Eminent Domain Report

Local government agencies sometimes enact short-term building moratoriums for certain areas to further assess changes in land use patterns or slow growth.  Those moratoriums imposed across a large area usually do not constitute a taking.  But what if a moratorium is imposed solely and specifically as to a singled-out property?  Does that moratorium give rise to a taking?  According to a recent court of appeal opinion, the answer is no, at least when that moratorium is imposed as a penalty against the property owner for violating local building codes.

Background

In Lemons v. City of Los ...

In June of last year, the U.S. Supreme Court issued a unanimous opinion in Horne v. Department of Agriculture holding that California raisin handlers could assert a takings claim as an affirmative defense to an enforcement action filed by the United States.  I am happy to point out that in our analysis of the Supreme Court's decision, we explained that "[n]o court has yet found that the Hornes were subject to an unconstitutional taking; rather, the Supreme Court merely held that the jurisdictional argument relied on by the Ninth Circuit to avoid a decision on the merits was ...