Message from the Chairs

Greetings! After returning from the ABA Annual Meeting in San Francisco and the Section of Litigation Leadership Conference in Chicago we are raring to go. Thanks to the outstanding work of our website editor, Robert J. Will, our website has received significant praise. Our Fifty State Compendium Editor, William Blake, reports that we now have state summaries online in states where 70% of our membership resides. In addition, a beta testing of our interactive maps is now online. We owe a tremendous debt of gratitude to Amanda Haschke of the Section staff for all of her hard work in making this happen. This is a tremendous accomplishment!

We continue to look for State Editors for our Eminent Domain Compendium. With your help, we will continue to improve our web-based resources and to work toward getting the majority of states represented. We are looking for additional authors/editors to complete the compendium. Please let us know if you have a desire to contribute to this effort.

Our esteemed leader these past four years, Susan A. Low, has transitioned. We welcome Jill Gelineau as her replacement as a new Co-Chair to work with Jeffrey A. Beaver. Jill has a wealth of knowledge of condemnation, zoning and land use and has been active in ABA leadership over the years. Jill practices in Portland, Oregon at the Schwabe Williamson law firm. She has developed a litigation practice with primary emphasis on representing landowners in condemnation matters. She successfully represented the Dolans in the Dolan v. City of Tigard trial following its remand from the United States Supreme Court, a case which established some significant property rights for landowners. She has been a speaker at numerous conferences locally, nationally and internationally, primarily speaking on the topics of condemnation and land use, and spoke to the Law Society of England and Wales in London in 1995. Jill is also the Oregon member of Owners' Counsel of America, an organization of experienced eminent domain lawyers which selects only one attorney from each state.

Our major objectives of the 2007-2008 year will be to make our Committee the premier source of information and networking for litigators in our field. We want to make membership an important credential for litigators engaged in the practice of condemnation, zoning and land use. We are working to enlarge and deepen our committee membership base and the importance of committee membership/contributions to individual members.We want our members to be able to find and network with other members in their state as well as with members in other states. We would like to continue to improve our newsletter and our subcommittee structure to encourage new leaders in our Committee and Section.

We plan to continue to monitor cutting edge issues as they arise federally and on a state by state basis by continually reminding our substantive subcommittee chairs and state editors to forward information and links to our website editor and newsletter editors.

With respect to zoning and land use issues we note that property rights proponents have taken up the initiative process in the West in attempts to rewrite State and Local land use regulations. A number of States have initiatives on the ballot that, if successful, will compel governmental agencies and local and state jurisdictions to compensate property owners whenever enacted land use laws, rules and regulations restrict a property owner's ability to develop his/her property and diminish the value of that particular property. In Oregon, an initiative passed in 2004 set the ground work for such initiatives. The impact of Oregon's initiative has been that land use regulations have been waived enabling the State to forego paying out approximately $5.6 billion in claims. These "pay or waive" measures may, as opponents have claimed, cost tax payers multiple of billions of dollars. On the other hand, proponents of the measures insist that property is "taken" or damaged without the payment of "just compensation" where land use regulations restrict their use of private property contrary to the Fifth Amendment. It remains to be seen how this will all wash out in November. As Gideon Kanner would say, “Stay Tuned”.

Jeffrey A. Beaver
Jill S. Gelineau
Co-Chairs, Condemnation, Zoning & Land Use Litigation Committee