NOT RECOMMENDED FOR PUBLICATION

File Name: 22a0486n.06

Case No. 22-3370

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS

FOR THE SIXTH CIRCUIT

ROVER PIPELINE LLC,

Plaintiff-Appellant,

v.

AMY M. ZWICK, Monroe County, Ohio

Engineer, in her official capacity, et al.,

Defendants-Appellees.

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ON APPEAL FROM THE 

UNITED STATES DISTRICT 

COURT FOR THE SOUTHERN 

DISTRICT OF OHIO

O P I N I O N

Before: CLAY, GIBBONS, and McKEAGUE, Circuit Judges.

McKEAGUE, Circuit Judge. Plaintiff-Appellant Rover Pipeline LLC (“Rover”) 

contracted with Defendant-Appellee Monroe County, Ohio, to access county roads with its 

equipment and vehicles. When the county engineer believed Rover violated that contract by 

excessively damaging the roads, she issued a cease-work order. Rover alleges that the issuance 

and enforcement of that order violated its constitutional rights. Rover also appeals the district 

court’s dismissal of its state-law claims without prejudice after declining to exercise supplemental 

jurisdiction. At bottom, this is a breach of contract dispute that has spawned numerous 

complicated constitutional challenges, none of which has merit. We affirm. 
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I.

Rover is an interstate natural gas pipeline company. The issues that give rise to this suit 

occurred during the construction of an approximately 4.2-billion-dollar pipeline project traversing

multiple states and counties, including Monroe County, Ohio. 

Natural gas projects often require the use of heavy construction vehicles and equipment, 

which can damage roads. Rover’s representatives met with Defendant-Appellee Monroe County 

Engineer’s Department in an attempt to obtain hauling and crossing permits to enable it to use the 

roads. Rover alleges that the county engineer refused to issue permits unless Rover signed the 

County’s Road Use Maintenance Agreement. A Road Use Maintenance Agreement is an 

agreement between a local government and private party that provides for road repair and 

maintenance when the private party damages a political subdivision’s roads. 

At the time of the events in this case, Monroe County had entered into nearly 180 road use 

maintenance agreements with other private companies, and Rover had entered road use 

maintenance agreements with “dozens” of cities, counties, and townships for this pipeline project. 

Additionally, Rover submitted a Residential Access and Traffic Mitigation Plan as part of its

application to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to begin the pipeline project, in which

Rover agreed to “enter into Road Use and Management Agreements with all state, county, and 

municipal regulatory entities to ensure that the roadways utilized during construction of the Project 

are returned to an as good as or better condition than they were prior to construction.” Nonetheless, 

Rover maintains that it entered the Road Use Maintenance Agreement with Monroe County under 

duress because it had to keep the pipeline project on schedule. 

Months after the parties signed the Road Use Maintenance Agreement, DefendantAppellee County Engineer Amy Zwick determined that four roads were excessively damaged, due 
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in part to Rover’s use.

1 She discussed the damaged roads with Rover. Monroe County Oil and 

Gas Coordinator and Highway Supervisor, Defendant-Appellee Brian Kress, even drove a Rover 

representative through the county to examine the roads. According to Zwick, there was “a lot of 

talk, but little action.”

On October 27, 2017, Kress emailed Rover to let it know that one of the roads had 

worsened to emergency conditions. A few days later, Zwick emailed Rover an Emergency Repair 

Notification, and sought legal advice about the situation from the Monroe County Prosecuting 

Attorney. The Road Use Maintenance Agreement provides in relevant part: 

If during the pipeline construction, road damage becomes excessive in nature, as 

reasonably determined by the County or Township, the applicant will make 

additional improvements to strengthen the road base and surface immediately upon 

written notice from the County Engineer or Township Trustees. All work accessed 

by said road will cease until repairs are done to correct the problem. 

R. 80-2, PID 5079. The Prosecuting Attorney advised Zwick that under the agreement “the 

County has the right to, and should, immediately prevent the companies’ access to the affected 

roadways.” R. 69-1, PID 3427. Zwick then emailed a cease-work letter to Rover. 

The next day, Zwick sent Kress and Defendant-Appellee Monroe County Sheriff’s Deputy 

Russell Blamble to four of Rover’s worksites with a copy of the cease-work order. Deputy 

Blamble was told he was there to make sure Kress did not get hurt during the process, and to keep 

the peace. The two visited the four designated work sites, two of which were unoccupied. 

