Drakes Bay Land Company v. United States

• Decision Date: 17 April 1970
• Docket Number: No. 275-66.,275-66.
• Parties: DRAKES BAY LAND COMPANY, a Corporation v. The UNITED STATES.
• Court: U.S. Claims Court

424 F.2d 574 (1970)

DRAKES BAY LAND COMPANY, a Corporation v. The UNITED STATES.

No. 275-66.

United States Court of Claims.

April 17, 1970.

Benjamin P. Bonelli, San Rafael, Cal., attorney of record, for plaintiff.

Herbert Pittle, Washington, D. C., with whom was Asst. Atty. Gen. Shiro Kashiwa, for defendant.

Before COWEN, Chief Judge, and LARAMORE, DURFEE, DAVIS, COLLINS, SKELTON and NICHOLS, Judges.

OPINION

NICHOLS, Judge.^*

This is an action for just compensation pursuant to the Fifth Amendment. Seeking to recover the difference between land valued at its highest and best use and its reduced current value, plaintiff claims that the diminution was caused by a Government taking. Although we agree that a taking has occurred, we believe that it was a taking of the entire property.

The subject land is a 468-acre tract located within the boundaries of the 53,000-acre Point Reyes National Seashore area (hereinafter Seashore) as authorized in 16 U.S.C. § 459c-1 (1964), Pub.L. 87-657, approved September 13, 1962, 76 Stat. 538.

The Seashore is located on the 60,000-acre Point Reyes peninsula in western Marin County, California, with only the easterly central part (a relatively small portion) of such peninsula being outside the Seashore boundaries. In the excluded area are located the towns of Inverness and Inverness Ridge. Subject land is adjacent to part of the excluded area, and is about halfway between the two towns. It is 35 miles north of San Francisco, 20 miles west of San Rafael, and within 50 miles of three million people in the San Francisco Bay area.

The overall central part of the Point Reyes peninsula is a relatively large area of land which narrows southwesterly into a substantial projection into the Pacific Ocean, with its broad terminal called Point Reyes. The southerly coast of this projection is the shore of Drakes Bay, where substantial inlet bays and a large sand spit exist. Northerly from Point Reyes, bounded by the Pacific Ocean, the peninsula gradually narrows until it becomes an elongated, finger-like extension of land, bounded on its easterly side by Tomales Bay, a long and narrow body of water which extends from the Pacific Ocean and separates the northern half of the peninsula from the mainland. The southerly part of the peninsula, narrower than the central part, is basically coastal mainland bounded on the west by the Pacific Ocean.

The pertinent Seashore was the third of the national seashore recreational areas authorized by acts of Congress, following Cape Hatteras National Seashore in 1937 and Cape Cod National Seashore in 1961. Supplementing studies conducted in the 1930's under the Civilian Conservation Corps program, and having obtained donated funds of $1,250,000 from the Avalon and Old Dominion Foundations, the National Park Service, Department of the Interior, hereinafter Park Service, completed in the 1950's a study of all shore lines of the United States, Altantic, Pacific, Gulf and Great Lakes, for creation of National seashore recreational areas.

As part of its Pacific Coast seashore survey, the Park Service published on June 30, 1957, its Preliminary Report, Point Reyes Peninsula, California, Seashore Area. The survey for that report was commenced in 1955, and the first publicity on such report was disseminated in 1958. The report proposed a 28,000-acre national seashore area, not including subject land.

Bills authorizing the Point Reyes National Seashore were introduced in Congress in 1959, 1960, 1961, and 1962. The 1959 and 1960 bills proposed a 35,000-acre seashore area, not including subject land. As hereinafter related, plaintiff acquired its land in early 1960, prior to the first legislative proposal in 1961, that the Seashore encompass such land. Of course, the bills introduced in 1959 through 1961 were not enacted.

Plaintiff, a California corporation, was organized on February 24, 1960, by Benjamin P. Bonelli, an attorney at law and land subdivider, resident of San Rafael, California, and David S. Adams, a subdivider, resident of San Anselmo, California. The two organizers had obtained in December 1959 an option to purchase from Millard E. Ottinger, a 1,000-acre tract of land, all located within the Seashore area as later authorized in 1962, but no part of which was included in the proposed bills prior to 1961.

