Title: Town of Linden v. Birge
Citation: N/A
Docket Number: 22S-PL-00352
State: Indiana
Issuer: Indiana Supreme Court
Date: March 7, 2023

I N  T H E  
Indiana Supreme Court 
Supreme Court Case No. 22S-PL-352 
Town of Linden, Indiana, et al., 
Appellants (Defendants below) 
–v– 
Darrell Birge and Sandra Birge, 
Appellees (Plaintiffs below). 
Argued: December 8, 2022 | Decided: March 7, 2023 
Appeal from the Montgomery Circuit Court,  
No. 54C01-1409-PL-774 
The Honorable Thomas H. Busch, Special Judge 
On Petition to Transfer from the Indiana Court of Appeals, 
No. 21A-PL-1811 
Opinion by Justice Goff 
Chief Justice Rush and Justices Massa, Slaughter, and Molter concur. 
 
 
 
FILED
C L E R K
Indiana Supreme Court
Court of Appeals
and Tax Court
Mar 07 2023, 2:16 pm
Indiana Supreme Court | Case No. 22S-PL-352 | March 7, 2023 
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Goff, Justice. 
State and federal courts have long held that a constitutional taking may 
occur from government-induced flooding. Analysis of a takings claim 
under these circumstances depends on whether the flooding is permanent 
or temporary in nature. Whereas a permanent flooding constitutes a per se 
taking, liability for a temporary flooding hangs on several case-specific 
factors. Because the intermittent flooding of the landowners’ property 
here is inevitably recurring, we hold that the trial court properly analyzed 
the claim as a permanent taking. But the trial court’s findings left 
unresolved whether the flooding’s interference was substantial enough to 
create a taking and the court should have considered the landowners’ 
property lying within the drainage easement. For those reasons, we vacate 
the trial court’s order and remand for further factual findings consistent 
with this opinion and, if necessary, a final determination of damages.  
Facts and Procedural History 
Originally built for agricultural purposes in 1898, the James Hose Drain 
carries water through the Town of Linden from the south, then through a 
drainage easement located on the Birges’ Property, after which it empties 
into a ditch just north of the Property. Due to years of neglect, the Drain 
had fallen into disrepair, resulting in frequent flooding of the Town, and 
ultimately hampering urban development. In 2009, the Town, along with 
Montgomery County, hired an engineering firm to propose a drainage-
improvement plan. The approved plan called for the expansion of a water-
detention area just south of the Town; the replacement of the Drain with a 
48-inch pipe; and the construction, at the drainage easement on the Birges’ 
Property, of two smaller 30-inch pipes splitting from the larger one (the 
Transfer Point), between which would lie a grated manhole to permit the 
flow of water in and out. 
To help fund the project, the Town imposed a special assessment on the 
landowners living within the watershed. After a final public hearing, the 
Birges were assessed benefits from the improvements in the amount of 
$7,679. The county drainage board then adopted the county surveyor’s 
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report and issued a reconstruction order, to which the Birges filed no 
objection.1 After the reconstruction project began in March 2012, 
contractors discovered existing underground utilities in the water-
detention area, prohibiting its planned enlargement. Engineers ultimately 
determined that the new drainage pipes, along with construction of a 
berm (an artificial ridge), would suffice to prevent flooding. When 
construction of the Transfer Point on the Property began, the Birges 
complained about the grated manhole, demanding—by formal written 
notice—that it not be installed or that contractors bury it deep enough to 
avoid impacting their farmland. After engineers confirmed the necessity 
of the manhole (due to the Property’s grading), and after concluding that 
the Birges had failed to timely object to the reconstruction plan, the county 
drainage board proceeded with the approved project—the surface-level 
grated manhole included. 
After completion of the project in late 2012, low-lying portions of the 
Birges’ Property flooded after any heavy rainfall, encumbering the Birges’ 
farming enterprise. So, rather than pay the $7,679 assessment, the Birges 
sued the Town, County, and others (collectively, the Defendants) for 
inverse condemnation. Defendants moved to dismiss, claiming 
discretionary-function immunity under the Indiana Tort Claims Act. The 
trial court granted the motion, but a panel of the Court of Appeals 
reversed. Birge v. Town of Linden, 57 N.E.3d 839 (Ind. Ct. App. 2016).  
