Agenda - Planning Commission - 06/06/2013

Home

Zoning Bulletin April 25, 2013 I Volume 7 ( Issue 8 See also: Barrow v. Prince Edward County, 121 Va. 1, 92 S.E. 910 (1917). See also: Williams v. Consolvo, 237 Va. 608, 379 S.E.2d 333 (1989). See also: Vick v. Siegel, 191 Va. 731, 62 S.E.2d 899 (1951) Case Note: Horton had also argued that it was entitled to fee reimbursement because the County's retention of the fees unjustly enriched the County and was inherently inequitable. The court again rejected Horton's argument, finding that the voluntary payment doctrine provided the County a valid defense to a claim asserting unjust enrichment. Inverse-. ondemnation— ondition_ placed on special exception is eemed unla ful Property owner then claims condition amounted to a regulatory taking Citation: Midwest Minerals, Inc. v. Wilson, 2013 WL 772640 (Ind. Ct. App. 2013) INDIANA (02/27/13)—This case addressed the issue of whether a regula- •tory taking (i.e., inverse condemnation) occurred as a result of a condition placed on a special exception granted to the landowner. The Background/Facts: Midwest Minerals, Inc. ("Midwest") owned real property (the "Property") in West Terre Haute in Vigo County (the "County"), Indiana. The Property was zoned M-2 heavy industrial and had been the site of a former coal mine. The County's Unified Zoning Ordinance (the "Ordi- nance") provided an exhaustive list of permitted uses in the M-2 heavy industrial district. The Ordinance also provided a list of activities that required a special exception, which included manufacturing gas. Midwest sought to establish a molecular methane gas processing unit on the Property. The processing unit would allow Midwest to extract coal mine methane gas and then process it by filtering out impurities to bring the methane gas to commercial grade. Because it was determined that Midwest's proposed activities would con- stitute "manufacturing" gas, Midwest was required, under the Ordinance, to apply to the Board of Zoning Appeals of the Area Plan Commission of Vigo County (the "BZA") to obtain a special exception. Eventually, in 2005, the BZA granted the special exception subject to certain conditions. One of the conditions —"the public water condition" — required Midwest to provide public water to any residential use, existing and future, within one-half mile of any and all wells associated with coal mine methane processing to insure there would be no contamination of the water supply to the surrounding residences. © 2013 Thomson Reuters 5