Ellis v. Wildcat Creek Wind Farm LLC
| Decision Date | 25 March 2021 |
| Docket Number | No. 02-20-00050-CV,02-20-00050-CV |
| Parties | G.C. ELLIS, MARY ELLIS, DAVID A. SAMPSON, KAREN ANN SAMPSON, CHRISTOPHER BANCROFT, BELLE FOURCHE RESOURCES LLC, AND COMPADRE CATTLE COMPANY LLC, Appellants v. WILDCAT CREEK WIND FARM LLC, Appellee AND G.C. ELLIS, MARY ELLIS, DAVID A. SAMPSON, KAREN ANN SAMPSON, CHRISTOPHER BANCROFT, BELLE FOURCHE RESOURCES LLC, AND COMPADRE CATTLE COMPANY LLC, Appellants and Appellees v. COOKE COUNTY, TEXAS, COOKE COUNTY COMMISSIONERS COURT, AND JOHN KLEMENT, Appellees and Appellants |
| Court | Texas Court of Appeals |
On Appeal from the 235th District Court Cooke County, Texas
Before Kerr, Birdwell, and Bassel, JJ.
Appellants are a group of property owners in Cooke County (the Property Owners). They brought suit to challenge a resolution that created a reinvestment zone—a preliminary step in creating tax incentives for Appellee Wildcat Creek Wind Farm LLC to build a wind power plant or "wind farm" in Cooke County. To that end, the Property Owners sued Wildcat and the other Appellees, who are a group of government defendants from Cooke County. The trial court granted Appellees' dispositive motions and denied or dismissed all of the Property Owners' claims.
The Property Owners allege that they have suffered damage to their property values due to the anticipated construction of a wind farm. But at root, that harm appears to have little to do with Appellees' challenged actions (a prelude to the creation of tax incentives) and more to do with contingent future events that may never come to pass (the eventual construction of a wind farm). We therefore conclude that the Property Owners have not carried their initial burden to demonstrate ripeness and standing. We vacate the trial court's judgment and dismiss the case for want of jurisdiction.
In 2019, Wildcat's parent company EDP Renewables approached the Cooke County Commissioners Court (CCCC) about EDP's plan to build a wind farm in Cooke County. EDP proposed to enter a tax abatement agreement with CCCC to help support the project, whereby CCCC would agree to abate a portion of theproperty taxes on the wind farm for the next ten years. The first step in securing an abatement agreement would be designating the project area as a reinvestment zone pursuant to Texas Tax Code Chapter 312.
CCCC was amenable to the plan, and it kicked off the designation process by arranging the public hearing that the statute requires. See Tex. Tax Code Ann. § 312.201(d). At the hearing, CCCC's commissioners heard public comment on the creation of the reinvestment zone, and a project manager for EDP spoke to the court about the nature of the Wildcat project. County Judge Jason Brinkley clarified that the only thing that was up for debate was the creation of the reinvestment zone; discussion of any specific tax abatements would occur later.
During debate, CCCC Commissioner John Klement fielded a question about whether he had a possible conflict of interest because some of his family members owned land within the reinvestment zone. Commissioner Klement explained that because the reinvestment zone did not come with any money benefit, he could legally vote on the measure. However, he explained that when it came time for CCCC to pass on any abatement agreement, "I will not have a vote" in light of the potential conflict. CCCC, including Commissioner Klement, then unanimously passed a resolution (five votes to none) to create the reinvestment zone.
To challenge the creation of the reinvestment zone, the Property Owners filed this suit against Wildcat and a group of governmental defendants including Commissioner Klement, CCCC, and Cooke County itself (the County Defendants).The centerpieces of the Property Owners' challenge were (1) Commissioner Klement's alleged breach of rules concerning conflicts of interest and (2) CCCC's alleged failure to include certain statutory findings in the resolution (or, to the extent that CCCC made the required findings, that those findings were unsupported). The Property Owners pleaded various claims:
The County Defendants filed a plea to the jurisdiction arguing that the Property Owners lacked standing and that their claims were unripe, along with a Rule 91a motion. Wildcat filed several types of attacks on the Property Owners' claims including, as pertinent to this appeal, a plea to the jurisdiction arguing lack of standing.