On remand, the Defendants unsuccessfully moved for summary 
judgment. After a subsequent hearing on the takings issue, at which both 
parties presented expert testimony and evidence of the flooding’s 
causation, the trial court found that 
• before the reconstruction project, the Birges’ Property 
experienced “no problem with flooding”;  
 
1 See Ind. Code § 36-9-27-52(d) (permitting a landowner to file written objections to a drainage 
assessment). 
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• while the reconstruction project resolved the Town’s flooding 
problems, “all the runoff from the entire watershed now flows 
into” the Birges’ Property due to increased pressurization at the 
Transfer Point during “every heavy rainfall”; 
• the “repeated flooding” increases the “surface flooding” and 
raises the “water table on [the Birges’ Property] outside of the 
drainage easement”; and  
• while the Property’s agricultural yields match the County 
average, the flooding has made farming on the Property “more 
difficult” than before.  
App. Vol. 5, pp. 58–60. Based on these findings, the trial court concluded 
that, by using the Property “as the overflow basin for any heavy rain,” the 
project amounted to a taking in the form of a “permanent physical 
invasion.” Id. at 61. The court then set the matter for a final determination 
of damages. Id. at 61–62. 
On interlocutory appeal, the Court of Appeals reversed, holding—in a 
unanimous published opinion—that “the trial court erred as a matter of 
law when it found that the frequent but non-permanent flooding of the 
Property constituted a permanent physical invasion of the property and a 
per se taking.” Town of Linden v. Birge, 187 N.E.3d 918, 931 (Ind. Ct. App. 
2022). The panel acknowledged, however, that, under the United States 
Supreme Court’s decision in Arkansas Game & Fish Commission v. United 
States, government-induced flooding need not be permanent to be a 
compensable taking. Id. (citing 568 U.S. 23, 34 (2012)). To resolve a takings 
claim in a temporary flooding case, the panel added, Arkansas Game 
directs courts to consider several factors—namely “(1) the duration of the 
interference, (2) the degree to which the invasion is intended or is the 
foreseeable result of authorized government action, (3) the character of the 
land at issue, (4) the owner’s reasonable investment-backed expectations 
regarding the land’s use, and (5) the severity of the interference.” Id. at 931 
(cleaned up). And, because the takings question is an “ad hoc, factual 
inquiry,” the panel remanded to the trial court to consider the Arkansas 
Game factors. Id. (citation omitted).  
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While finding the trial court’s takings analysis dispositive, the panel 
also concluded (1) that nothing in the record suggested the trial court 
improperly relied on the “highest and best use of the property” to find a 
taking,2 (2) that sufficient evidence supported the trial court’s finding that 
the drain reconstruction (rather than some external factor) caused the 
flooding, and (3) that the trial court properly limited its consideration of 
the flooding’s impact to those portions of the Property that lie beyond the 
county’s drainage easement. Id. at 932–934. 
The Birges petitioned for transfer, which we grant to clarify the proper 
analytical framework for takings claims based on flooding and to address 
whether the drainage-easement statute exempts the County from liability 
for a taking. We summarily affirm the Court of Appeals on the first and 
second issues outlined above. See Ind. Appellate Rule 58(A)(2). 
Standards of Review 
When, like here, the trial court issues special findings and conclusions 
under Trial Rule 52, an appellate court applies a two-tiered standard of 
review—first determining whether the evidence supports the findings 
and, if so, whether the findings support the judgment. Indiana Land Tr. Co. 
v. XL Inv. Properties, LLC, 155 N.E.3d 1177, 1182 (Ind. 2020). Without 
reweighing the evidence or reassessing witness credibility, the appellate 
court applies a “clearly erroneous” standard, deferring to the trial court’s 
factual findings “as long as they are supported by evidence and any 
legitimate inferences therefrom.” Id.  