At the Ozark Eddy Bridge site, Kress told a foreman that the workers needed to leave the 

site. Deputy Blamble reports that he did not speak with anyone directly, but that he did tell 

everyone generally that they needed to “move along” because things were taking too long. 

1 Rover and two other companies, EQT Corporation and TransCanada Corporation, were all held jointly liable for the 

damage to the road. 
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At the next stop, the Boltz Hill Road site, Kress similarly shared the cease-work news in 

an attempt to clear the site. At that site, Deputy Blamble also reports that, when asked by workers 

what would happen if they did not leave, he responded that they risked a charge of disorderly 

conduct, but that the ultimate decision on whether they would be charged would be left with his 

supervisor. One of the workers recalls the Boltz Hill Road site events differently, and testified that

at the site: 

[Deputy Blamble] just told me that we had to vacate the right-of-way; that someone 

hadn’t secured the permits or a permit had expired or something and that we could 

not be there. We had to vacate the premises, and if he caught any of us on that road 

again that day, he was going to arrest us.

Rager Dep., R. 62, PID 1291. Ultimately the site was cleared and no one was arrested. 

Rover filed suit and a motion for a temporary restraining order (TRO) the day after Kress 

and Deputy Blamble visited the construction sites. The district court granted the TRO four days 

later, enjoining Appellees from “interfering with or otherwise obstructing Rover, its agents, 

contractors and/or representatives from accessing and/or driving on the Public Roads, and . . . from 

forcibly removing, or otherwise causing to be removed, Rover from its own private property and/or 

barring Rover’s access to the same.” Then the parties settled that action and filed a stipulation of 

dismissal without prejudice. But, following that dismissal, Appellees moved for a TRO, alleging 

that Rover never furnished agreed upon funds. The district court granted Appellees’ TRO. 

Rover then filed the suit giving rise to this appeal. Rover alleges that Appellees violated 

its constitutional rights and the rights of its workers and breached the Road Use Maintenance 

Agreement. Both parties filed motions for summary judgment. The district court denied Rover’s 

motion for summary judgment and granted in part Appellees’ motion. The district court denied 

Appellees’ motion insofar as it required ruling on the breach of contract claims, as it chose not to 

exercise supplemental jurisdiction over those claims, and instead dismissed those claims without 
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prejudice. Appellees had numerous qualified immunity arguments that the district court chose not 

to address because it found “substantial other grounds to grant [Appellees] summary judgment.” 

R. 94, PID 5369. The district court similarly “[set] aside [Appellees’] arguments on standing.” Id. 

at 5388. Rover appealed. 

II.

We review a district court’s grant of summary judgment de novo, viewing the evidence in 

the light most favorable to the non-movant. Fisher v. Nissan N. Am., Inc., 951 F.3d 409, 416 (6th 

Cir. 2020) (citing Anderson v. Liberty Lobby, Inc., 477 U.S. 242, 255 (1986)). Summary judgment 

is appropriate when there are no genuine issues of material fact and a party must prevail as a matter 

of law. Id.; Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(a). Because the parties have filed cross-motions for summary 

judgment, we “evaluate each motion on its own merits and view all facts and inferences in the light 

most favorable to the nonmoving party.” Appoloni v. United States, 450 F.3d 185, 189 (6th Cir. 

2006) (citing Westfield Ins. Co. v. Tech Dry, Inc., 336 F.3d 503, 506 (6th Cir.2003)).

Before turning to address each of Rover’s claims, a note about standing is warranted. For 

its Fourth Amendment, false arrest, and Equal Protection claims,2 Rover details injury suffered by 

the violation of the workers’ rights, not its own. It was Rover’s workers, not Rover itself, who 

were allegedly seized in violation of the Fourth Amendment/subjected to false arrest when they 

were forced to leave the property by the deputy. It was Rover’s workers who were allegedly 

discriminated against in violation of equal protection when they were barred from using the public 

2 Appellees explicitly challenge only the prudential standing of Rover to bring its Fourth Amendment claim. But that 

argument applies with equal force to these other claims, which are claims of its workers, not Rover itself. While there 

is a circuit split on this issue, see Potter v. Cozen & O’Connor, 46 F.4th 148, 155 (3d Cir. 2022) (detailing split), under 

the rule of this circuit we may address prudential standing issues sua sponte. See Fair Elections Ohio v. Husted, 770 