The trial court rendered a final judgment that largely ruled in Appellees' favor. As relevant here, the trial court denied the pleas to the jurisdiction as to the mandamus and inverse condemnation claims but granted the pleas as to the unjust enrichment and regulatory estoppel claims. The trial court also denied the injunctive relief claim on its merits, dismissed the inverse condemnation claim without prejudice, granted a declaration that Commissioner Klement had violated conflict disclosure rules, and denied declaratory relief in all other respects.
The Property Owners appealed the denial and dismissal of their claims. The Property Owners generally focus on the merits of whether conflict rules were violated and their prayer to set the resolution aside.
The County Defendants cross-appealed, arguing that the trial court lacked jurisdiction. Their first issue revolves around the justiciability concerns of standing and ripeness.
We agree with the County Defendants that a lack of standing and ripeness requires us to dismiss the case. We therefore do not consider the Property Owners' arguments concerning the merits.
Standing is a prerequisite to subject matter jurisdiction, and subject matter jurisdiction is essential to a court's power to decide a case. Garcia v. City of Willis, 593 S.W.3d 201, 206 (Tex. 2019). Ripeness, like standing, is a threshold issue that implicates subject matter jurisdiction. Robinson v. Parker, 353 S.W.3d 753, 755 (Tex. 2011); Patterson v. Planned Parenthood of Hous. & Se. Tex., Inc., 971 S.W.2d 439, 442 (Tex. 1998).
Standing and ripeness are questions of law that we review de novo. Heckman v. Williamson Cty., 369 S.W.3d 137, 149-50 (Tex. 2012). The burden is on the plaintiff to affirmatively demonstrate the trial court's jurisdiction. Id. at 150. When assessing a plea to the jurisdiction, our analysis begins with the live pleadings. Id. We construethe plaintiff's pleadings liberally, taking all factual assertions as true and looking to the plaintiff's intent. Id.
"In ruling on a defendant's plea to the jurisdiction, courts should decide the plea without delving into the merits of the case." Farmers Tex. Cty. Mut. Ins. Co. v. Beasley, 598 S.W.3d 237, 241 (Tex. 2020) (cleaned up). But a court is not required to look solely to the pleadings; it may consider evidence, and it must do so when necessary to resolve the jurisdictional issues raised. Id. "[I]f a plea to the jurisdiction challenges the existence of jurisdictional facts, we consider relevant evidence submitted by the parties when necessary to resolve the jurisdictional issues raised." Id. "When undisputed evidence supports the plea to the jurisdiction and implicates the merits of the case, we take as true all evidence favorable to the nonmovant, and we indulge every reasonable inference and resolve any doubts in the nonmovant's favor." Id. (cleaned up). If, after examining the pleadings and any undisputed evidence, the court concludes that standing or ripeness does not exist, the case must be dismissed. See id.
"In Texas, the standing doctrine requires a concrete injury to the plaintiff and a real controversy between the parties that will be resolved by the court." Meyers v. JDC/Firethorne, Ltd., 548 S.W.3d 477, 484 (Tex. 2018). Under Texas law, the standing inquiry begins with determining whether the plaintiff "himself (rather than a third party or the public at large), suffered the injury." Heckman, 369 S.W.3d at 155. Theplaintiff must have suffered an "injury in fact"—an invasion of a legally protected interest which is (a) concrete and particularized, and (b) actual or imminent, not conjectural or hypothetical. Meyers, 548 S.W.3d at 485 (quoting Lujan v. Defs. of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560-61, 112 S. Ct. 2130, 2136 (1992) (plurality op.)).
The second element requires that the plaintiff's alleged injury be "fairly traceable" to the defendant's conduct. Id. "This required showing of a causal connection between the plaintiff's injury and the defendant's conduct serves as a means of identifying the proper defendants." Id.
To establish the third standing requirement, a plaintiff must show that there is a substantial likelihood that the requested relief will remedy the alleged injury. Id. "If, for example, a plaintiff suing in a Texas court requests injunctive relief[,] but the injunction could not possibly remedy his situation, then he lacks standing to bring that claim." Id. (quoting Heckman, 369 S.W.3d at 155).
"Ripeness doctrine is invoked to determine whether a dispute has yet matured to a point that warrants decision." Perry v. Del Rio, 66 S.W.3d 239, 249 (Te...
To continue reading
Request your trial