Opinion ID: 2691733
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: Litigation Involving Property

Text: {¶ 9} In 1999, the Erie MetroParks Board of Commissioners initiated a declaratory-judgment action in the Erie County Court of Common Pleas against Key Trust. In 2000, the board filed an amended complaint for declaratory judgment that added those property owners, including most of the relators in this case, who may have received Key Trust’s interests in the former canal-company property. The common pleas court entered a judgment finding that the property leased by the railroad consisted solely of the Merry and Townsend properties but that the lease was void because it had been breached by a predecessor in interest to the board of park commissioners. 3 SUPREME COURT OF OHIO {¶ 10} On appeal, the court of appeals affirmed the judgment of the common pleas court insofar as it found that the railroad lease was limited to the land obtained by the canal company from Merry and Townsend. Erie Metroparks Bd. of Commrs. v. Key Trust Co. of Ohio, N.A. (2001), 145 Ohio App.3d 782, 787-788, 764 N.E.2d 509. The court of appeals held that the trial court had, however, erred by concluding that the board’s predecessor in interest had breached the railroad lease. Id. at 790. The court of appeals reversed that portion of the trial court’s judgment invalidating the lease and remanded the cause for further proceedings. Id. at 791. {¶ 11} On remand, the common pleas court held that the lessee had not abandoned the leased property, that the lease is in full force and effect, that the board of park commissioners is the current lessee and the holder of the lessee’s rights under the lease, that the board is entitled to the sole occupancy and use of the leased property, that the rights of the defendants – including most of the relators here – are subject to the board’s rights under the lease, and that the lease permitted the board to improve and use the leased property as a parkway or recreational trail. The trial court further concluded that the extent of the leased property was limited to the Merry and Townsend tracts conveyed to the canal company. {¶ 12} In an appeal from the common pleas court’s judgment on remand, the defendants, including most of the relators here, asserted that the portion of the judgment describing the leased property differed from a prior description, which had restricted the leased property to the Merry and Townsend parcels. The court of appeals rejected this contention by holding that the judgment on remand did not contradict the finding in the previous judgment entries “that the leased property encompassed only land obtained from Townsend and Merry.” Erie Metroparks Bd. of Commrs. v. Key Trust Co. of Ohio, Erie App. Nos. E-02-009 4 January Term, 2010 and E-02-011, 2002-Ohio-4827, ¶ 22. The court of appeals affirmed the trial court’s judgment.
{¶ 13} In 2003, the Coleses, Buffalo Prairie, and certain other landowners filed a civil-rights action in federal district court under Sections 1983, 1985(2), and 1985(3), Title 42, U.S.Code, against the board and its director-secretary for violations of their rights under the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the United States Constitution. Coles v. Granville (Jan. 24, 2005), N.D. Ohio No. 3:03 CV 7595, 2005 WL 139137. They alleged that in developing the recreational trail, the board asserted entitlement to property beyond that found to be covered by the railroad lease in the Key Trust cases. The federal district court dismissed the case and determined that, as a federal court, it was barred from reviewing the state court’s findings. Id. at . On appeal, the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit affirmed, holding that the plaintiffs’ cause of action for unconstitutional takings was not ripe for federal review when they had not brought a state action in mandamus to compel appropriation proceedings. Coles v. Granville (C.A.6, 2006), 448 F.3d 853, 865.
{¶ 14} Shortly after the Sixth Circuit’s decision in Coles, the Coleses, Buffalo Prairie, and certain other property owners who are successors to the canal-company property – but not including the relators in the present mandamus case – filed an action in this court for a writ of mandamus to compel the board of park commissioners and its director-secretary to either (1) commence an appropriation proceeding to compensate them for the board’s taking of their property or (2) relinquish the seized property and direct the park district not to file an eminent-domain action to appropriate their property. {¶ 15} In November 2007, we granted a writ of mandamus to compel the board to commence an appropriation proceeding to compensate the property 5 SUPREME COURT OF OHIO owners for an involuntary taking of their property. State ex rel. Coles v. Granville, 116 Ohio St.3d 231, 2007-Ohio-6057, 877 N.E.2d 968, ¶ 59. We found that the property owners had “established that by employing their private property for public use as a recreational trail, the board of park commissioners has taken their property.”
{¶ 16} In January 2009, relators filed this action for a writ of mandamus to compel respondents, Erie MetroParks and its board of commissioners, to “initiate, within sixty (60) days of the issuance of the Writ, appropriation proceedings” pursuant to R.C. Chapter 163. After the park district and its board filed an answer and motion for judgment on the pleadings, we granted an alternative writ. Respondents filed an amended answer raising a statute-oflimitations defense. {¶ 17} The parties have now filed evidence and briefs. We granted relators the Hohlers’ application to dismiss their claims. {¶ 18} The parties have also filed motions for leave to supplement their evidence. For the parties’ initial motions, because they are unopposed and neither side claims prejudice from their consideration by the court, we grant the motions. We also grant relators’ July 30 motion for leave to supplement their evidence because we find that the proffered evidence is pertinent to their mandamus claim and relators could not have been submitted it at the time that their evidence was due. {¶ 19} This case is now before us for our consideration of the merits.