Court Opinion

ID: 9797581
Source: CourtListenerOpinion
Date Created: 2023-08-31 04:24:45.964714+00
Date Added: 2024-06-11T08:57:17.014449
License: Public Domain

Judge DAILEY
concurring in part and dissenting in part.
I dissent from part III of the majority opinion. In my view, the trial court correctly determined that it could not grant relief in the nature of specific performance to Cornerstone.
The majority concludes that the Authority’s obligations under the agreements may be enforced under principles of promissory es-toppel. However, one of the elements of a promissory estoppel claim is that the promis-ee reasonably relied on the promise to its *610detriment. Patzer v. City of Loveland, 80 P.3d 908, 912 (Colo.App.2003).
“[A]s a general rule, ‘those who deal with the Government are expected to know the law and may not rely on the conduct of government agents contrary to the law.’ ” Emery Mining Corp. v. Sec’y of Labor, 744 F.2d 1411, 1416 (10th Cir.1984) (quoting Heckler v. Cmty. Health Servs., 467 U.S. 51, 63, 104 S.Ct. 2218, 2225, 81 L.Ed.2d 42 (1984)).
As noted by one leading commentator, “the officers of a municipal corporation cannot confer public powers upon others, nor delegate legislative powers; nor can powers conferred upon, or which appertain, or properly belong, to any office or department be surrendered or transferred and be performed by others.” 10 Eugene McQuillin, Municipal Corporations § 29.07 (3d ed.1999 rev. vol.).
“The power of eminent domain is an inherent attribute of the sovereignty of the state, to take or authorize the taking of any private property within its jurisdiction for public use to promote the general welfare, without the consent of the owner, upon payment of just compensation, according to the method prescribed by law.” 11 McQuillin, supra, § 32.02 (2000 rev. vol.); see also In re Condemnation of 110 Wash. St., 767 A.2d 1154, 1158-59 (Pa.Commw.Ct.2001)(quoting Lance’s Appeal, 55 Pa. 16, 25-26 (1867): “The power arises out of that natural principle which teaches that private convenience must yield to the public wants.”).
As the majority points out, state and federal cases alike hold that the power of eminent domain cannot be abridged by contract. And while the majority correctly posits that these cases involve situations where condemning authorities have agreed to refrain from condemning property, I see no reason why the rule announced in these cases should not also apply in cases where the condemning authority has purportedly bound itself to condemn certain property. In each instance, the governmental prerogative to decide whether condemnation is in the public interest is at stake; in each instance, the private interests seek ultimate control of the exercise of that prerogative. In my view, the analysis should not be any different when, as here, a private entity wants to control the governmental prerogative to take others’ private property.
My conclusion finds support in Joleewu, Ltd. v. City of Austin, 916 F.2d 250 (5th Cir.1990), vacated in part on other grounds, 934 F.2d 621 (5th Cir.1991). In Joleewu, the United States Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit determined that a contract that purported to dictate when a city must initiate condemnation proceedings was unenforceable because the timing of acquisition of land for a public purpose is a governmental function which could not be impeded by contract. The court reasoned that “[i]f the acquisition of land for a public purpose is a governmental function, so is the decision about the timing of the acquisition.” Joleewu, supra, 916 F.2d at 255. This reasoning supports the view that whether and when to condemn are governmental prerogatives that cannot be controlled by contract.
I reject the majority’s conclusion that the Authority’s right to abandon condemnation proceedings could be relinquished by agreement or lost by estoppel. As the trial court pointed out, the authorities upon which Cornerstone relies — including Piz v. Housing Authority, 132 Colo. 457, 465-67, 289 P.2d 905, 910 (1955) — involve disputes between condemning authorities and condemnee-land-owners:
The courts [in those cases] have stepped in to protect landowners in unique situations where the equities cry out for a remedy. Here, however, what is at stake is an exercise of the power of eminent domain to complete a project that the municipality has concluded does not serve a public purpose. The issue is not the protection of an innocent and mistreated landowner. Rather, it is the protection of Cornerstone’s and Walgreens’ ability to make a profit on this project.
For similar reasons, I find the authority upon which Cornerstone relies to be distinguishable and unpersuasive. In essence, Cornerstone wants to use a governmental prerogative, when the governmental entity no longer wishes to use that prerogative, to force unwilling landowners to give up their property.
*611The obvious problem with eminent domain is its coercive nature....
The coercive nature of eminent domain is sometimes justified on the grounds that the government must pay “just compensation” when it takes property....
But the constitutionally required just compensation that courts routinely award property owners when the government condemns their property is generally viewed as undercompensatory.... The owners of a condemned property are, by definition, not willing sellers. They may be unwilling to sell because the “fair market value” offered does not match the value of the property to them, either because they value the property more highly for sentimental reasons or because they are denied compensation for increments of value that willing sellers would probably insist upon, or at least bargain hard for, before entering into a transaction.
Charles E. Cohen, Eminent Domain After Kelo v. City of New London: An Argument for Banning Economic Development Takings, 29 Harv. J.L. & Pub. Pol’y 491, 536-38 (2006)(footnotes omitted) (mentioning, as examples of uncompensated value, an owner’s “loss of the autonomy to refuse to sell at any price, even at a price exceeding his [or her] own valuation of the property,” “sentimental attachment [to the property], unique suitability of the property to the owner’s needs, relocation costs ... and the aggravation of having to move”); see also Kelo v. City of New London, 545 U.S. 469, 521, 125 S.Ct. 2655, 2686, 162 L.Ed.2d 439 (2005)(Thomas, J., dissenting)(“So-called ‘urban renewal’ programs provide some compensation for the properties they take, but no compensation is possible for the subjective value of these lands to the individuals displaced and the indignity inflicted by uprooting them from them homes.”); Nicole Stelle Garnett, The Public-Use Question as a Takings Problem, 71 Geo. Wash. L.Rev. 934, 945 (2003) (“the measure of damages awarded in an eminent-domain proceeding — namely, the fair market value of the property — frequently fails to make property owners ‘whole,’ especially with respect to subjective losses” (footnote omitted)).
Here, Cornerstone wants to compel the specific performance of agreements, the consequences of which fall largely on persons not party to the agreements. In my view, Cornerstone can use neither contract nor estoppel principles to compel the Authority to impose the human costs of forced displacement upon unwilling landowners after the Authority has decided that the public interest no longer requires a taking of the property.
Consequently, I would uphold the trial court’s determination that specific performance was not available to the extent that it depended on the exercise of the Authority’s condemnation authority.