A de novo standard of review applies to the trial court’s conclusions of 
law and the parties’ constitutional challenges. In re Adoption of I.B., 32 
N.E.3d 1164, 1169 (Ind. 2015). 
 
2 See Tornatta Investments, LLC v. Indiana Dep’t of Transp., 879 N.E.2d 660, 664 (Ind. Ct. App. 
2008) (courts consider the “highest and best use” of a property only when calculating 
damages from a taking) (quotation omitted), trans. denied. 
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Discussion and Decision 
When the State exercises its inherent authority to take private property 
for public use, the United States Constitution requires just compensation 
for that taking. U.S. Const. amend. V. If the government takes property 
but fails to initiate eminent-domain proceedings, an affected property 
owner may recover money damages from the State by suing for inverse 
condemnation. Ind. Code § 32-24-1-16. An action for inverse 
condemnation requires the claimant to show (1) a taking or damaging (2) 
of private property (3) for public use (4) without payment of just 
compensation (5) by a government entity. Murray v. City of Lawrenceburg, 
925 N.E.2d 728, 731 (Ind. 2010) (internal quotation marks and citations 
omitted). 
The question here focuses on the first of these factors—whether and to 
what extent a taking has occurred.  
The Birges argue (I) that the trial court properly determined that the 
Defendants’ actions resulted in a permanent physical invasion. The Court 
of Appeals, they insist, misconstrued applicable federal precedent—and 
misapplied Arkansas Game—by concluding that the flooding of their 
Property amounted only to a temporary physical invasion. The Birges also 
argue (II) that, by limiting the flooding’s impact to those portions of the 
Property lying beyond the drainage easement, the Court of Appeals 
improperly expanded the Defendants’ statutory immunity from a takings 
claim.  
We address both these arguments in turn.   
I. The trial court properly analyzed the government-
induced flooding as a permanent physical 
invasion.  
In 1871, the United States Supreme Court first recognized that a taking 
may occur from government-induced flooding. In Pumpelly v. Green Bay & 
Mississippi Canal Co., the State of Wisconsin created a lake by damming a 
section of the Fox River, overflow from which “remained continuously” 
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on the petitioner’s land. 80 U.S. (13 Wall.) 166, 177 (1871). When “real 
estate is actually invaded by superinduced additions of water, earth, sand, 
or other material,” effectively destroying or impairing its usefulness, the 
Court considered it “a taking, within the meaning of the Constitution.” Id. 
at 181. 
Following Pumpelly and its progeny, the Supreme Court, in United 
States v. Cress, considered another flooding-related takings claim. The 
government in that case erected a lock and dam along the Cumberland 
River in southern Kentucky, resulting in periodic, “frequent overflows” 
onto the landowner’s property and diminishing its value by half. 243 U.S. 
316, 318 (1917). In holding that the “damage” to the land amounted to a 
taking, the Court noted that “this is not a case of temporary flooding or of 
consequential injury” but, rather, “a permanent condition, resulting from 
the erection of the lock and dam.”3 Id. at 327. To be sure, the Court 
acknowledged that, unlike cases in which the “overflowing [of] lands by 
permanent back-water” resulted in a taking, the property at issue was 
“not constantly but only at intervals overflowed.” Id. at 327–28, 329. But 
that was a distinction “only of degree” rather than of kind. Id. at 328. The 
“character of the invasion” determines whether a taking occurred, the 
Court emphasized, “not the amount of damage resulting from it, so long 
as the damage is substantial.” Id. And a “right to compensation” for 
“intermittent but inevitably recurring overflows,” the Court concluded, 
was no less valid than a right to compensation for a “condition of 
continual overflow by back-water.” Id. 
Nearly a century later, in Arkansas Game, the Supreme Court considered 
“whether a taking may occur, within the meaning of the Takings Clause, 
when government-induced flood invasions, although repetitive, are 
temporary.” 568 U.S. at 26. In that case, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers 
had authorized seasonal flooding of the Black River over a limited “span 
 
3 Rather than focusing on the “permanence of the government action—construction of the 
lock and dam—[as] the controlling factor,” as the Birges contend, see Pet. to Trans. at 10 
(emphasis added), the takings analysis in Cress rested on the “condition” (i.e., the flooding) 
that resulted from the government action. 