F.3d 456, 461 n.2 (6th Cir. 2014). We see no reason not to do so here, as the issue is already briefed regarding the 

Fourth Amendment claim and there are no material differences between that claim and the rest of the listed claims in 

terms of the third-party standing analysis. 
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roads to travel to Rover, not Rover as an entity. In its Reply Brief, Rover attempted to clarify that 

the civil rights claims are its own, “as the possessor and titleholder of the affected private property 

and commercial construction sites,” not its employees’. Reply Br. at 5. But Rover’s Fourth 

Amendment seizure, false arrest, 3and Equal Protection4claims are not related to property rights. 

They are individual rights belonging to the employees. And Rover has not pointed to any authority 

stating that an employer may assert the individual constitutional claims/rights of its employees as 

its own claims, rather than via third-party standing. 

Rover also argues that it can bring claims of third parties, specifically its workers who are 

its “guests and business licensees.” Id. at 8. This is problematic, because a party “generally must 

assert his own legal rights and interests, and cannot rest his claim to relief on the legal rights or 

interests of third parties.” Warth v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 499 (1975). Section 1983 specifically 

grants a cause of action “to the party injured,” Jaco v. Bloechle, 739 F.2d 239, 241 (6th Cir. 1984)

(quoting 42 U.S.C. § 1983), and ordinarily standing does not exist to vindicate the constitutional 

rights of a third-party. Smith v. Jefferson Cnty. Bd. of Sch. Comm’rs, 641 F.3d 197, 208 (6th Cir. 

2011) (en banc). Third party standing is limited to cases where (1) “the party asserting the right 

has a ‘close’ relationship with the person who possesses the right” and (2) “there is a ‘hindrance’

to the possessor’s ability to protect his own interests.” Kowalski v. Tesmer, 543 U.S. 125, 130 

3 Rover does not allege that the officer’s entry onto its land was an unconstitutional search or seizure of its 

land/property, only an unconstitutional seizure/false arrest of its employees. And employees, of course, are not 

property, and Rover does not argue that they are. Cf. Seale v. Peacock, 32 F.4th 1011, 1028 (10th Cir. 2022) (“[T]o 

the extent [the plaintiff] argues he lost clients and employees, people are not property or things that can be the subject 

of a civil theft claim.” (citing Property, BLACK’S LAW DICTIONARY (11th ed. 2019))). Rover speaks only in terms of 

the employees’ individual Fourth Amendment rights to not be “removed from Rover’s private property by a show of 

authority . . . against their will.” Appellant’s Br. at 30. Thus, there is no sound argument that Rover may assert the 

employees’ individual constitutional claims as its own simply because of the employer-employee relationship. 

4 Rover argues that its “employees, agents, representatives, contractors, and workers were unlawfully barred from 

using the public roadways of the State of Ohio to travel to their place of employment by Appellees” in violation of 

“their right to equal protection under the law.” Appellant’s Br. at 35, 37 (emphasis added). 
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(2004) (quoting Powers v. Ohio, 499 U.S. 400, 411 (1991). The Supreme Court has been reluctant 

to recognize third-party standing claims outside of the First Amendment context and contexts 

where “enforcement of the challenged restriction against the litigant would result indirectly in the 

violation of third parties’ rights,” id. at 130 (quoting Warth, 422 U.S. at 510), neither of which is 

relevant here. 

We assume without deciding that Rover has a “close” relationship with its workers. Cf. id. 

at 139 (Ginsburg, J., dissenting) (explaining that the Court has found a close relationship “when 

nothing more than a buyer-seller connection was at stake”)

5

; but see Region 8 Forest Serv. Timber 

Purchasers Council v. Alcock, 993 F.2d 800, 810 (11th Cir. 1993) (“In cases allowing third-party 

standing, the relationship between the party asserting the right and the third party has been 

characterized by a strong identity of interests which is absent in an employer/employee 

relationship.”).

