Court Opinion

ID: 9449291
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-04 15:01:46.875238+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T17:36:33.340072
License: Public Domain

Case: 22-2026   Document: 32     Page: 1   Filed: 08/04/2023

        NOTE: This disposition is nonprecedential.

   United States Court of Appeals
       for the Federal Circuit
                 ______________________

     BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA
            COUNTY, MISSISSIPPI,
               Plaintiff-Appellant

                            v.

                   UNITED STATES,
                   Defendant-Appellee
                 ______________________

                       2022-2026
                 ______________________

     Appeal from the United States Court of Federal Claims
 in No. 1:21-cv-01415-LAS, Senior Judge Loren A. Smith.
                  ______________________

                 Decided: August 4, 2023
                 ______________________

     PATRICK WAYNE PENDLEY, Pendley, Baudin & Coffin,
 Plaquemine, LA, argued for plaintiff-appellant. Also rep-
 resented by JOHN DEAKLE, RONALD JOHNSON, IV, Deakle-
 Johnson Law Firm, Hattiesburg, MS.

     BRIAN C. TOTH, Appellate Section, Environment and
 Natural Resources Division, United States Department of
 Justice, Washington, DC, argued for defendant-appellee.
 Also represented by TODD KIM.
                  ______________________
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32     Page: 2    Filed: 08/04/2023

 2          BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US

      Before DYK, BRYSON, and STARK, Circuit Judges.
 DYK, Circuit Judge.
     The Board of Supervisors of Issaquena County, Missis-
 sippi (the “Board”) sued the United States in the Court of
 Federal Claims (“Claims Court”), alleging that actions or
 inactions by the United States led to flooding in 2018 and
 2019 that damaged the Board’s property and destroyed pri-
 vate property and reduced economic activity, thereby de-
 priving the county of tax revenue. The Board sought
 compensation for the damage under the Takings Clause of
 the Fifth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution. The Claims
 Court granted the government’s motion to dismiss, holding
 that the Board’s complaint failed to state a takings claim.
 Although we hold that the Board’s complaint failed to state
 a claim, we will exercise our discretion to permit the Board
 to seek leave from the Claims Court to amend its com-
 plaint. We therefore affirm in part and vacate and remand
 in part.
                        BACKGROUND
     “At this stage in the proceedings, we accept the
 [Board’s] well-pleaded factual allegations as true,” and
 “may also look to matters incorporated by reference or in-
 tegral to the claim, items subject to judicial notice, and
 matters of public record.” A & D Auto Sales, Inc. v. United
 States, 748 F.3d 1142, 1147 (Fed. Cir. 2014) (internal quo-
 tation marks, modifications, and citations omitted).
                              I
     Issaquena County lies on the southern edge of the Mis-
 sissippi Delta, an alluvial valley stretching approximately
 from the Tennessee-Mississippi border in the north to
 Vicksburg, Mississippi in the south. The Mississippi and
 Yazoo rivers converge on the east bank of the Mississippi
 just north of Vicksburg to form a Y shape, with the Missis-
 sippi running from the northwest and the Yazoo running
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32      Page: 3    Filed: 08/04/2023

 BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US             3

 from the northeast. The county is located in between those
 rivers.
     The Delta has often been flooded by its surrounding
 rivers, at times compounded by storms resulting from its
 proximity to the Gulf of Mexico. See United States v. Spo-
 nenbarger, 308 U.S. 256, 260 (1939) (“[O]ccupation of the
 alluvial valley of the Mississippi has always been subject
 to this constant hazard [of flooding].”). When a river over-
 flows its banks, the result is known as headwater flooding.
 Backwater flooding, by contrast, happens when a river,
 such as the Mississippi, rises more than a tributary such
 as the Yazoo, causing the tributary’s water to surge until it
 matches the height of the dominant river. There is no issue
 here of damage from Mississippi headwater flooding. In-
 stead, the Board claims damage that allegedly resulted
 from the government’s construction of gates and levees to
 prevent backwater flooding, which had the consequence of
 interfering with the natural drainage of floodwater created
 by excessive rainfall.
     In 1927, the Delta was struck by the Great Flood,
 which displaced more than 600,000 people, inundated 16
 million acres of land, and inspired the Delta Blues classic
 “When the Levee Breaks.” During the Great Flood, the
 Mississippi was 80 miles wide at Vicksburg, just south of
 Issaquena County.
      Congress responded in 1928 by authorizing the Army
 Corps of Engineers (the “Corps”) to carry out a “comprehen-
 sive ten-year program for the entire [Mississippi] valley,
 embodying a general bank protection scheme, channel sta-
 bilization and river regulation, all involving vast expendi-
 tures of public funds.” Sponenbarger, 308 U.S. at 262; see
 also Flood Control Act of 1928, Pub. L. No. 70-391, ch. 569,
 45 Stat. 534, 535, 537; First Amended Compl. ¶ 17, Board
 of Supervisors of Issaquena County v. United States, 160
 Fed. Cl. 300 (2022), ECF No. 9 (“Amended Complaint”).
 The program resulted in the construction of additional Mis-
 sissippi River levees.
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32     Page: 4    Filed: 08/04/2023