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of years”—between 1993 and 2000—to provide downstream farmers with 
an extended harvest time. Id. at 27–28. The cumulative impact of this 
periodic flooding resulted in the destruction of thousands of acres of 
timber owned by the petitioner-landowners. Id. at 26. In 2005 (five years 
after the floodings had ceased), the landowners sued the government, 
arguing that the Corps’ seven-year practice amounted to a compensable 
taking under the Fifth Amendment. Id. at 29. The United States Court of 
Federal Claims ruled in favor of the landowners, but the United States 
Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit reversed, concluding that, while 
government-induced flooding may warrant a takings claim, such flooding 
must be “a permanent or inevitably recurring condition, rather than an 
inherently temporary situation.” Id. at 27, 29 (quoting Arkansas Game & 
Fish Com’n v. United States, 637 F.3d 1366, 1378 (Fed. Cir. 2011)). The 
Supreme Court disagreed, holding that government-induced flooding of a 
temporary nature, or of “finite duration,” receives “no automatic 
exemption from Takings Clause inspection.” Id. at 27, 34, 38. 
Based on this precedent, we analyze a flooding-related takings claim as 
follows: (1) if the flooding is continuous or “intermittent but inevitably 
recurring,” and the invasion is “substantial,” then it results in a per se 
taking; (2) if, on the other hand, the flooding is temporary or of “finite 
duration,” then the Arkansas Game factors apply. 
The Birges argue that Cress is controlling.4 Defendants, by contrast, 
insist that this case “is more like an intermittent, temporary flooding issue 
that should be analyzed using the Arkansas Game factors.” Oral Argument 
at 17:50–18:00; see also County’s Resp. in Opp. to Trans. at 11 (arguing that 
the “trial court erred by failing to expressly consider and balance” the 
Arkansas Game factors). 
We agree with the Birges.  
 
4 The Birges also argue that, even if the flooding were temporary, the trial court made 
sufficient findings to address the Arkansas Game factors. But, because we find Cress controlling 
here, we need not address that argument.  
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Unlike in Arkansas Game, where the “recurrent floodings” were of 
“finite duration” (lasting from 1993 to 2000), 568 U.S. at 27 (emphasis 
added), the floodings here are repetitive and of indefinite duration—i.e., 
they amount to a “permanent condition,” see Cress, 243 U.S. at 327. As the 
trial court expressly found, and as the record evidence supports, the drain 
reconstruction project has resulted in “repeated flooding events” on the 
Birges’ Property due to increased pressurization at the Transfer Point 
during “every heavy rainfall.” App. Vol. 5, p. 59; see Tr. Vol. 2, p. 56 
(expert testifying to the same effect). In other words, the flooding here 
amounts to a permanent physical invasion by way of “intermittent but 
inevitably recurring overflows.” See Cress, 243 U.S. at 328 (emphasis 
added). Indeed, so long as the Property sustains “heavy rainfall” (or 
unless and until the County takes the necessary corrective measures), the 
flooding will persist indefinitely. This type of physical appropriation 
reflects the “clearest sort of taking,” which we assess by “using a simple, 
per se rule: The government must pay for what it takes.” See Cedar Point 
Nursery v. Hassid, 141 S.Ct. 2063, 2071 (2021) (internal quotation marks and 
citations omitted).  
Still, a taking occurs only when “the damage is substantial.” Cress, 243 
U.S. at 328 (emphasis added). Here, the Birges presented evidence of the 
flooding’s interference with their use of the Property. Brian Shelby, the 
farmer who rents the Birges’ Property, testified that the Property, to his 
recollection, “[n]ever pool[ed] water” before the reconstruction project. Tr. 
Vol. 2, p. 31. But since the project’s completion, he attested, the Property is 
“almost always” wet, creating “root issues” for the crops and preventing 
him in some years from farming it “at all without getting equipment 
stuck.” Id. at 31–32. The constant saturation of the Property, he added, 
delays the annual planting season by up to a month, preventing him from 
ever attaining the “maximum yield.” Id. at 32.  