But the hindrance prong defeats Rover’s argument. Rover relies solely on the allegation 

that the workers who were allegedly unconstitutionally seized/subjected to false arrest are 

financially disincentivized from suing themselves due to the “absence of damages and the costs of 

vindicating their rights.” Reply Br. at 8–9. Specifically, Rover points to the fact that, due to 

contractual obligations, those workers were paid anyway, despite being forced to leave their 

jobsite. In other words, those workers “may actually have obtained an inadvertent pecuniary 

benefit from Appellees’ unlawful actions because they were paid for more days than it would have 

otherwise taken to complete their work had Appellees’ [sic] not detained and removed them from 

Rover’s private property and construction sites.” Id. at 10. But Rover points to no affirmative 

5 However, we note that this statement comes from a case involving direct regulation of the litigant, a posture in which, 

as stated, the Supreme Court has been much more receptive to third-party standing. See Kowalski, 543 U.S. at 130. 

This is not the posture of this case. 
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obstacle preventing the workers from suing on their own behalf, and none is apparent from the 

record. Typically, third-party standing has been found appropriate in the face of concerns such as 

“deterrence from filing suit due to privacy concerns, imminent mootness of a case, or systemic 

practical challenges to pursuing one’s own rights.” Moody v. Mich. Gaming Control Board, 847 

F.3d 399, 402 (6th Cir. 2017). There is no evidence that the workers’ claims involve any of those 

issues. See Smith, 641 F.3d at 209. 

The cases in which the Supreme Court has recognized third-party standing are thus vastly 

different from this one and involve more than just potential financial disincentive. In Singleton v. 

Wulff, doctors challenged the exclusion of abortions from Medicaid coverage; the third parties 

whose rights were actually affected by that restriction (pregnant women) faced deterrents to suit 

including a desire for privacy regarding such a sensitive medical procedure and mootness due to 

the end of pregnancy. 428 U.S. 106, 117 (1976). The issue was much the same in Eisenstadt v.

Baird, which involved a contraceptive seller’s challenge to a restriction on contraceptives. 405 

U.S. 438, 445–46 (1972). The seller was allowed to assert the rights of potential contraceptive 

users, in large part because “[t]he rights of husband and wife . . . are likely to be diluted or adversely 

affected unless those rights are considered in a suit involving those who have this kind of 

confidential relation to them,” and because under the challenged restriction the users were “not 

themselves subject to prosecution and, to that extent, [were] denied a forum in which to assert their 

own rights.” Id. at 446. And in Powers, the Supreme Court found that criminal defendants have

third party standing to bring potential jurors’ equal protection claims when race-based peremptory

strikes are made. 499 U.S. at 414. The Court explained that this was proper because: 

The barriers to a suit by an excluded juror are daunting. Potential jurors are not 

parties to the jury selection process and have no opportunity to be heard at the time 

of their exclusion. Nor can excluded jurors easily obtain declaratory or injunctive 

relief when discrimination occurs through an individual prosecutor’s exercise of 
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peremptory challenges . . . . And, there exist considerable practical barriers to suit 

by the excluded juror because of the small financial stake involved and the 

economic burdens of litigation . . . . The reality is that a juror dismissed because of 

race probably will leave the courtroom possessing little incentive to set in motion 

the arduous process needed to vindicate his own rights. 

Id. at 414–15 (citations omitted). 

Rover points us to no case where a party was allowed to assert a third-party claim on the 

sole basis of financial disincentive of the third party to bring suit. Although Powers did mention 

lack of financial incentive as a reason why improperly excluded jurors are hindered in bringing 

suit, it was merely one in a long list of factors that together culminated in the conclusion that 

excluded jurors faced so many barriers that third-party suits were appropriate. See id.; see also 

Smith, 641 F.3d at 209 (indicating that Powers concerned “systemic practical challenges to filing 

suit”).6 But financial disincentive alone appears far less of a hindrance than other hindrances found 

insufficient to justify third-party standing. See, e.g., Kowalski, 543 U.S. at 132–33 (indigent 

litigants needing to proceed pro se face an insufficient obstacle). Many claims do not involve great 

financial compensation in comparison to the costs of litigation, but litigants bring them anyway—

ostensibly to vindicate their rights. To allow mere financial disincentive—especially where, as 

here, there is no indication that bringing suit would be inordinately difficult or expensive—to 

justify third-party standing would open the floodgates where the Supreme Court has been careful 

to limit access. See Crawford v. United States Dep’t of the Treasury, 868 F.3d 438, 455 (6th Cir. 