 4          BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US

      The government recognized that the improved Missis-
 sippi levees, by retaining more water in the river, led to
 more flood risk in the area between the Mississippi and Ya-
 zoo rivers known as the Yazoo Backwater Area (“Area”).
 See M. C. Tyler et al., Flood Control on the Lower Miss.
 River, H.R. Doc. No. 77-359, at 37 (1st Sess. 1941). In 1936
 Congress approved a plan to construct an additional chan-
 nel, known as the Eudora Floodway, to direct overflow from
 the Mississippi to, ultimately, the Gulf of Mexico. See id.
 at 11, 30; 33 U.S.C. § 702a-2. In 1941, however, Congress
 “abandoned” the floodway and instead funded the creation
 of a new levee system to protect the Area from backwater
 flooding. See Flood Control Act of 1941, Pub. L. No. 77-228,
 § 3, 55 Stat. 638, 642–44 (codified as amended at 33 U.S.C.
 §§ 702a–702m). 1 The resulting Yazoo Backwater Project
 (“Backwater Project”) was completed in its current form in
 1978.
     The mainline levee system built up after the Great
 Flood runs parallel to the Mississippi. The Backwater Pro-
 ject extended the levees from the confluence of the Yazoo
 and Mississippi rivers for about 30 miles to the northeast,
 running parallel to the Yazoo, where another set of levees
 picks up.

     1   See also U.S. Army Corps of Eng’rs, 2020 Final
 Supplement No. 2 to the 2007 Final Supplement No. 1 to
 the 1982 Yazoo Area Pump Project Final Environmental
 Impact Statement, Appendix G (“2020 EIS Appx. G”),
 ¶¶ 2–3,    https://www.mvk.usace.army.mil/Missions/Pro-
 grams-and-Project-Management/Project-Management/Ya-
 zoo-Backwater-Project/Yazoo-Backwater-Report/FileId/30
 3749/.
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32      Page: 5    Filed: 08/04/2023

 BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US             5

                              II
     In this case, the Board alleged in its complaint that the
 government’s “design, construction, maintenance and sub-
 sequent operation” of the Backwater Project led to flooding
 of the Board’s land, which constituted a taking under the
 Fifth Amendment. Amended Compl. ¶ 6. According to the
 Board, the Backwater Project uses levees and floodgates to
 protect the Area from backwater flooding. See id. ¶¶ 19,
 22. Before the Backwater Project was built, the Yazoo
 River played an important role in draining rainfall from
 the Area. Id. ¶ 18. “The levees constructed as part of the
 Yazoo Backwater Project altered and cut off this natural
 drainage in order to protect the area from flooding during
 high flood stages along the Mississippi and Yazoo Rivers
 and the resulting backwater inundation that occurred.” Id.
 To prevent rainfall from accumulating behind the levees,
 the Backwater Project uses the floodgates at the Steele
 Bayou Control Structure to allow water to drain out of the
 Area. See id. ¶¶ 19, 22. When the water is high on the
 Mississippi and Yazoo rivers, however, the floodgates
 “must remain closed to prevent backwater flooding,” and
 “any additional precipitation that falls within the 4,093
 square mile drainage area becomes trapped behind the Ya-
 zoo Backwater levee system and unable to drain.” Id. ¶ 19.
     So if there is both backwater flooding from the Missis-
 sippi and extensive rainfall inside the Area between the
 mainline and Backwater Project levees, “the Yazoo Basin
 essentially becomes a bathtub with no effective drainage
 mechanism,” and there is nowhere for the water in the
 Area to go except onto dry land. Id. ¶ 20. To address that
 possibility, after building the levees and floodgates the
 Corps planned to construct a pump system to remove ex-
 cess water from the Area. See id. ¶ 19. The Corps never
 built the pumps. See id.
     From late 2018 through the summer of 2019, the Mis-
 sissippi flooded and heavy rainfall fell in the Area. See id.
 ¶¶ 22–23. The Corps kept the Steele Bayou Control
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32       Page: 6   Filed: 08/04/2023

