Court Opinion

ID: 9819471
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-09-01 06:26:07.462061+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T12:25:28.182230
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE APPLETON, specially concurring: While I concur with the majority opinion that there is no private right of action for an alleged violation of the Planning Act, I write separately to express my belief that each of the plaintiffs lacks standing. For a party to have standing to sue, that party must be the subject of actual or threatened injury in fact to a legally cognizable interest. Greer v. Illinois Housing Development Authority, 122 Ill. 2d 462, 492-93, 524 N.E.2d 561, 574-75 (1988). Plaintiffs have alleged defendants’ noncompliance with the Planning Act, the purpose of which has been set forth above. The legally cognizable interest of AFSCME Council 31 and Don Todd is determined by their contract of employment with the State of Illinois. That contract guarantees the union’s members certain rates of compensation and compliance with workplace rules such as seniority and benefits of employment. It has not been alleged, nor can it be, that the union contract guarantees employment in a site-specific facility in perpetuity. As a logical consequence, these plaintiffs have no legally cognizable interest in maintaining either the size (population) or existence of a particular developmental disability treatment facility. Plaintiff Lariy Bomke is an Illinois state senator who represents a portion of the Logan County community. It is immaterial whether he voted in the legislature for or against funding for the Center. He has no legally cognizable interest that was damaged by defendants’ actions. Mere disagreement with the Governor’s decisions does not give one standing to sue. As for Norlan and Eleanor Newmister, any injury in fact to them, while more sympathetic, is also lacking. Plaintiffs currently allege that the Department of Health and Human Services is in the process of transferring residents of the developmental center to other facilities before the Planning Board has issued a permit allowing them to do so. No allegation is made that the Newmisters’ son is part of that group. As for the closure of the facility, no common-law or statutory right accrues to any party to prevent closure, only a process of review and permit to regulate such actions. In recent years, the State of Illinois has closed numerous mental health facilities, driver’s service facilities, correctional facilities, and other such institutions. Each such closure involved dislocation of employees, an inconvenience to the population served, and diminution in the ready availability of service to the location of the abandoned site. Yet a recipient of state services has no legally cognizable interest in maintaining a site-specific location of such services. While there is some authority that a statutory violation grants standing to anyone arguably within the zone of interests sought to be protected by the statute in question (Association of Data Processing Service Organizations, Inc. v. Camp, 397 U.S. 150, 153, 25 L. Ed. 2d 184, 188, 90 S. Ct. 827, 830 (1970)), our supreme court has expressly deleted the zone-of-interest test for standing from Illinois jurisprudence (Greer, 122 Ill. 2d at 492, 524 N.E.2d at 574). Greer reversed, sub silentio, the use of the zone-of-interest test adopted by the First District in Cottage-63rd Street Currency Exchange, Inc. v. Callahan, 104 Ill. App. 3d 586, 589, 432 N.E.2d 1258, 1260 (1982) (where injury arises from violation of a statute, standing requires plaintiff to be one of a class designed to be protected by the statute). Without reference to a zone of interest created by the Planning Act, plaintiffs have no standing because they have no legally cognizable interest which has been damaged by the actions alleged to have been committed by these defendants in violation of the Act.