designation that would allow mixed-use development, was not a Penn Central taking.
Continue Reading CA6: Denial Of Rezoning Is Not A Penn Central Taking
Pictured: PLF’s Steve Davis, getting us started. We’re underway today with the academic symposium “Euclid Turns 100: Rethinking an Antiquated Case and Reimagining Euclidean Zoning for the Century Ahead” at the George Mason Law School. Cosponsored by the law school’s Journal of Law, Economics, and Policy, Mercatus Center, and our outfit Pacific Legal Foundation, the symposium is designed to focus the discussion of housing, zoning, and property rights (hot topics in the headlines), and ask the question: has Euclidean zoning outlived its usefulness? And if so, what, if anything, should replace it?
Continue Reading Symposium: “Euclid Turns 100: Rethinking an Antiquated Case and Reimagining Euclidean Zoning for the Century Ahead”
If you are still looking for a reason to head to the 808 next month, here it is. The 2026 Future of Property Law Conference, February 13, 2026 at the University of Hawaii School of Law.
Continue Reading 2026 Future of Property Law Conference, University of Hawaii Law School, Feb 13, 2026 (Live & Webcast)
Tomorrow, November 22, 2025 is the 99th anniversary of the day in 1926 when the United States Supreme Court issued its landmark opinion in Village of Euclid v. Ambler Realty Co., 272 U.S. 365 (Nov. 22, 1926).
You know this one (and can you call yourself a dirt lawyer if you don’t?).
When an opinion starts off with “[t]his zoning/inverse condemnation case revolves around the availability of parking…” you kinda know, whatever the issues might be, that the court isn’t likely headed in a good direction for the claimant.
That’s exactly how the Supreme Court of South Carolina began The Gulfstream Cafe, Inc. v. Georgetown County
Here’s the latest in a case we’ve been following.
Recall that a couple of months ago, the court of appeals held that the challengers were likely to succeed in their challenge to Dallas’s short-term rental ban. The case was up on appeal from a preliminary injunction, so there wasn’t a lot in that