 6          BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US

 Structure gates closed for months to keep out the floodwa-
 ters from the Mississippi. See id. ¶ 22. The rainwater was
 trapped behind the levees, with “no outlet through which
 to drain into the Mississippi River, Yazoo River, or any-
 where else,” and inundated approximately 550,000 acres in
 the Area by May 2019. Id. ¶¶ 22–23. “Approximately 687
 residential homes and hundreds of additional structures
 were damaged or destroyed by the floodwaters,” and
 “roads, bridges, culverts and other governmental infra-
 structure within Issaquena County” were flooded. Id.
 ¶¶ 23–24. The flooding also damaged “roadbeds, ditches,
 levees, and other drainage structures” in the county, forced
 the local government to take emergency actions to keep its
 transportation infrastructure working, and resulted “in a
 severe reduction of the [county’s] tax revenue.” Id. ¶ 24.
                              III
     On June 1, 2021, the Board sued the United States in
 the Claims Court, asserting that the “affirmative acts or
 inactions of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers . . . resulted
 in an unlawful taking of [the Board’s] lands under the Fifth
 Amendment of the United States Constitution.” Original
 Complaint ¶ 3, Board of Supervisors of Issaquena County,
 160 Fed. Cl. 300, ECF No. 1. The Board amended its com-
 plaint in October 2021 to add more detail about the damage
 it alleged it had suffered as a result of the taking. See
 Amended Compl. ¶¶ 25–26. According to the Board, it
 amended its complaint in part because the government
 wanted the Board to list all the roads, culverts, and bridges
 that were allegedly destroyed by the flooding. Oral Arg. at
 34:07–28.
     The United States moved to dismiss the case for failure
 to state a claim, and the Claims Court granted the motion.
 First, the Claims Court found that the Board alleged that
 government inaction—failure to install the pumps and
 build the Eudora Floodway—caused flooding in the Area.
 Relying on the Supreme Court’s decision in Sponenbarger
 and our decision in St. Bernard Parish Gov’t v. United
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32      Page: 7    Filed: 08/04/2023

 BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US             7

 States, 887 F.3d 1354 (Fed. Cir. 2018), the court held that
 government inaction cannot be the basis of a takings claim.
 See J.A. 4–6. Second, the Claims Court found that the
 Board alleged that government action—building the Back-
 water Project and shutting the Steele Bayou Control Struc-
 ture gates—caused flooding. See J.A. 6–7. But because the
 Board had not alleged that the government caused worse
 flooding than that which would have occurred in the ab-
 sence of government action designed to prevent flooding,
 the Board had not adequately pled a takings claim. See id.
    The Board appeals.      We have jurisdiction under 28
 U.S.C. § 1295(a)(3).
                         DISCUSSION
                               I
     We review dismissals by the Claims Court for failure
 to state a claim de novo and “must presume that the facts
 are as alleged in the complaint, and make all reasonable
 inferences in favor of the plaintiff.” Cary v. United States,
 552 F.3d 1373, 1376 (Fed. Cir. 2009). To survive a motion
 to dismiss, “the complaint must contain ‘sufficient factual
 matter, accepted as true, to state a claim to relief that is
 plausible on its face.’” A & D Auto Sales, 748 F.3d at 1157
 (quoting Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 556 U.S. 662, 678 (2009) (sec-
 ondary quotation marks and citation omitted)).
     The Takings Clause guarantees that the government
 will not take private property “for public use, without just
 compensation.” U.S. Const. amend. V, cl. 4. The Supreme
 Court has long held that “government-induced flooding can
 constitute a taking.” Arkansas Game & Fish Comm’n v.
 United States, 568 U.S. 23, 32 (2012) (citing Pumpelly v.
 Green Bay Co., 80 U.S. 166 (1871) and United States v.
 Cress, 243 U.S. 316 (1917)); see also Cedar Point Nursery v.
 Hassid, 141 S. Ct. 2063, 2071 (2021).
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32      Page: 8    Filed: 08/04/2023

