Opinion ID: 2611904
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 2

Heading: The Court Improperly Applies Its Own Definition of Occupant.

Text: The court's definition of occupant requires that the occupier of the premise have an equitable interest in improvements. Even under this definition, Mrs. Capener would not be entitled to a conveyance of title. The court correctly notes that a tenant is not an occupant in the analogous townsite act context. Opinion at 1073. The relationship between the Assemblies of God and Mrs. Capener is consistent with, and most analogous to, the relationship between landlord and tenant. The Assemblies of God and Mrs. Capener could not both occupy the land in the statutory sense. And while a tenant might have a claim to ownership of improvements under specific circumstances, the court cites no authority for the proposition that the mere existence of such a claim transforms the tenant into an occupant entitled to a conveyance of title. Furthermore, given the terms of the permit, Mrs. Capener cannot have had an equitable interest in the improvements on the land vis-a-vis the United States. The permit states that any improvements will be forfeited to the United States if not removed by the permittee, the Assemblies of God. Whether a permit holder ever can receive title under Section 14(c) is a question that is not necessary to decide, as Mrs. Capener was not a permit holder. She was on land permitted to another, at the sufferance of another, with no expectation of ever gaining title. The only equitable interest in improvements that may have existed was held by the Assemblies of God. Mrs. Capener's sponsor, the Assemblies of God, was denied title when it tried to obtain it outside of the context of ANCSA. [5] The Assemblies of God has never pursued any ANCSA claim. It has never asserted a Section 14(g) claim to protect its valid existing rights as permittee. It has never pursued a Section 14(c)(2) claim to [a] tract occupied ... by a nonprofit organization, although there appears to be no dispute that the Assemblies of God is a nonprofit organization, and that it occupied the land. Yet whatever claim the Assemblies of God may have had, its claim was either as a permittee or as a nonprofit organization which occupied the land.