Whether this (and other) evidence shows an interference substantial 
enough to create a taking was a question of fact for the factfinder. See 
Mendenhall v. City of Indianapolis, 717 N.E.2d 1218, 1227 (Ind. Ct. App. 
1999). But the trial court here found only that the flooding rendered 
farming on the Property “more difficult” than before. App. Vol. 5, p. 60. 
We thus remand for further development of the trial court’s factual 
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findings to support its determination whether the flooding amounted to a 
permanent physical invasion. 
We now turn our attention to the geographic scope of the Birges’ 
takings claim.  
II. The statutory right of entry does not exempt a 
county from liability for a takings claim. 
Indiana Code section 36-9-27-33 gives to a county a “right of entry over 
and upon land” lying within seventy-five feet of a regulated drain and it 
exempts a county from liability for any necessary drain “reconstruction or 
maintenance” that results in damage to crops grown within that right of 
way. I.C. § 36-9-27-33(a), (d) (2013).  
The trial court here expressly limited its findings to the Birges’ Property 
“outside of the drainage easement.” App. Vol. 5, p. 59 (emphasis added). 
This finding, the Court of Appeals concluded, restricted the compensable 
taking to the flooding’s effect on Property lying beyond the “pre-existing 
drainage easement.” Birge, 187 N.E.3d at 934. The Birges fault the Court of 
Appeals for misinterpreting Indiana Code section 36-9-27-33. Pet. to Trans. 
at 7–8. Such a reading of the statute, they contend, “improperly expanded 
the grant of immunity” to permit the destruction of “all crops within 75 
feet of a regulated drain.” Id. at 19, 20.  
Defendants, on the other hand, insist that Indiana courts interpreting 
the statute “have routinely held that this property right constitutes an 
easement.” County’s Resp. Opp. to Trans. at 15; see Mattingly v. Warrick 
Cnty. Drainage Bd., 743 N.E.2d 1245, 1249 (Ind. Ct. App. 2001) (“A plain 
reading of the statute shows that the legislature intended to create both a 
seventy-five foot right-of-entry and a seventy-five foot right-of-way, or 
easement.”); Johnson v. Kosciusko Cnty. Drainage Bd., 594 N.E.2d 798, 804 
(Ind. Ct. App. 1992) (concluding that “state law grants the county an 
easement of up to 75 feet on either side of the drain”). And because it 
holds an interest in the Property here “by way of this statutory easement,” 
the County argues that no taking may arise based on changes to the 
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Property lying within the easement. County’s Resp. Opp. to Trans. at 7, 
17. 
Again, we agree with the Birges.  
When interpreting a statute, we begin by reading its words in their 
plain and ordinary meaning, taking into account “the structure of the 
statute as a whole.” ESPN, Inc. v. Univ. of Notre Dame Police Dep’t, 62 
N.E.3d 1192, 1195 (Ind. 2016). Mindful of what the statute says and what it 
doesn’t say, we aim to “avoid interpretations that depend on selective 
reading of individual words that lead to irrational and disharmonizing 
results.” Id. (quotation and citation omitted). Rather, we presume the 
“legislature intended for the statutory language to be applied in a logical 
manner consistent with the statute’s underlying policy and goals.” 
Rodriguez v. State, 129 N.E.3d 789, 793 (Ind. 2019) (quotation and citation 
omitted). Ultimately, “our goal is to determine and give effect to” the 
legislature’s intent. State v. Int’l Bus. Machines Corp., 964 N.E.2d 206, 209 
(Ind. 2012) (citation omitted). 
Whether we refer to the County’s interest in the Property as an 
“easement” or something else, the statute here grants the County a “right 
of entry over and upon land” lying within seventy-five feet of a regulated 
drain for the limited purpose of the drain’s “operation” or “reconstruction 
or maintenance.” See I.C. § 36-9-27-33(a), (d). To facilitate this right of 
entry, the statute prohibits the erection of permanent structures and the 
planting of “woody vegetation” along the easement without the county’s 
written consent. I.C. § 36-9-27-33(d). And, while a landowner need not 
secure approval for the placement of temporary structures, the county 
may order the immediate removal of those structures, along with any 
“woody vegetation,” if necessary for the drain’s operation or maintenance. 
