Opinion ID: 2973538
Heading Depth: 2
Heading Rank: 1

Heading: The District Court’s Prior Decisions

Text: On March 30, 1995, the district court issued its “Decision and Entry Sustaining Motion of Plaintiff Waste Management of Ohio, Inc. for Clarification of Agreed Consent Decree and Sustaining in Part and Overruling in Part Said Plaintiff’s Motion for Supplemental Relief Pursuant to the Settlement Agreement.” Waste Management filed the motion for clarification because of a dispute over the dimensions of the landfill and asked the court to interpret and clarify the Consent Decree and Settlement Agreement. JA 153-54 (“Indeed . . . this Court specifically stated that its purpose was to help the parties clarify the Consent Decree and not to modify it.”). The court conducted an oral and evidentiary hearing. Specifically at issue in this 1995 decision was a dispute over the situs of the landfill, its final slope and its final maximum height above sea level. No. 04-4326 Waste Management of Ohio, Inc. v. City of Dayton Page 7 Waste Management argued that the site plan “was not more than a conceptual drawing, which did not purport to set final dimensions for the landfill,” and also that PD-69, “as incorporated into the Settlement Agreement and adopted” by the City did not mention a final, maximum height or final grading slope. The district court reviewed the evidence, including James Logsdon’s affidavit, and found that the Consent Decree and Settlement Agreement do not expressly mention either of the dimensions for the landfill. Nevertheless, the court found that “the Settlement Agreement does provide that WMI shall construct the landfill in accordance with revised PD-69, and, under revised PD-69, WMI agreed that all dimensions on the approved plan shall be binding upon it.” The court then found that when the City approved the Settlement Agreement, the only plan before it was “the plan which WMI submitted to Dayton on August 1, 1990, and to which Dayton’s staff added a legend and the text of revised PD-69.” Finding that this plan was the “approved plan,” the court concluded that the dimensions in the plan were binding on Waste Management. Waste Management continued to argue that the parties did not expect the final dimensions to be determined prior to the involvement of the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency. The district court found, however, that “there is no language in the Consent Decree, Settlement Agreement or revised PD-69 which would give either WMI or the Ohio EPA the right to alter the dimensions of the landfill.” The court further rejected Waste Management’s claim that “its original design of the landfill was dynamic, conceptual only and subject to change, and that, therefore, the dimensions for final, maximum height and slope . . . are not binding.” Moreover, “[t]here is no language in the Consent Decree, Settlement Agreement or revised PD-69 which would provide for the design of a landfill subject to later alteration by a body other than the Dayton City Commission.” No. 04-4326 Waste Management of Ohio, Inc. v. City of Dayton Page 8 Accordingly, “[t]he Settlement Agreement quite unambiguously provides that the dimensions on the approved plan shall be binding” on Waste Management.
The dispute in 1996 involved the “location of certain buildings[, parking lots, and wheel washing facilities] on the landfill property.” See Opinion Setting Forth Decision on Unresolved Dispute; WMI Ordered to Pay Escrowed Funds to Dayton. To start, the district court referenced its 1995 decision where it interpreted the Settlement Agreement to require Waste Management to comply with all the terms and conditions of revised PD-69. Revised PD-69 specifically provided that: “All dimensions on approved plan shall be binding, and the appropriate scale be used to interpret where dimensions are lacking, unless modified as per Section 150.289 of the R.C.G.O.” Based on the 1994 Letter from Paul Woodie, Waste Management argued that the City was now estopped from preventing Waste Management from moving the buildings to the south side of the landfill. The district court concluded that it did not have jurisdiction to hear the estoppel claim. It found that “this Court’s jurisdiction is limited to the question of whether [the] Settlement Agreement and the Consent Decree permit WMI to locate the buildings on the south side of the property, rather than on the western edge, as was disclosed by the initial site plan which accompanied Revised PD-69.” Regarding the interpretation issue, the court found that “the initial site plan shows that the buildings will be located on the western side of the property.” The court continued: Although the text of Revised PD-69 does not address the location of the buildings, it expressly states that “parking shall be located in the area depicted on the site plan No. 04-4326 Waste Management of Ohio, Inc. v. City of Dayton Page 9 . . . .” Parking is an integral part of the buildings in question. Given the fact that this Court has concluded that the initial site plan is binding on the parties and the additional fact that Revised PD-69 states that parking (parking which is integral to the buildings) shall be located in the area depicted on that plan, this Court cannot conclude that Dayton violated the Settlement Agreement or the Consent Decree by denying the requested minor adjustments. In short, the initial site plan cannot be deemed binding on one issue [the height and slope issues from the 1995 decision] and not on another [the buildings].” In sum, this Court, in its decision of March 30, 1995, held that the site plan which accompanied Revised Pd-69 is binding on the parties. That site plan reveals that the buildings would be located on the western side of the landfill; therefore, the parties agreed, in the Settlement Agreement and the Consent Decree, that the buildings would be located on that side of the landfill. (internal citations omitted and emphasis added). The court, as previously mentioned, did not address Waste Management’s estoppel argument because it concluded that it lacked jurisdiction to do so. B. Waste Management I — The First Appeal to the Sixth Circuit After the district court’s 1995 and 1996 decisions holding that the Settlement Agreement required the buildings to be placed on the western side of the property but that it did not have jurisdiction to hear Waste Management’s estoppel argument, Waste Management pursued an interlocutory appeal to this Court. See Waste Management I, 132 F.3d 1142. The only issue appealed by Waste Management was whether the district court erred by concluding that it lacked jurisdiction to address the estoppel argument. Id. at 1143, 1144 (“WMO claims that the district court does possess subject matter jurisdiction over the buildings relocation issue even as it may implicate post-settlement actions by the City, the equitable principle of estoppel, and WMO’s ability to obtain approval for the relocation through a procedure provided for under the city zoning code.”). Early in this Court’s opinion, it noted that the district court’s 1995 “decision and order was not appealed by Waste Management and is not a subject of this appeal.” Id. at 1144 n.1. No. 04-4326 Waste Management of Ohio, Inc. v. City of Dayton Page 10 This Court framed the issue narrowly as “whether the City, by virtue of its post-settlement actions, is estopped from refusing to approve WMO’s construction of buildings on the south side of a landfill property, instead of the west side as originally designated in a consent decree between the parties”); id. at 1146 (consistently referring to Waste Management’s claim as one for modification of the terms rather than interpretation of their meaning). In doing so, it recognized that at the district court level, Waste Management argued that the Settlement Agreement permitted the buildings to be placed on the south side or, in the alternative, the City was estopped from protesting their placement on the south side, but that on appeal, Waste Management argued only the estoppel issue. Id. at 1145. Furthermore, this Court’s closing statement — not expressing any opinion on whether “new factual considerations or events [] have rendered the strict enforcement of a consent decree so inequitable that a modification would be justified,” id. at 1146 — demonstrates that the Court was not addressing the underlying merits of the case.