After a law suit was filed to compel specific performance of the option agreement, plaintiff acquired the 1,000-acre tract by deed on March 30, 1960. In late 1960, Bonelli and Adams agreed to a division of the land into two tracts, and Adams took title to one tract and withdrew from plaintiff corporation. The tract retained by plaintiff included a 28.8-acre parcel sold by plaintiff on January 24, 1962, and also the 468 acres comprising the subject land, which has been owned by plaintiff ever since March 30, 1960.

Subject land is located on the western slope of the Inverness Ridge on Point Reyes peninsula, with its easterly border extending along the skyline of the ridge for about 1½ miles, and with the view from the skyline being Tomales Bay to the east and the Pacific Ocean and Drakes Bay to the west. It is generally covered with bishop pines, pepper trees, alder and buckeye trees, has two year-round streams, and a lake and grassy valley area in its westerly part.

Commencing in 1955, the property adjacent easterly to subject land had been successfully subdivided and sold in small lots as Paradise Ranch Estates by the same Adams who was later an organizer with Bonelli of plaintiff corporation. Such subdivision is on the eastern slope of Inverness Ridge outside of but immediately adjacent to the Seashore.

Prior to 1960, there had been no subdivision or development of land on the Point Reyes peninsula within the Seashore area as authorized in 1962. The holdings were large dairies or beef ranches owned by wealthy families. Most of the peninsula, including the area of subject land, had been closed to the public by locked gates.

Commencing in 1960, Drakes Beach Estates, Inc., a corporation owned by Bonelli and others, engaged in subdividing, developing and sales of lots on land located at and near Drakes Bay, thereafter included in the Seashore area.

Plaintiff acquired the subject land for the purpose of subdividing and selling it in small lots or parcels. In 1961, Bonelli brought three new stockholders into plaintiff corporation to assist in financing subdivisions on subject land. They were experienced and active in the field of financing such projects by issuance and sale of property improvement bonds. Each was made an equal stockholder in plaintiff corporation with Bonelli, by his purchase of stock holdings in plaintiff corporation.

At all pertinent times, Marin County zoning ordinances permitted subdivision of subject land into single family residential units of not less than 7,500 square feet each, subject to official approval of any planned subdivision.

On February 3, 1961, plaintiff filed its Drakes Bay Pines subdivision map on subject land with the Marin County Planning Commission, requesting variances from road improvement standards previously allowed by the County of Marin in other subdivisions in the nearby area and the western part of county generally.

In late 1961 and early 1962, Bonelli had several conferences with employees of the Park Service, one of whom was James E. Cole, regarding the subdivision of subject land. Cole was regional chief of planning for the Park Service, and his major work concerned the proposed Seashore. Bonelli was advised that the Park Service believed that the pending Seashore bill would be enacted; that subject land would be within the boundaries prescribed therein; that subdivision of subject land would increase land values and make acquisition of land for the Seashore more difficult for the United States; that subdivision would scar the hills and partially destroy the scenic value of the area; that the United States could exchange federal land for subject land under Section 8 of the Taylor Grazing Act; that defendant was currently negotiating land exchanges with other property owners on the Point Reyes peninsula; and that the Park Service urgently desired to make such an exchange with plaintiff and would fully cooperate if plaintiff would work on an exchange of its land for federal land.

In reliance on such statements, plaintiff withdrew its tentative subdivision map from the Marin County Planning Commission, and Bonelli went to various offices of the Bureau of Land Management, Department of the Interior, determined what federal lands were available for exchange, and traveled to a number of areas in California, Nevada and Arizona, viewing available federal lands.

On March 13, 1962, plaintiff again filed a subdivision map, called Drakes Bay Pines, and a petition with Marin County, proposing to subdivide 168 acres of subject land into 76 lots. Plaintiff was experiencing financial difficulties in meeting its accrued tax and mortgage liabilities, and was concerned that it would not be prepared to sell lots if the Seashore bill was not enacted in 1962.

In not requesting variances from county road standards, plaintiff reasonably believed that such a request would be futile because of pressure being exerted on the Marin County Board of Supervisors (which had to approve any variances) to prevent subdivision of land within the proposed Seashore area. Such pressure was variously being exerted by employees of the Park Service, Secretary of the Interior Stewart L. Udall, Undersecretary of the Interior James K. Carr, U. S. Representative Clement W. Miller of the congressional district covering the Point Reyes peninsula, Senator Clair Engle of California, Senator Thomas H. Kuchel of California, the Point Reyes National Seashore Foundation, the Sierra Club, numerous other conservation groups, many private citizens, and virtually every San Francisco Bay area newspaper, all advocates of the establishment of the...