Opinion ID: 1373013
Heading Depth: 1
Heading Rank: 7

Heading: the takings argument

Text: [15] Appellants Grimes argue that diminishment of their prior appropriation in any way is a taking of their property right for which they must be compensated or have the decision of the trial court set aside. [78] A vested water right is a type of private property that is subject to the Fifth Amendment prohibition on takings without just compensation. [79] Nevertheless, the concept of beneficial use, as developed in the common law and as described earlier in this opinion, operates as a permissible limitation on water rights. [80] RCW 90.14.160 provides for relinquishment of unused water rights. The statute provides that: Any person entitled to divert or withdraw waters of the state through any appropriation authorized by enactments of the legislature prior to enactment of chapter 117, Laws of 1917, or by custom, or by general adjudication, who abandons the same, or who voluntarily fails, without sufficient cause, to beneficially use all or any part of said right to divert or withdraw for any period of five successive years after the effective date of this act, shall relinquish such right or portion thereof, and said right or portion thereof shall revert to the state, and the waters affected by said right shall become available for appropriation in accordance with RCW 90.03.250.[ [81] ] Pursuant to RCW 90.14.160, Appellants Grimes were entitled to divert or withdraw the subject water. However, the referee's finding, which we will not disturb, that their voluntary failure, without sufficient cause, to beneficially use all of the waters diverted requires that those waters revert to the state ... and ... become available for appropriation. The Grimeses' claim that their water right has been partially taken without just compensation necessarily fails.