2017) (noting that the third-party standing exception is “rare”). 

Further, the financial disincentive issue here is different than the one at issue in Powers, 

where the disincentive stemmed solely from the fact that the suits, due to their complicated context, 

6 The same is true for the case cited by Rover, United States v. De Gross, 960 F.2d 1433, 1437 (9th Cir.1992), which 

involved “numerous procedural difficulties” such that the third party, “the improperly excluded juror[,] effectively 

lacks a remedy for his unconstitutional exclusion from the trial.”
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would likely be expensive to bring and result in very little damages. Here, Rover makes no 

argument about this suit being inherently prohibitively expensive, and its financial incentive 

argument revolves around the fact that the workers may have actually obtained a financial benefit 

due to the alleged violation of their rights. 

As the Supreme Court has noted, “third parties themselves usually will be the best 

proponents of their own rights,” and it simply “may be that in fact the holders of those rights . . . 

do not wish to assert them . . . .” Singleton, 428 U.S. at 113–14. The balance between financial 

gain and vindication of one’s rights, without more, is a personal choice for the right-holder to 

make. Cf. Friedman v. Harold, 638 F.2d 262, 265–66 (1st Cir. 1981) (“The bankrupt wife whose 

alleged rights are being asserted by the trustee is specifically asking this court that those ‘rights’

not be granted to her. She not only does not wish to assert any rights she may have regarding 

discrimination on the basis of her sex, but she could be economically injured if the challenged 

aspect of the tenancy by the entirety were struck down as invalid. This is a classic example of the 

Supreme Court’s principle preventing a litigant from asserting the third-party rights of those who 

do not want such rights asserted.”); Sessions v. Morales-Santana, 137 S. Ct. 1678, 1689 (2017) 

(indicating that mere “disinterest” is not a sufficient hindrance). The kind of relatively minor 

financial disincentive alleged by Rover is simply not a “genuine obstacle,” Singleton, 428 U.S. at 

116, to bringing a claim such that third-party standing—and potentially overriding the desires of 

the workers regarding their own rights—is warranted. Rover therefore does not have standing to 

bring the Fourth Amendment, false arrest, or Equal Protection claims on behalf of the workers 

whose rights were allegedly violated.
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Having addressed those standing issues, we move to each of Rover’s remaining claims in 

turn. 

A. Procedural Due Process

We turn first to Rover’s procedural due process claim. The Fourteenth Amendment 

provides, in relevant part, that “[n]o State shall . . . deprive any person of life, liberty, or property, 

without due process of law . . . .” U.S. Const. amend. XIV, § 1. This Due Process Clause generally 

requires notice and an opportunity to be heard before depriving a person of a property or liberty 

interest, but it is “flexible and calls for such procedural protections as the particular situation 

demands.” Garcia v. Fed. Nat’l Mortg. Ass’n, 782 F.3d 736, 740–41 (6th Cir. 2015) (quoting 

Armstrong v. Manzo, 380 U.S. 545, 552 (1965)). To determine whether the right has been violated, 

courts first consider whether a plaintiff was deprived of a protected property or liberty interest. 

Warren v. City of Athens, Ohio, 411 F.3d 697, 708 (6th Cir. 2005) (citing Hamilton v. Myers, 281 

F.3d 520, 529 (6th Cir. 2002)). If the plaintiff was, courts consider whether the deprivation 

violated due process rights. Id. 

Rover alleges that it had a protected interest in owning and peacefully enjoying property, 

in moving freely in public spaces, and in the freedom to work and pursue economic opportunities. 

Appellant’s Br. at 15. But even assuming Rover has an interest in each of these things, Rover 

repeatedly overlooks the fact that it entered into a contract restricting those interests in certain 

circumstances. Zwick and Kress believed that the road conditions warranted a cease-work order 

pursuant to the contract. And “[a] plaintiff may not bring a § 1983 action ‘when the deprivation 

is a simple breach of contract and there is [an] adequate state breach of contract action available 

as a remedy.’” See Machisa v. Columbus City Bd. of Educ., 563 F. App’x 458, 462–63 (6th Cir. 

2014); see also Shoemaker v. City of Howell, 795 F.3d 553, 559 (6th Cir. 2015) (explaining 
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procedural due process requirements are “fluid and fact dependent” (citation omitted)). Because 

Ohio provides for a breach of contract claim, “that process is due process” in this case. Lujan v. 

