Real Estate & Property Law

Airport issues with Solbergs

By Alan Ackerman

Hunterdown County Democrat

At last night's committee meeting, Don Baldwin asked, "When is enough, enough?" He said officials have "squandered literally millions of dollars" in legal fees in the battle with the Sol bergs. "When is the bleeding going to stop? When will the committee reduce its losses -- or more correctly our losses... When will fiscal sanity be restored?"

The comments are in the wake of last month's opinion from the Superior Court Appellate Division about the township's efforts to condemn and acquire the land surrounding Solberg Airport and acquire development rights to the airport itself. The opinion reverses that of a trial judge and says that only a trial can resolve the issues in the dispute.

The court also sided with the Solbergs over its dispute with the township over property taxes. It overturned a previous court decision to allow the township to withdraw money from a trust fund to pay taxes it said were owed on the property after the date it acted to take the property. "Solberg had no responsibility for the taxes," the court wrote.

But at this week's meeting, the Township Committee voted to ratify is decision to appeal the case to the state Supreme Court. Because the three-judge Appellate opinion was unanimous, the Supreme Court is not required to accept the case for review.

When local governments lose condemnation actions because they do not have the statutory authority to take, the first thing they do is yell, 'Appeal,' as if some golden wand will finally give them the authority they know they do not have.  That is where the community is going with the Solberg Airport eminent domain proceeding. 

This case sounds like the attempted acquisition of the Grosse Ile Bridge between Grosse Ile Township and Riverview in Michigan.  The Township, by multiples, added to the expense by forcing the issue through a Supreme Court decision, losing every step of the way.

Full post as published by National Eminent Domain Blog on September 13, 2009 (boomark / email).