 8          BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US

                              II
     On appeal, the Board has suggested three theories of
 recovery. The first theory does not state a takings claim,
 and the second theory was not adequately pled. The third
 theory is also not adequately pled in its present form, but
 we conclude a potential amendment might clarify the com-
 plaint so that it adequately states a claim.
      First, the Board alleged that the flooding at issue was
 caused by the government’s failure to build pumps in the
 Backwater Project, or to construct an alternative drainage
 system. See, e.g., Amended Compl. ¶¶ 19, 21, 26. Those
 allegations cannot state takings claims. Throughout its
 amended complaint the Board referred to both the govern-
 ment’s “affirmative acts or inactions” as the source of the
 alleged taking, see id. ¶¶ 3, 6, 26, and asserted that
 “[b]ecause the pumps were never completed, an estimated
 687 homes were flooded during the Yazoo Backwater Flood
 of 2019,” id. ¶ 21. But as we have held, “[t]akings liability
 must be premised on affirmative government acts.” St.
 Bernard Parish, 887 F.3d at 1362; see also Oral Arg. at
 11:59–12:26 (Board counsel agreeing with the court that
 “[f]ailure to put the pumps in doesn’t state a takings
 claim”). The government’s failure to install pumps or to
 construct an additional floodway cannot result in takings
 liability.
      Second, the Board suggests on appeal that the original
 government projects to shore up the Mississippi levee sys-
 tem after the Great Flood—built before the Backwater Pro-
 ject—were “expected [to] increase flood heights” on the
 Mississippi, requiring “additional flood protection for the
 Yazoo Backwater Area.” Appellant’s Br. 5 (internal quota-
 tion marks and citation omitted). The Board in its com-
 plaint made no claim based on a theory involving the flood
 control measures on the Mississippi undertaken almost a
 century ago. Indeed, the Board’s claim for relief rested en-
 tirely on the Corps’ actions vis-à-vis the Backwater Pro-
 ject’s construction and operation, rather than any earlier
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32      Page: 9    Filed: 08/04/2023

 BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US             9

 government actions. See Amended Compl. ¶¶ 29–30; see
 also Appellant’s Br. 3 (summarizing the Board’s allegations
 as relating solely to the Backwater Project). The only
 claims the Board even attempted to state involved govern-
 ment actions beginning no earlier than 1941.
      Third, the Board alleged that the Corps’ construction
 and operation of the Backwater Project led to flood damage.
 See Amended Compl. ¶¶ 6, 19–23, 27, 29–30. But the
 Board in its complaint never plausibly explained how the
 Backwater Project, which indisputably protects the Area
 from backwater flooding, see id. ¶ 18, led to worse flooding
 than would have occurred in its absence. “To survive a mo-
 tion to dismiss, a complaint must contain sufficient factual
 matter, accepted as true, to ‘state a claim to relief that is
 plausible on its face.’” Iqbal, 556 U.S. at 678 (quoting Bell
 Atl. Corp. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 544, 570 (2007)). A plain-
 tiff must therefore present “factual content that allows the
 court to draw the reasonable inference that the defendant
 is liable for the misconduct alleged.” Id.; see also Bot M8
 LLC v. Sony Corp. of Am., 4 F.4th 1342, 1352 (Fed. Cir.
 2021).
     As we held in St. Bernard Parish, the crucial causality
 question in cases like this is whether “the flood damage
 that actually occurred” was worse than “the flood damage
 that would have occurred if there had been no government
 action at all.” St. Bernard Parish, 887 F.3d at 1363. That
 analysis “must consider the impact of the entirety of gov-
 ernment actions that address the relevant risk” by as-
 sessing whether the plaintiff’s damage was greater than it
 would have been if the government had not acted to “pre-
 vent[] the same type of injury on the same property where
 the damage occurred.” Id. at 1364, 1366. 2 The Board’s

