Opinion ID: 2609384
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 6

Heading: Excess Condemnation

Text: Excess condemnation is the acquisition by the government through eminent domain of more property than is directly necessary for a public improvement. 2A Julius L. Sackman, Nichols on Eminent Domain § 7.06[7][a] at 7-169 (3d rev. ed. 1998) (Excess Condemnation).
Our constitution prohibits excess condemnation of more property than is necessary for the proposed public use even if no private use is contemplated. City of Pullman v. Glover, 73 Wash.2d 592, 439 P.2d 975 (1968); Eastvold v. Superior Court, 48 Wash.2d 417, 294 P.2d 418 (1956); 3 Julius L. Sackman, Nichols on Eminent Domain § 9.03, at 9-10 (3d rev. ed. 1998) (Extent of Interest Acquired, [1]Reasonable Necessity Rule). This required nexus to necessity is known as the public use doctrine. Stoebuck, Theory of Eminent Domain, supra, at 589. Accordingly, the power of eminent domain is strictly construed against the government, 3 Nichols § 9.03, supra, at 9-17, 9-18, to protect against its abuse. The majority also acknowledges the rule that [f]or a proposed condemnation to be lawful, the State must prove that ... property appropriated is necessary for that [public] purpose, Majority at 1255, as well it must. Spokane Valley Land & Water Co. v. Arthur D. Jones & Co., 53 Wash. 37, 48, 101 P. 515 (1909) (It is fundamental that the condemning party cannot take more than his reasonable necessities require.). See also City of Tacoma v. Humble Oil & Ref. Co., 57 Wash.2d 257, 260, 356 P.2d 586 (1960) (stating universal rule that the condemner may take no greater interest than is reasonably necessary for the contemplated public use or necessity.) (citations omitted).
It follows from the reasonable necessity rule ( i.e., that the condemnor may take only that estate reasonably necessary to accomplish the purpose for which the property is to be taken) that only an easement or a qualified fee is ordinarily taken, except if the authorizing statute provides that a fee simple shall be taken, or if a fee simple is necessary for the purposes for which the land is taken. Therefore, if the statute is silent regarding the estate to be taken, only an easement may be acquired or, if necessary, a base or qualified fee.[ [8] ] 3 Nichols § 9.03[3][a], supra, at 9-20, 9-21. The estate or interest which is acquired by eminent domain when it is not necessary to condemn the fee is usually called an easement or servitude.... [S]uch an estate or interest exists, and has existed at least as long as private easements have existed. Id. at 9-23. So too it is clearly the rule in this jurisdiction as well that the necessity of the taking must be defined by the narrowest estate in land which will accomplish the public use; whereas condemnation of an easement or other servitude, not a fee, is the norm. [I]t is well settled that when land is taken for the public use, unless the fee is necessary for the purposes for which the land is taken, as for example when land is taken for a schoolhouse or the statute expressly provides that the fee shall be taken, the public acquires only an easement. City of Seattle v. Faussett, 123 Wash. 613, 618, 212 P. 1085 (1923) (quoting 10 R.C.L. 88). See also City of Pullman v. Glover, 73 Wash.2d 592, 595, 439 P.2d 975 (1968) (In fact, the extent of the taking may be no greater than is reasonably necessary for the stated public purpose.); William B. Stoebuck, 17 Washington Practice, Real Estate: Property Law § 9.10, at 558 (1995); 3 Nichols § 9.03[3][a], supra, at 9-20. Just as a railroad may not condemn a right of way in fee, but only as an easement to be extinguished upon abandonment, Neitzel v. Spokane Int'l Ry. Co., 65 Wash. 100, 117 P. 864 (1911), the necessary estate to be condemned here is at the fourth-floor level, and arguably above, plus only that space necessary for foundation supports. The surplus or excess ground parcelthat which is actually to be sold in fee to the private partyis in no sense necessary for this public use, save and except a possible temporary easement for construction purposes. That condemnation of an estate less than a fee would reasonably suffice to accommodate the exhibition hall use is illustrated by the very facts of this case which admit the simultaneous divestiture of the underlying fee, subject to a government servitude coincident with its sale to a new private purchaser.