G & G Fire Sprinklers, Inc., 532 U.S. 189, 197 (2001). 

We acknowledge, however, that the action did not stop with the issuance of the cease-work 

order, because Rover alleges that Deputy Blamble enforced that order by threatening to arrest the 

workers if they drove on the at-issue roads. Assuming that Deputy Blamble did in fact threaten to 

arrest the workers, as we must at this stage, we still find no procedural due process violation, 

because such actions were “random and unauthorized” and there are available state remedies to 

compensate Rover. See Warren, 411 F.3d at 709–10 (citation omitted); see also Daily Servs., LLC 

v. Valentino, 756 F.3d 893, 907 (6th Cir. 2014). 

Rover itself alleges that Deputy Blamble lacked authority to threaten arrest. Reply Br. at 

25. And there is no evidence that any deputy, let alone Deputy Blamble, has ever threatened arrest 

in a similar situation. Finally, Rover has not alleged, let alone shown, inadequate state remedies 

to compensate it for any abuse of process that Deputy Blamble’s actions may represent. Cf. GEFT 

Outdoors, LLC v. City of Westfield, 922 F.3d 357, 367 (7th Cir. 2019) (finding no likelihood of 

success on due process claim when a city attorney showed up at a worksite and told workers they 

would be arrested if they did not leave). Thus, summary judgment was properly granted. 

B. Substantive Due Process

Rover also alleges that Appellees violated its substantive due process rights by requiring it 

to sign the Road Use Maintenance Agreement before it could begin its work and then creating an 

arbitrary procedure wherein the county ignored the causation requirement of the agreement and 
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shut down work based on only a presumption that Rover damaged the roads, rather than the other 

companies also working on the pipeline. Appellant’s Br. at 22–23.7

The Due Process Clause “contains a substantive component that bars certain arbitrary, 

wrongful government actions ‘regardless of the fairness of the procedures used to implement 

them.’” Zinermon v. Burch, 494 U.S. 113, 125 (1990) (quoting Daniels v. Williams, 474 U.S. 327, 

331 (1986)). To establish a violation of this substantive due process right, a plaintiff must allege: 

(1) a constitutionally protected property interest that (2) was deprived by arbitrary and capricious 

state action. MSI Regency, Ltd. v. Jackson, 433 F. App’x 420, 429 (6th Cir. 2011). This second 

requirement is that the state’s action “either lacks a rational basis or is willful and unreasoning.” 

GMS Dev. Holding Co. 3, LLC v. Bloomfield Twp., 740 F. App’x 495, 496–97 (6th Cir. 2018) 

(quotation and citations omitted). 

As a preliminary matter, a “state-created contractual right is not a proper subject of federal 

protection under the doctrine of substantive due process.” Taylor Acquisitions, L.L.C. v. City of 

Taylor, 313 F. App’x 826, 834 (6th Cir. 2009) (quotation and citations omitted). But even if we 

assume that there was a constitutionally protected property interest outside of the interest created 

by the contract, Rover’s claim fails, because Rover has not established that the state’s action was 

arbitrary and capricious.

The county determined that the road damage was excessive and accordingly shut down 

Rover’s work. This action was contemplated by the contract, which seemingly left the 

determination to the county’s discretion. See Road Use Maintenance Agreement, R. 80-2, PID 

5079 (“If during the pipeline construction, road damage becomes excessive in nature, as 

reasonably determined by the County or Township, the applicant will make additional 

7 Rover did not argue that Deputy Blamble’s actions constituted a substantive due process violation. 
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improvements to strengthen the road base and surface immediately upon written notice from the 

County Engineer or Township Trustees.” (emphasis added)); see also Systematic Recycling LLC

v. City of Detroit, 635 F. App’x 175, 183 (6th Cir. 2015) (“Non-renewal of the HCA was a result, 

moreover, that was expressly contemplated by the terms of the contract itself, which allowed for 

the possibility that the city would not renew it. It does not ‘shock the conscience’ for Detroit to 

do something that the contract between the parties had previously contemplated.”). This does not 

rise to the level of a substantive due process violation. Cf. GMS Dev. Holding Co. 3, LLC, 740 F. 