     2   See also Arkansas Game & Fish Comm’n v. United
 States, 736 F.3d 1364, 1372 n.2 (Fed. Cir. 2013) (holding
 that “the proper comparison” for causation analysis was
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32     Page: 10    Filed: 08/04/2023

 10         BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US

 allegations here do not currently allow us to draw the rea-
 sonable inference that the United States is liable for such
 but-for damage.
     As discussed above, the Backwater Project is a series of
 levees and floodgates that shield the Area from backwater
 flooding from the Yazoo river. As shown in the Corps-pro-
 duced map below, of which we take judicial notice, the
 mainline levees generally guard the Area against flooding
 from the Mississippi river to the west and the Backwater
 Project generally blocks flooding from the south and east. 3
 The Corps allows water to drain out of the leveed Area by
 opening the Steele Bayou Control Structure gates when
 water on the landside is at a minimum height and higher
 than the water on the riverside. When water is higher

 “between the flooding that occurred prior to the construc-
 tion of [the government dam that plaintiff argued led to
 flooding] and the flooding that occurred during [the time of
 the asserted taking]”); Sponenbarger, 308 U.S. at 266–67
 (“[I]f governmental activities inflict slight damage upon
 land in one respect and actually confer great benefits when
 measured in the whole, to compensate the landowner fur-
 ther would be to grant him a special bounty.”).
      3   The map is reproduced, as annotated by the court
 to circle the location of the Steele Bayou Control Structure,
 from U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Final Supp. No. 1 to
 the 1982 Yazoo Area Pump Project Final Environmental
 Impact          Statement,         Appx.      4       (2007),
 https://www.mvk.usace.army.mil/Missions/Programs-and-
 Project-Management/Project-Management/Yazoo-Backwa-
 ter-Project/Yazoo-Backwater-Report/FileId/259737/,         at
 plate 4-1. Levees are marked on the map with dark lines.
 We may take judicial notice of it because it is “accurately
 and readily [discernible] from sources whose accuracy can-
 not reasonably be questioned.” Apple Inc. v. Qualcomm
 Inc., 992 F.3d 1378, 1384 (Fed. Cir. 2021) (quoting Fed. R.
 Evid. 201(b)) (alteration in original).
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32     Page: 11    Filed: 08/04/2023

 BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US            11

 outside than inside the levee, “the flood gates at the Steele
 Bayou [C]ontrol [S]tructure must remain closed to prevent
 backwater flooding.” Amended Compl. ¶ 19.
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32     Page: 12   Filed: 08/04/2023

 12         BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US

     The Board does not appear to dispute that the Backwa-
 ter Project protects Issaquena County from backwater
 flooding. See Amended Compl. ¶¶ 18–19. But it neverthe-
 less avers that the Backwater Project led to flooding be-
 cause it prevented rainwater from draining out of the Area
 when the gates were closed. See Amended Compl. ¶¶ 20–
 23, 27. The Amended Complaint on its face does not plau-
 sibly allege any flooding of the Board’s land greater than
 would have taken place if the Backwater Project had not
 been built.
     To start, as the Board effectively admits, if the Back-
 water Project had not been there, the Area would almost
 certainly have been struck with backwater flooding in 2018
 and 2019. At that time, “the Mississippi River experienced
 the longest extended period of near record-high stages
 since the Great Flood of 1927,” and “the gates at the Steele
 Bayou [C]ontrol [S]tructure were forced to remain closed
 for months to prevent Mississippi River water from enter-
 ing and flooding the Yazoo Backwater Area.” Id. ¶ 22. The
 complaint thus appears to concede that absent the Back-
 water Project, backwater flooding would have entered the
 Area. The Board has never alleged that the Backwater
 Project made Mississippi river flooding worse.
     Nor does the complaint in its present form plausibly
 explain how the construction of the Backwater Project
 could have led to worse rainwater flooding than would have
 occurred in its absence. Though the Board alleges that the
 Backwater Project prevents the Area from naturally drain-
 ing into the Mississippi and Yazoo rivers, id. ¶ 18, it sug-
 gests that this is only a problem “when high flood stages
 along the Mississippi and Yazoo Rivers coincide with ex-
 cessive rainfall events within the Yazoo Basin,” id. ¶ 20.
 But when the Mississippi and Yazoo rivers are high enough
 to force the gates closed, no rainwater could drain out of
 the Area with or without the Backwater Project. See id.
 ¶¶ 19, 22. So the current complaint does not plausibly ex-
 plain how the Project’s existence in that scenario could
 worsen rainwater flooding.
Case: 22-2026     Document: 32      Page: 13    Filed: 08/04/2023

 BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US               13

     For similar reasons, the Board has not explained how
 the Corps’ operation of the Backwater Project worsened
 flooding. The complaint focuses on the government’s deci-
 sion to keep the Steele Bayou Control Structure gates
 closed when the Mississippi was in flood. See id. ¶¶ 22, 27.
 But as the Board concedes, opening the gates during that
 time would only have “exacerbated” the flooding. See Oral
 Arg. 34:44–35:03 (Board counsel conceding that the Corps
 could not “open the gate[s] in 2019 . . . when the . . . river-
 side was higher than the landside . . . because that would
 have exacerbated [the flooding in the Area]”); see also
 Amended Compl. ¶ 22.
     For the first time on appeal, the Board attempts to rem-
 edy this gap, arguing that the government is systemati-
 cally increasing flood risk by preventing the Backwater
 Area from draining when the Mississippi is not in flood.
 With sufficient factual content, such a theory might pre-
 sent a plausible allegation of but-for causation as to the
 flooding at issue. But there is no specific allegation in the
 Board’s complaint that the Backwater Project made things
 worse by blocking water from draining during non-flood pe-
 riods. See id. ¶¶ 22, 27 (blaming rainwater flooding largely
 on the government’s decision to close the floodgates, not the
 Project’s general retention of water in the Area).
     The Board also seeks to distinguish St. Bernard Parish
 on the grounds that that case was decided after trial, while
 here the Claims Court dismissed the case on the pleadings.
 But as we have held in the regulatory takings context, tak-
 ings plaintiffs must plausibly plead but-for causation to
 survive a motion to dismiss. In A & D Auto Sales, we ex-
 plained that because “there can be no regulatory taking
 without a showing of but-for decline in value, a takings
 plaintiff must . . . allege sufficient facts in its complaint to
 show what use or value its property would have had.” 748
 F.3d at 1157. Likewise, there can be no physical takings
 liability without a showing of “what would have occurred if
 the government had not acted,” St. Bernard Parish, 887
 F.3d at 1362 (internal quotation marks and citation
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32      Page: 14    Filed: 08/04/2023

 14         BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US

 omitted). A takings plaintiff, whether alleging a physical
 or a regulatory taking, must allege sufficient facts in its
 complaint to show the value of its property but for the gov-
 ernment’s actions. See A & D Auto Sales, 748 F.3d at 1157;
 see also Associated Gen. Contractors of California, Inc. v.
 California State Council of Carpenters, 459 U.S. 519, 526
 (1983) (“It is not . . . proper to assume that the [plaintiff]
 can prove facts that it has not alleged or that the defend-
 ants have violated the . . . laws in ways that have not been
 alleged.”) (quoted with approval in Twombly, 550 U.S. at
 563 n.8).
     In the alternative, the Board argues that its pleading
 meets the requirements of St. Bernard Parish. We are not
 persuaded. For example, the Board averred that once the
 Backwater Project was in place “without the pumps, the
 Yazoo Basin essentially [became] a bathtub with no effec-
 tive drainage mechanism, and the United States knew or
 should have known this type of [rainwater] flooding event
 was likely to occur.” Id. ¶ 20. The Board further alleged
 that “[r]outing the drainage of the entire Yazoo Basin to
 the Steele Bayou Control Structure, and allowing the flood-
 gate to remain closed, created a massive pool of water for
 which there is no drain.” Id. ¶ 27. To the extent these al-
 legations rest on the government’s failure to install the
 pumps, they fail to state a claim, as previously discussed.
 To the extent that the Board is alleging that the construc-
 tion of the Backwater Project caused flooding, the com-
 plaint fails to explain (or even directly allege) how the
 Project brought about a worse result than would have oc-
 curred anyway.
     The Board also suggests that even if its Amended Com-
 plaint did not adequately allege but-for causation, it has
 explained its theory of but-for causation in its appellate
 brief, relying in part on an engineering report prepared by
 the Corps for administrative purposes unrelated to this lit-
 igation. The Board also tells us that by the time it filed its
 Amended Complaint it had retained a hydrological expert
 and a civil engineer. The hydrological expert was prepared
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32      Page: 15    Filed: 08/04/2023

 BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US             15

 to opine that flooding is of a greater depth and duration as
 a consequence of the government’s actions. See Appellant’s
 Br. 22–23. These expert reports were not submitted in the
 Claims Court, and are not part of the record.
      If the Board had articulated in its Amended Complaint
 all that it has argued to us, including its explanation of how
 the Project could have physically exacerbated flooding in
 the Area, that might have been sufficient to allege but-for
 causation. See, e.g., Appellant’s Br. 7 (“Plaintiff’s property
 has experienced flooding which is of a greater depth and
 duration than if the government had taken no action at
 all.”), 12 (“[T]he construction and operation of the Yazoo
 Backwater Project . . . has resulted in more severe and pro-
 longed flooding of Plaintiff’s lands.”); 22 (“[E]ven when the
 Steele Bayou gates are fully open, the water is unable to
 evacuate as quickly as it naturally would had the Govern-
 ment taken no action in the Yazoo Backwater Area.”). In-
 corporation of the Corps’ engineering report into the
 complaint, paired with sufficient explanation of its rele-
 vance, may likewise have pushed the Amended Complaint
 “across the line from conceivable to plausible.” Iqbal, 556
 U.S. at 680. The report states, for example: “After the sig-
 nificant rainfall in the last week of February [2019], eleva-
 tions on the Mississippi River at Vicksburg and the Steele
 Bayou riverside started to fall. However, the Steele Bayou
 flood control structure gates remained closed throughout
 March, preventing the Yazoo Backwater to drain.” 2020
 EIS Appx. G ¶ 68. Taking all reasonable inferences in fa-
 vor of the Board, the report might be read as supporting a
 finding that the government’s construction of the Steele
 Bayou Control Structure and its decision to keep its gates
 closed made the flooding worse than it would have been if
 the government had never even built the Backwater Pro-
 ject. However, the Board did not make any allegations in
 its Amended Complaint based on the report or its retained
 experts. Nor did it include even a single sentence explicitly
 making the express allegation that the flooding experi-
 enced following the government’s actions was worse than
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32     Page: 16    Filed: 08/04/2023

 16         BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US

 the flooding that preceded it, resulting in the Board’s dam-
 age.
      In evaluating the sufficiency of a complaint, we gener-
 ally do not consider new arguments made on appeal that
 are not included in the complaint. See Kimble v. United
 States, 991 F.3d 1238, 1244 (Fed. Cir. 2021). We will not,
 therefore, make an initial determination as to whether a
 complaint that adds some or all of what the Board has iden-
 tified to us would be sufficient to state a claim. But we are
 persuaded that the Board should have an opportunity to
 pursue such an assessment from the Claims Court in the
 first instance.
      Although the complaint failed to state a claim, in our
 discretion we think it appropriate to allow the Board to ask
 the Claims Court to consider an amended complaint that
 would explain how the construction and operation of the
 Backwater Project led to increased flooding compared to a
 world in which the Project had not been built. See Mittle-
 man v. United States, 104 F.3d 410, 417 (D.C. Cir. 1997)
 (sua sponte remanding to allow plaintiff to “refine” unclear
 portion of complaint); Garlick v. Quest Diagnostics Inc., 309
 F. App’x 641, 643 (3d Cir. 2009) (“[T]he courts of appeals
 have the inherent authority sua sponte to order a district
 court to grant a plaintiff leave to amend her complaint
 where portions of the pleading are less than pellucid in
 ways that frustrate application of the relevant law.”). Alt-
 hough the Board did not seek leave from the Claims Court
 to file a second amended complaint, and did not expressly
 ask us for a remand for that purpose (until the issue came
 up at oral argument), the Board has now expressed its in-
 terest in seeking to amend. See Oral Arg. 7:39–8:40. 4

