On November 27th of this year, the Supreme Court of Montana settled a land use dispute between the McKay couple and the company “Wilderness Development.” The company owned land adjacent to the McKays and had plans to build a resort community. The McKays felt that the company had cleared trees on a piece of their land for which the company did not have an easement for. In this case an easement is when one property owner lets another use their land for a specific and limited purpose. The couple also felt that the company violated some of the rules of their subdivision community by building a road to access a maintenance building they built for the new resort community. The Lincoln County district court found the company owed the McKays $350,000 in damages (violating the subdivisions rules) and $1 million in punitive damages (aka non tangible damages). In addition, they were awarded $6,500 for tree damage. The company cut down 100+ trees in an area in which they said they had road easements.
But it wasn’t over there. The case went to the Montana Supreme Court and reduced the damages to $25, 000 and the tree damages to $600. The Supreme Court said the district court jury was not properly instructed on how to calculate damage costs. The reason the McKays felt that the company had violated the subdivision rules was because of the way the community had been zoned. It was zoned as 20 single family residential or agricultural lots with no further subdivision of the lots allowed. The McKays were upset with what the company was planning to do with the area adjacent to their land.
This case raises a few issues that I think would be of interest for an environmental lawyer: land use, zoning, tree worth, and easements. I was shocked to find out how little they valued the removal of over 100 trees in an area which I’m sure is beautiful and pretty untouched. I looked into how an arborist would appraise a trees worth, and these are the things they take into account: “This species rating is based on the species of tree, the geographic area where the tree is located, the species’ ability to adapt to the geographic location and the species’ desirability in the landscape. This rating is then combined with other information gathered on site — including tree condition and location — and applied against the replacement cost of the tree to determine whether the appraised value deviates from the replacement cost” (Claims magazine). Just like we learned in class, the value of nature is subjective.
The question, can the residents of a community file suit against a party that is violating not them, but the subdivision’s rules, was one of the problems with the McKays case. I definitely think they can. The community was zoned like it was for a reason. The residents have a stake in what their neighbors do. This is why part of the punitive damages awarded the McKay’s had to do with emotional distress. I think it is interesting how a land use issue can be disturbing enough to someone that they can get money for it. That is evidence of how important land planning is to the lives of the people already established in an area, it is something to be taken very seriously. When it comes to cutting down trees too, that’s a line that I don’t think the company should have crossed, especially if they were not sure if they had the easement.
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I think that any compensation for the damages will largely be arbitrary.
ReplyDeleteWhen people have a dispute over land, it shows a distinct lack of communication between the parties involved. Companies would never follow the rules if they thought they could get away with it, so accountability measures are necessary to keep them on the strait and narrow. In this case, the accountability lies squarely on lawsuits by those who were wronged. I feel that other measures should have been taken as lawsuits have a history of being time inefficient.