Id.  
Beyond these limited restrictions, the statute permits the landowner to 
“use the land in any manner consistent with this chapter and the proper 
operation of the drain,” including the planting of crops. Id. (emphasis 
added). And, while exempting the County from liability for any damage 
done to “[c]rops grown on a right-of-way” when “necessary in the 
reconstruction or maintenance of the drain,” the statute expressly directs 
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the County, when “exercising the right” of entry, and “to the extent 
possible,” to “use due care to avoid damage” to the “crops and approved 
structures inside the right-of-way.” I.C. § 36-9-27-33(c), (d) (emphasis 
added). Moreover, when exercising its right of entry, the county must 
notify the property owner, either orally or in writing, of the “purpose for 
the entry.” I.C. § 36-9-27-33(c).  
The “intrusions contemplated” by this statute, Indiana courts have 
opined, are merely “incidental,” “minimal and infrequent.” Johnson, 594 
N.E.2d at 804 (distinguishing such intrusions from takings, which involve 
“actual interference with, or disturbance of property rights, which are not 
merely consequential, or incidental injuries to property or property 
rights”). While such “incidental” damage to crops still permits the farmer 
to “use the land” in a “manner consistent with” Indiana drainage law, see 
I.C. § 36-9-27-33(d), the complete destruction of crops from intermittent 
yet inevitably recurring (i.e., permanent) flooding does not. Interpreting 
the statute as immunizing the county from liability for any loss occurring 
within the easement would deprive the Birges of their right to farm the 
land and to realize its fullest economic potential. Cf. Johnson, 594 N.E.2d at 
804–05 (holding that the drain’s conversion to a “regulated drain” resulted 
in “no additional taking of the property” where landowners “presented 
no evidence that they [would] be unable to use the property” and “even 
acknowledge[d] that they may plant crops” within the easement).  
In short, the right of entry under Indiana Code section 36-9-27-33 does 
not exempt the county from liability for a takings claim.  
Conclusion 
For the reasons above, we hold that the Birges’ takings claim is 
properly analyzed as a per se permanent taking—one encompassing that 
portion of the Property lying both within and outside of the county’s 
drainage easement. But whether the flooding’s interference is substantial 
enough to create a taking is a question left unresolved by the trial court’s 
findings. We thus vacate the trial court’s order and remand (1) for further 
factual findings on the issue of whether the flooding here amounted to a 
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substantial permanent physical invasion of the Property (including that 
portion lying within the drainage easement), and (2) for a final 
determination of damages (if any), the assessment of which should 
include consideration of the flooding’s effect on the Birges’ use of the 
Property within the statutory right of way. 
Rush, C.J., and Massa, Slaughter, and Molter, JJ., concur. 
A TT O R N E YS F O R  AP P EL LA N T  
T O W N  OF  L IN D E N  
Sheri Bradtke McNeil 
Lizabeth R. Hopkins 
Kopka Pinkus Dolin, PC 
Crown Point, Indiana 
A TT O R N E YS F O R  AP P EL LA N T S 
M O N T G OM E R Y C OUN T Y , ET AL.  
John J. DeRoss, Jr. 
Brandon W. Ehrie 
Kyle A. Lansberry 
Lewis Wagner, LLP 
Indianapolis, Indiana 
A TT O R N E YS F O R  AP P EL LA N T S 
B AN N I N G E N G I NEER I N G , P. C. , J E FF  
H E AL Y,  A N D J O SE PH  L. MI LLE R  
Gregory P. Cafouros 
Steven E. Runyan 
Kroger Gardis & Regis, LLP 
Indianapolis, Indiana 
A TT O R N E YS F O R  AP P EL LE ES  
James E. Ayers 
Wernle, Ristine & Ayers 
Crawfordsville, Indiana 
Michael L. Einterz 
Michael L. Einterz, Jr. 
Einterz & Einterz 
Zionsville, Indiana