Zoning & Planning

The Supreme Court of Montana’s opinion in Tai Tam, LLC v. Missoula County, No. DA21-0660 (Nov. 15, 2022) starts off like a somewhat typical land use dispute turned into a constitutional fight. The property owner sought subdivision approvals for a 28-acre parcel to allow residential development, and the County denied the applications because “the

Syllabus

Starting in January, we’ll be teaching the venerated, and oh-so-important Land Use course (Law 580) at the University of Hawaii’s Law School.

We’re at least temporarily stepping into some mighty big slippers (this is Hawaii, so we don’t always wear shoes), as this is the course that our mentor Professor David Callies taught for

Here it is, the official agenda and program for the 40th ALI-CLE Eminent Domain & Land Valuation Litigation Conference, February 2-4, 2023 (with a special event the evening of Wednesday, February 1, 2023 to entice you to arrive early).

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Here’s the brochure with the complete agenda, schedule, and faculty listing. But to tempt you,

Well, that was quick. As we noted here, we recently argued a case in the Ninth Circuit (October 20, 2022) about whether a regulatory takings claim is ripe

Not long after we posted the argument recording, the Ninth Circuit panel issued a short memorandum opinion rejecting our arguments wholesale (November 1, 2022).

So earlier

Check it out: our Pacific Legal Foundation colleagues Jim Burling, Jon Houghton, and Jeff McCoy, along with Jeremy Hopkins (Cranfill & Sumner, North Carolina), share with us the latest on property rights, Sackett, takings, the future of Penn Central, and the upcoming SCOTUS arguments in Wilkins v. United States (is

The County of El Dorado requires everyone seeking a building permit for new development to pay a fee to mitigate the additional traffic that the proposed development is predicted to cause. But the County doesn’t calculate the fee by actually looking at a proposed development and predicting what traffic impacts in may be responsible for.

Earlier this month, the U.S. District Court invalidated Honolulu’s stretching of the minimum term for a residential rental from 30 days to three months, concluding that the ordinance likely violates the state Zoning Enabling Act, and also would be a taking if implemented. The court issued a preliminary injunction.

The lawyers repping the plaintiffs in

October 20, 2022 was what one advocate noted was “land use day at the Ninth Circuit,” because three out of the four cases being argued in Courtroom 3 of the San Francisco courthouse were indeed land use — or perhaps more accurately, regulatory takings — cases.

Ours was one of those cases, Ralston v. San

Many Honolulu residents don’t like short-term (less than 30 day) rentals. Whether fueled by NIMBY-ism, a genuine belief that tourists should stay out of residents’ neighborhoods and be limited to accommodations built for transients, or the belief that long-term rentals to locals somehow promote more affordable housing, the anti-transient renter vibe is most definitely

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We spoke on the second panel of the day at the 2022 Brigham-Kanner Property Rights Conference at the William and Mary Law School. The subject of our panel — which included Professors David Callies, Tim Mulvaney, and Dave Owen — was “Reshaping the Framework Protecting Property Under the Roberts Court.

Here’s a rough