Court Opinion

ID: 9717962
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-26 07:13:40.220278+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T18:23:56.429580
License: Public Domain

JUSTICE NICKELS, dissenting: I do not agree that the trial court erred in granting the landowners’ motion in limine to exclude evidence of special benefits to the property not taken. Therefore, I respectfully dissent. In the instant case, the condemning authority took a portion of landowners’ property in order to construct wetlands to compensate for other wetlands destroyed by the highway project and for a utility easement. The measure of damages to property not taken is the difference in the fair market value of the property as a whole before and after the improvement and, in making this computation, special benefits accruing to the remaining parcel by reason of the improvement must be set off against the damages. Department of Public Works & Buildings v. Divit (1962), 25 Ill. 2d 93, 100-01 (citing Kane v. City of Chicago (1945), 392 Ill. 172, and Capitol Building Co. v. City of Chicago (1948), 399 Ill. 113. The trial court and the appellate court both determined that the benefits attributed to the subject property’s proximity to the highway were simply too remote to consider. In reversing, the majority determines that the benefits of the highway must be considered as a matter of law. In doing so, the majority engages in a questionable statutory construction analysis and ignores the broader factual basis for the trial court’s ruling. In making the determination that the trial court erred as a matter qf law in granting landowners’ motion in limine, the majority engages in a questionable analysis of the relevant sections of the Eminent Domain Act. Section 7 — 120 of the Act provides that "due consideration shall be given to any special benefit that will result to the property owner from any public improvement *** on such property.” (Emphasis added.) (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1991, ch. 110, par. 7 — 120.) The majority first determines that because the compensatory wetlands and the easement were "necessary” to the highway project, they are as much a part of the project as the traffic lanes and interchanges. (162 Ill. 2d at 195.) Second, apparently insecure in resting judgement on the finding that the wetlands were a part of the highway project, the majority then determines that such a finding is not necessary because of language found in section 7 — 119. (162 Ill. 2d at 196, citing Ill. Rev. Stat. 1991, ch. 110, par. 7 — 119.) I disagree with the majority on both points. The Eminent Domain Act, as legislation designed to protect individual constitutional rights from governmental overreaching, must be strictly construed. (Ayer v. City of Chicago (1894), 149 Ill. 262, 271.) There can be no dispute that section 7 — 120 unambiguously states that only those special benefits that result from the "public improvement to be erected on such property” need be considered. (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1991, ch. 110, par. 7 — 120.) It is also undisputed that only the compensatory wetlands and a utility easement are on landowners’ property. The highway itself is some 500 feet from landowners’ property and separated by the wetlands. Given the language of section 7 — 120, I see no error in excluding evidence concerning benefits to the landowner from a highway so removed. See Illinois State Toll Highway Authority v. Itasca Bank & Trust Co. (1991), 216 Ill. App. 3d 926 (finding that evidence of special benefits of a highway project should have been excluded where no part of landowner’s property was taken for the highway, but instead the property was taken for "off alignment improvements” deemed necessary for the project). As additional support for finding error in the exclusion of evidence concerning special benefits from the highway, the majority also relies on section 7 — 119. Section 7 — 119 provides that evidence is admissible as to "any benefit to the landowner that will result from the public improvement for which the eminent domain proceedings were instituted.” (Ill. Rev. Stat. 1991, ch. 110, par. 7 — 119.) The majority claims that, under this "clear and unambiguous” language, evidence of special benefits is admissible regardless of where the improvement is located. 162 Ill. 2d at 196. I do not agree that the language of section 7 — 119 is clear and unambiguous. That section fails to differentiate between special benefits that are admissible and general benefits which are not admissible. (Capitol Building Co., 399 Ill. at 119.) In contrast, section 7 — 120 expressly refers to "special benefits” and has the additional element that such benefits result from the public improvement to be erected on the property taken. Section 7 — 120 is clear and unambiguous, section 7 — 119 is not. I also fail to see how the existence of section 7 — 119 allows the majority to simply ignore the more specific requirements of section 7 — 120. Accordingly, I do not agree with the construction of this statute proffered by the majority. In addition to conducting a strained and ultimately unsatisfying statutory construction analysis, the majority also fails to acknowledge the broader factual basis for the trial court’s ruling. Special benefits are those aspects of the proposed improvement that appreciably enhance the market value of the remainder. (Department of Public Works & Buildings v. Griffin (1923), 305 Ill. 585, 591.) Such special benefits must be "real and substantial, not chimerical and speculative, and must be capable of measurement and computation.” (Divit, 25 Ill. 2d at 100-01.) As such, a trial judge must be vested with discretion to determine whether the condemning authority has provided a sufficient foundation for consideration of such benefits. I do not agree that the trial court abused its discretion in excluding evidence concerning special benefits to the remainder. Condemnor’s appraisers testified that damage to the remainder was fully offset by the proximity of the subject property to the toll road interchange located some 500 feet away. In excluding this testimony, the trial judge reasoned that the wetland project did not provide a sufficient "nexus” to the rest of the highway project. Given that landowners’ property was situated at such a distance from the highway and separated by wetlands, I believe the trial court properly determined that any such benefits were too remote and speculative to be considered. Thus, the majority fails to acknowledge the broader factual basis for the trial court’s ruling. In closing, I wish to express my view that condemnation proceedings present a unique circumstance under the law deserving careful consideration. The legal confiscation and forced sale of a landowner’s property places the landowner up against the vast resources of the government. Landowners are forced to hire attorneys and experts in order to protect their interests, which reduces their actual recovery. In such a situation, the potential for overreaching by the government is apparent. In my view, such circumstances require a condemning authority to show that the right to reduce damages to the remainder with evidence of special benefits be free from doubt. Under the clear language of section 7 — 120 and the facts of this case, I believe that the condemning authority has failed to show the necessary prerequisites for reducing damages to the remainder with evidence of special benefits. Therefore, I would affirm the rulings of the trial and appellate courts excluding evidence of special benefits in the present case. CHIEF JUSTICE BILANDIC and JUSTICE McMORROW join in this dissent.