App’x at 497 (“Local governments make that sort of judgment every day, and nothing about the 

Township’s reasoning here allows us to deem its decision constitutionally arbitrary. This is simply 

a dispute about which the federal Constitution has nothing to do.” (internal citation omitted)); see 

also Hussein v. City of Perrysburg, 617 F.3d 828, 833 (6th Cir. 2010) (“The asphalt driveway 

incident did not implicate specific constitutional guarantees, denial of a driveway does not shock 

the conscience, and an asphalt driveway is not an interest so rooted in the traditions and conscience 

of our people as to be fundamental.”). 

Rover pushes back, arguing that the actions were arbitrary because the county ignored the 

“causation” requirement of the contract. Appellant’s Br. at 22–23. Further, Rover disagrees with 

the characterization of the road damages as “excessive” as required by the contract. Id. But these 

are breach of contract arguments. The district court therefore did not err in rejecting Rover’s 

substantive due process claim.

C. Taking 

Rover alleges that Appellees violated its right to access its property by public roadways,

which amounted to “deprivation of sacrosanct property rights by a state actor without just 

compensation.” Appellant’s Br. at 32. 
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The Fifth Amendment’s Takings Clause, applicable to states through the Fourteenth 

Amendment, prohibits taking “private property . . . for public use, without just compensation.” 

U.S. Const. amend. V; Palazzolo v. Rhode Island, 533 U.S. 606, 617 (2001). 

Again, Rover’s arguments repeatedly overlook the fact that the cease-work order was 

issued pursuant to a contract, and the right to use the property at issue was granted by the contract. 

As such, the proper remedy lies in a breach of contract suit. See Laborers’ Int’l Union of N. Am., 

Loc. 860 v. Neff, 29 F.4th 325, 335 (6th Cir. 2022) (“But we have not found a case, as an initial 

matter, in which a government official merely breached a contract and a cognizable Takings Clause 

claim arose from the breach.”); B & B Trucking, Inc. v. U.S. Postal Serv., 406 F.3d 766, 769 (6th 

Cir. 2005) (“Additionally, if the truckers contend correctly that the contracts do not validly restrict 

their right to control their fuel supply, and USPS nevertheless abridged that right, then the proper 

recourse would be a breach-of-contract claim, not a takings claim.”). The district court properly 

granted Appellees summary judgment on Rover’s takings claim. 

D. Monell Claim 

As Rover has failed to establish a constitutional violation, its Monell claim also fails. See 

McQueen v. Beecher Cmty. Schs., 433 F.3d 460, 471 (6th Cir. 2006); Scott v. Clay Cnty., Tenn., 

205 F.3d 867, 879 (6th Cir. 2000) (“Nevertheless, our conclusion that no officer-defendant had 

deprived the plaintiff of any constitutional right a fortiori defeats the claim against the County as 

well.”). 

E. State Law Claims

Finally, Rover argues that the district court erred by declining to exercise supplemental 

jurisdiction over its state law claims. We review a district court’s decision to decline to exercise 

supplemental jurisdiction over state law claims for abuse of discretion. Veneklase v. Bridgewater 
No. 22-3370, Rover Pipeline LLC v. Amy M. Zwick et al. 

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Condos, L.C., 670 F.3d 705, 709 (6th Cir. 2012) (citing Gamel v. City of Cincinnati, 625 F.3d 949, 

951 (6th Cir. 2010)). We reverse only if “we are left with the definite and firm conviction that the 

district court made a clear error of judgment in its conclusion upon weighing relevant factors.” Id.

(quotation omitted).

If a district court has dismissed all claims over which it has original jurisdiction, it may 

decline to exercise supplemental jurisdiction. 28 U.S.C. § 1367(c)(3). As such, we have explained 

that “declining to exercise supplemental jurisdiction over an action with no remaining federal 

claims is not an abuse of discretion.” Southard v. Newcomb Oil Co., LLC, 7 F.4th 451, 453 (6th 

Cir. 2021). That is especially true in this case, where the state breach of contract outcome could 

have important local consequences. See Oberer Land Devs. Ltd. v. Sugarcreek Twp., Ohio, No. 

21-3834, 2022 WL 1773722, at *6 (6th Cir. June 1, 2022). Accordingly, we affirm the district 

court’s decision not to retain jurisdiction over Rover’s state law claims.

III.

For these reasons, we AFFIRM the district court’s judgment.