A servitude which would allow the construction and placement of the exhibition hall at the fourth floor level is readily capable of independent condemnation in an eminent domain proceeding. See 2 Julius L. Sackman, Nichols on Eminent Domain § 5.04[5][a][i] (3d rev. ed.1998), at 5-298 (Acquisition of Airspace Development Rights); Stoebuck, 17 Wash. Prac. § 9.14, supra, at 571 (Property Rights Upon Land of Another (Servitudes)); Robert R. Wright, The Law of Airspace (1968); Final Draft of Model Airspace Act, 7 Real Prop., Prob. & Tr. J. 353 (1972) (hereinafter Model Act); Pearson v. Matheson, 102 S.C. 377, 86 S.E. 1063 (1915). The facts of this case present a prototypical example of excess condemnation where the governmental entity seeks to take more property than the proposed project requires. See Stoebuck, 17 Wash. Prac. § 9.14, supra, at 589. Such is obviously true given the proposed public project which by its very nature defines its own necessities. What is required is reasonable necessity.... The short answer to the question is deceptively simple: if the only justification for an eminent domain taking, the only public use or purpose the governmental entity identifies, is a certain project, then of course any land beyond what the project requires will not be taken for even an alleged public use. If we agree that 20 acres and no more are needed for a public park, then of course one more acre or one more square foot are excess. Stoebuck, 17 Wash. Prac. § 9.20, supra, at 590. While the maxim cujus est solum ejus debet esse usque ad coelum (whoever has the land possesses all the space upwards to an indefinite extent) is of ancient lineage, [9] early English precedent recognized a separate title in the estate of an upper room or upper stories in houses or buildings. Such was first memorialized in connection with the privileges accorded legal scholars resident at the Inns of Court. See Stuart S. Ball, Division Into Horizontal Strata of the Landspace Above the Surface, 39 Yale L.J. 616, 620 (1930). The growth of the Temple societies necessitated more chambers and when the societies were unable to finance this building program during the reign of Elizabeth I, the various fellows of the Temples built upon designated sites, with the chamber so erected being granted to them for life with the power in the life tenant of assigning or devising these chambers to any other fellow or fellows who would have a similar life tenancy and power of disposition. Wright, supra, at 68-69. Accordingly Lord Coke recognized, [A] man may have an inheritance in an upper chamber, though the lower buildings and soile be in another, and seeing it is an inheritance corporeall it shall passe by livery. Wright, supra, at 69 (citing Coke on Littleton 48b (1628)). See also Model Act at 360. Such division of property into layers of horizontal estates found favor in American jurisprudence since the outset, Model Act at 363, where it has been recognized, for example, that [t]he right of an owner to carve out of his property as many estates or interests (perpendicular or horizontal, perpetual or limited) as it may be able to sustain cannot be open to doubt.... R.M. Cobban Realty Co. v. Donlan, 51 Mont. 58, 149 P. 484, 487 (1915). See also, e.g., Cheape v. Town of Chapel Hill, 320 N.C. 549, 359 S.E.2d 792, 800 (1987) ([T]hey argue ... the holder of a fee simple may not divide his fee horizontally,... [but] absent some specific restraint, the holder of a fee simple may divide his fee in any manner he or she chooses.); cf. Model Act at 363. Our jurisdiction has also long recognized the validity of an estate in property described by a space in the air. See, e.g., Taft v. Washington Mut. Sav. Bank, 127 Wash. 503, 221 P. 604 (1923) (city may vacate part of street easement suspended at an altitude above the street itself).
Since air space can be transferred, it can be taken in eminent domain. Model Act at 365, 366; cf. Stoebuck, Theory of Eminent Domain, supra, at 606 (The conclusion is that `property' in eminent domain means every species of interest in land and things of a kind that an owner might transfer to another private person.). See also Model Act at 365; 2 Nichols § 5.04[5][a], supra, at 5-298, and 3 Nichols § 11.02[2], supra, at 11-30. Some eminent domain statutes expressly reference taking air space as well. [10] Moreover an air space estate is even fair game for an action in inverse condemnation. See, e.g., Hillsborough County Aviation Auth. v. Benitez, 200 So.2d 194, 199 (Fla.App.1967). Applying the aforementioned principles to the case at bar, the conclusion must follow that all that was truly necessary for the government to condemn was a servitude for the air space over the subject property in conjunction with that easement necessary for foundation supports and temporary construction activities. However, the actual condemnation was greatly in excess of that. Such resulted in what the trial court found to be a surplus ground estate which the government would resell to a private entrepreneur for recoupment of a portion of its investment. Such our constitution plainly prohibits as well.