Federal Takings Blog

The owners of land adjacent to a former railroad line converted to a hiking trail under the rails-to-trails program will have another chance to pursue takings claims after the Federal Circuit said the government failed to prove that the landowners didn’t own the property beneath the rail line. A Florida-law doctrine known as the “centerline...

In a unanimous panel opinion, the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals ruled in our favor that a property owner is qualified to testify at trial regarding the value of her property, including severance damages, when a natural gas pipeline company took her property by eminent domain.  Even though it is a long-established rule of evidence that property...

Thor Hearne Interviewed by Sarasota ABC 7 News about Sarasota County’s Demand that Landowners Remove “Encroachments” from the Legacy Trail Right-of-Way. Thor Hearne was interviewed by a reporter for Sarasota ABC 7 News about Sarasota County’s recent demand letter sent to hundreds of landowners along the northern extension of the Legacy Trail. ...

True North Law is responding to notices sent by Sarasota County to hundreds of Sarasota landowners.  Sarasota County’s notices demand that landowners remove all “encroachments,” which include swimming pools, sheds, septic and drainage fields, patios, and other structures, from the Legacy Trail right-of-way on their property prior to February...

On November 6, 2019, True North Law filed an amicus brief in the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit on behalf of property rights organizations and a prominent legal scholar in support of Georgia landowners whose land was taken by the federal government for a public recreational rail-trail.  The Cato Institute, Southeastern Legal...

(U.S. Supreme Court), 572 U.S. 93 (2014) We served as lead counsel for amici curiae Cato Institute, American Farm Bureau Federation, American Land Title Association, National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, Public Lands Council, and Property Law Professors James Ely, Jr., Richard Epstein, Donald Kochan, and Dale Whitman in a case filed by the U.S....

(U.S. Supreme Court) We represented a group of Michigan property owners in this Trails Act taking case, concurrently filed in both the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Michigan and the U.S. Court of Federal Claims, challenging the Tucker Act’s prohibition on filing taking cases against the United States over $10,000 in an Article...