Opinion ID: 1974568
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 5

Heading: I-D Procedural History of This Action.

Text: In October 1974, five years after the Maine statute took effect, the commission instituted injunctive proceedings under § 2717(4) to compel removal of the approximately 260 signs of defendant that had been amortized. The case was referred to a Referee who recommended after a hearing that judgment be entered for defendant on the basis that the Maine statute  and more specifically the distinction it makes between compensable and noncompensable signs, as here applied to make signs subject to amortization rather than acquisition by eminent domain solely on the criterion of the unavailability of federal funds  was unconstitutional as a violation of the equal protection of the laws. The State took an appeal to this Court. We overturned the Superior Court's entry of judgment for the defendant based upon the Referee's recommendation and remanded to the Superior Court for further proceedings. State v. National Advertising Company, supra . Defendant neither cross-appealed nor briefed other arguments. Our conclusions in that appeal which bear upon the instant appeal were: (1) that the legislative classification of advertising signs conditioning compensability upon the availability of federal funds was not arbitrary or violative of equal protection; (2) that at the time the action was commenced (October 1974), the Federal Highway Beautification Act did not mandate payment of compensation for removal of signs. Without further hearings, and based upon review of the transcript of proceedings before the Referee, the Superior Court on remand held for the State on all the issues now being raised before us. Defendant's timely motion for findings of facts was denied by the Superior Court (because some of the proposed factual findings proposed were not germane to the delineated issues, and there existed an adequate basis for appellate review). The Superior Court stayed the injunction pending this appeal.