Greetings and welcome to the Condemnation, Zoning & Land Use Litigation Committee. “May you live in interesting times.” So goes the so-called Chinese curse. Well, by anyone’s definition, 2008 certainly would qualify as interesting times. We hope that notwithstanding the turbulent economy and harsh winter weather, all of you are doing well and will have safe and restful holiday season.

Our committee continues to grow and offer new and exciting opportunities for members to educate themselves on recent developments in the law, network with other top professionals in the field, and promote their practice to colleagues in other parts of the country. We are excited to announce that the committee is debuting a new publication, the annual review, which will provide useful and comprehensive information on the most significant cases, legislative initiatives, and other legal developments for the past year throughout the country in the condemnation, zoning, and land use field. Charles B. McFarland, will be the editor-in-chief of this new project. We welcome Charles to our editorial team and encourage everyone who has a case, article, or development that they believe is worthy of inclusion in this publication to contact him as soon as possible.

We continue to expand and improve our 50 State Condemnation Law Project, captained by our compendium editor Bill Blake. We hope that the interactive map makes it easier to access the content you want in the state in which you’re interested. We’re excited that as time progresses, more and more state-specific information is becoming accessible through this portal.

Consider joining our committee and consider becoming a contributor either to this website or to the Committee’s annual review. If you do not see your state (or a state in which you practice) in the compendium, please think about becoming a state editor. This offers substantial exposure for both you and your firm’s land use practice with a very modest time commitment. Contact Bill Blake, Robert J. Will, or one of our committee chairs, Jeff Beaver or Jill Gelineau, if you are interested. Already, several of our state editors have contributed case notes and commentary on interesting developments in the law, in addition to their state outlines, and have reported positive feedback (and referrals) as a result of the postings! You could join them.

Spread the word among your colleagues to bookmark this site as an essential resource for condemnation, land use, or zoning lawyers.

Robert J. Will, Website Editor

With mountains of client documents constantly being created, preserved, and distributed in electronic format, there can be no doubt that discoverable electronic data in real property litigation is on the rise. This shift has caused real property attorneys of all stripes—condemnation, eminent domain, zoning, and beyond—to focus more heavily on electronic discovery by asking some basic questions. How to effectively locate and produce the relevant “smoking gun” piece of electronic evidence without breaking the bank? Must all preserved paper documentation be scanned? Can archival data be efficiently hosted and viewed?

In Texas, a common carrier pipeline company transporting natural gas is a public utility with the power of eminent domain, able to condemn property for purposes of laying a pipeline. Even where the company does not actually resort to condemnation, the threat of it can give the company enormous leverage when negotiating an easement. That leverage may be reduced by municipal regulation.

These two courses, January 8-10, 2009, allow practitioners who are new in the field of eminent domain to network with many of the nation’s most experienced condemnation lawyers, and to benefit from many of those same lawyers serving as their faculty.