      4 Also at oral argument, the government objected to
 granting leave to amend the complaint, citing party
 presentation principles and noting that the Board failed to
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32      Page: 17    Filed: 08/04/2023

 BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US             17

     Ordinarily, we would not grant any relief under such
 circumstances. See Taylor v. United States, 959 F.3d 1081,
 1091 (Fed. Cir. 2020) (finding, in takings case, no abuse of
 discretion where Claims Court did not permit amendment
 that was never requested of it and was first mentioned on
 appeal). The Claims Court did not abuse its discretion
 here, and not even the Board suggests it did. Nonetheless,
 in these unusual circumstances—where the plaintiff’s alle-
 gations in its brief on appeal may be sufficient to state a
 claim and where the government does not assert meaning-
 ful prejudice—we believe that we can appropriately exer-
 cise our discretion to provide the Board an opportunity to
 seek leave to amend one last time and attempt to state a
 plausible takings theory based on government action. See
 A & D Auto Sales, 748 F.3d at 1158–59 (granting leave to
 amend where plaintiffs failed to plead economic loss while
 making clear they intended to establish loss of value);
 Brooks v. Ross, 578 F.3d 574, 580 (7th Cir. 2009) (noting
 that Federal Rules of Civil Procedure provide for “a liberal
 notice pleading regime, which is intended to ‘focus litiga-
 tion on the merits of a claim’ rather than on technicalities

 file a motion for leave to amend or ask for such relief in its
 appellate brief. See Oral Arg. at 20:04–21:13. The Board’s
 failure to seek leave appears to have been an unintentional
 forfeiture, not a deliberate waiver, and courts may sua
 sponte consider forfeited positions. See United States v.
 Campbell, 26 F.4th 860, 872 (11th Cir. 2022) (en banc) (cit-
 ing Wood v. Milyard, 566 U.S. 463, 471 & n.5 (2012)); see
 also United States v. Sineneng-Smith, 140 S. Ct. 1575, 1579
 (2020) (“There are no doubt circumstances in which a mod-
 est initiating role for a court is appropriate.”).
      We think it plain that the Board did intend to plead
 that the government’s actions in constructing and operat-
 ing the Project caused worse flooding damage than would
 otherwise have occurred. But the Board failed to ade-
 quately make these allegations in its original or amended
 complaints.
Case: 22-2026    Document: 32      Page: 18    Filed: 08/04/2023

 18          BOARD OF SUPERVISORS OF ISSAQUENA COUNTY v. US

 that might keep plaintiffs out of court” (quoting
 Swierkiewicz v. Sorema N.A., 534 U.S. 506, 514 (2002))); 6
 Charles Alan Wright et al., Federal Practice & Procedure
 § 1473 (3d. ed., April 2023 update) (A “basic polic[y]” of the
 Federal Rules is “that pleadings are not an end in them-
 selves but are only a means to assist in the presentation of
 a case to enable it to be decided on the merits.”).
     We do not require that the Claims Court allow such
 amendment. We intend only to require the Claims Court
 to consider whether such amendment should be allowed
 under the typical standards governing amendments under
 Rule 15(a)(2) of the United States Court of Federal Claims.
 We therefore vacate the Claims Court’s dismissal and re-
 mand for proceedings consistent with this opinion. 5
  AFFIRMED IN PART, VACATED AND REMANDED
                  IN PART
                            COSTS
 No costs.

      5  There is an additional issue presented by the com-
 plaint here that we do not reach: whether expected tax rev-
 enue is a compensable property interest under the Takings
 Clause. See, e.g., 2 Julius L. Sackman et al., Nichols on
 Eminent Domain § 5.03[6][f][iii] (3d ed. 2023) (“A tax[ing]
 [authority] does not have a compensable interest in a prop-
 erty taken by eminent domain.” (capitalization altered));
 United States v. 6,321 Acres of Land More or Less In Suf-
 folk Cnty., 479 F.2d 404, 406 (1st Cir. 1973) (recognizing
 the “the general rule making non-compensable [under the
 Takings Clause] an expectation of taxes”); Adams v. United
 States, 391 F.3d 1212, 1225 (Fed. Cir. 2004) (declining “to
 treat a statutory right to be paid money as a legally-recog-
 nized property interest”).