Check out State ex rel. Sunset Estate Properties, LLC v. Village of Lodi, No. 2013-1856 (Mar. 10, 2015), a case in which the Ohio Supreme Court held that a local zoning ordinance was unconstitutional on its face.
The Village's zoning code, adopted in 1987, banned manufactured home (trailer) parks. Of course, the ordinance could not ban those parks already in existence, which were allowed as nonconforming uses. Sunset Estates was one such park.
The ordinance also provided that if a nonconforming use was discontinued for six months, that was evidence of the owner's intent to abandon the nonconforming use:
Whenever a nonconforming use has been discontinued for a period of six months or more, such discontinuance shall be considered conclusive evidence of an intention to legally abandon the nonconforming use. At the end of the six-month period of abandonment, the nonconforming use shall not be re-established, and any further use shall be in conformity with the provisions of this Zoning Code. In the case of nonconforming mobile homes, their absence or removal from the lot shall constitute discontinuance from the time of absence or removal.Slip op. at 4 (quoting Lodi Zoning Code 1280.05(a)).
"In reliance on this provision, when a tenant left one of appellees’ mobile-home-park lots and the lot was vacant for longer than six months, Lodi would refuse to reconnect water and electrical service when a new tenant wanted to rent the lot." Slip op. at 2. This meant that the owners of the Sunset Park were not able to rent those lots.
They sued, alleging that it was unconstitutional that they lost their nonconforming use rights to a portion of their property by virtue of their tenants' acts. They sought a declaratory judgment that the ordinance was facially unconstitutional (due process), and for Ohio's version of inverse condemnation (under Ohio procedure, a property owner alleging a taking does not sue for damages in inverse, but seeks a writ of mandamus compelling the government to institute eminent domain proceedings).
Long story short: the Ohio Supreme Court held it is a due process violation. There isn't much analysis in the opinion, and this is about all Their Honors had to say:
The Fourteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution and Article I, Section 16 of the Ohio Constitution provide that no person shall be deprived of life, liberty, or property without due process of law. The plain language of the last sentence of the ordinance imputes a tenant’s abandonment of a lot within a mobile-home park on the park’s owner. In so doing, the provision impermissibly deprives the owner of the park of the right to continue the use of its entire property in a manner that was lawful prior to the establishment of the zoning ordinance. Pursuant to the due-process clauses of the United States and Ohio Constitutions, this impermissible deprivation of the vested private-property ;rights of mobile-home-park owners defeats Lodi’s argument that the provision is rationally related to its legitimate goals of protecting property values and encouraging development. Thus, the last sentence of the ordinance is an unconstitutional deprivation of a property right and may not be applied.Slip op. at 7.
The key sentence in that paragraph is the second one, where the court appeared offended that the tenant's abandonment is imputed to the park owner.
State ex rel. Sunset Estate Properties, LLC v. Village of Lodi, No. 2013-1856 (Ohio Mar. 10, 2015)
