Jersey Heights Neighborhood Ass'n v. Glendening, 98-1804

• Court: United States Courts of Appeals. United States Court of Appeals (4th Circuit)
• Writing for the Court: Before WILKINSON, Chief Judge, and WILKINS and KING; WILKINSON; KING
• Citation: 174 F.3d 180
• Parties: The JERSEY HEIGHTS NEIGHBORHOOD ASSOCIATION, a non-profit membership association; Charles K. Whittington; Ann V. Church; Daniel Appleby, The Reverend; James Boone; Billy Chandler; Rita Chandler; Elsie M. Trader; Dwight Waters; Madeline Waters; Starr Sherrie Waters, by her next friends Dwight and Madeline Waters; Shirley Winder, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v. Parris N. GLENDENING, in his official capacity as Governor of the State of Maryland; State Of Maryland; Parker F. Williams, in his official capacity as Administrator of the Maryland State Highway Administration; Maryland State Highway Administration (MSHA); David L. Winstead, in his official capacity as Secretary of the Maryland Department of Transportation; Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT); Federal Highway Administration; Rodney E. Slater, in his official capacity as Secretary of the United States Department of Transportation; United States Department of Transportation, Defendants-Appellees, and Philip L. Tilghman, in his official capacity as President of the Wicomico County Council; Theodore Shea, in his official capacity as Acting Director of the Wicomico County Planning and Zoning Office; Wicomico County, Maryland, Defendants.
• Docket Number: No. 98-1804,98-1804
• Decision Date: 05 April 1999

Page 180

174 F.3d 180 The JERSEY HEIGHTS NEIGHBORHOOD ASSOCIATION, a non-profit
membership association; Charles K. Whittington; Ann V.
Church; Daniel Appleby, The Reverend; James Boone; Billy
Chandler; Rita Chandler; Elsie M. Trader; Dwight Waters;
Madeline Waters; Starr Sherrie Waters, by her next friends
Dwight and Madeline Waters; Shirley Winder, Plaintiffs-Appellants, v.
Parris N. GLENDENING, in his official capacity as Governor
of the State of Maryland; State Of Maryland; Parker F.
Williams, in his official capacity as Administrator of the
Maryland State Highway Administration; Maryland State
Highway Administration (MSHA); David L. Winstead, in his
official capacity as Secretary of the Maryland Department of
Transportation; Maryland Department of Transportation
(MDOT); Federal Highway Administration; Rodney E. Slater,
in his official capacity as Secretary of the United States
Department of Transportation; United States Department of
Transportation, Defendants-Appellees,
and
Philip L. Tilghman, in his official capacity as President of
the Wicomico County Council; Theodore Shea, in his official
capacity as Acting Director of the Wicomico County Planning
and Zoning Office; Wicomico County, Maryland, Defendants. No. 98-1804. United States Court of Appeals,
Fourth Circuit. Argued Jan. 26, 1999.
Decided April 5, 1999.

Page 183

ARGUED: Steven Paul Hollman, Hogan & Hartson, L.L.P., Washington, D.C., for Appellants. Lawrence Paul Fletcher-Hill, Assistant Attorney General, Baltimore, Maryland, for state Appellees; Eileen Therese McDonough, United States Department of Justice, Washington, D.C., for federal Appellees. ON BRIEF: Deborah A. Jeon, American Civil Liberties Union Foundation of Maryland, Centreville, Maryland; Sherrilyn Ifill, The Public Justice Center, Inc., Baltimore, Maryland, for Appellants. J. Joseph Curran, Jr., Attorney General of Maryland, Linda D. Strozyk, Assistant Attorney General, Margaret Witherup Tindall, Staff Attorney, Baltimore, Maryland, for state Appellees; Lois J. Schiffer, Assistant Attorney General, Environment and Natural Resources Division, Andrea Berlowe, Robert L. Klarquist, United States Department of Justice, Washington, D.C.; Allen F. Loucks, Assistant United States Attorney, Baltimore, Maryland, for federal Appellees.

Before WILKINSON, Chief Judge, and WILKINS and KING, Circuit Judges.

OPINION

WILKINSON, Chief Judge:

Residents of the community of Jersey Heights, Maryland challenge the siting of a new highway adjacent to their neighborhood. They assert claims against state and federal agencies and officials under the Federal-Aid Highway Act, the National

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Environmental Policy Act, Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Fair Housing Act, and the Maryland Environmental Policy Act, as well as the Equal Protection Clause and 42 U.S.C. §§ 1983 and 1985. On the defendants' motions to dismiss, the district court found that the residents had failed to state a claim under the Fair Housing Act and that the rest of their claims were time-barred. The court then dismissed their complaint. Jersey Heights Neighborhood Ass'n v. Glendening, 2 F.Supp.2d 772 (D.Md.1998).

Appellants seek to derail this highway construction project years after the original siting decision was made. Most of their claims are now stale, and we affirm their dismissal. There is one exception: We reinstate as timely appellants' challenge to the agencies' decision not to prepare a supplemental environmental impact statement in 1995. We also hold that appellants' Title VI and section 1985 claims against the federal defendants are barred by sovereign immunity, and that appellants failed to state a claim under the Fair Housing Act. We therefore affirm in part, reverse in part, and remand this case for proceedings consistent with this opinion.

I.

Maryland intends, with federal funding assistance, to build a new Route 50 Bypass around the City of Salisbury in the eastern part of the State. Route 50 is the principal latitudinal artery spanning Maryland's eastern peninsula. Constructed nearly a half-century ago, the highway serves the region's commercial traffic and funnels seasonal vacationers from Baltimore and Washington to the seaside resort of Ocean City. At present, the route also passes directly through downtown Salisbury, where it doubles as a main thoroughfare for local traffic.

Officials began as early as 1975 to look for ways to alleviate the resulting traffic and congestion in downtown Salisbury. Their remedy of choice was to construct a bypass around the City. As with any public project of this magnitude, a long process of agency planning and public debate ensued.

In order to receive federal funding for the Bypass the Maryland State Highway Administration (SHA) was required to follow the approval process established under the Federal-Aid Highway Act (FAHA), 23 U.S.C. § 101 et seq. Although the details of this process have evolved since 1975, its essential mandates have remained constant. State planners must first choose a site for the highway, an endeavor requiring the consideration of alternative locations, community participation in public hearings, and preparation of environmental impact statements in compliance with the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), 42 U.S.C. § 4321 et seq. See 23 U.S.C. §§ 109,128; 23 C.F.R. Part 771. The Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) has final approval authority over the final environmental impact statement (FEIS), and memorializes that approval by issuing a Record of Decision (ROD). 23 C.F.R. §§ 771.125, .127. Certification of compliance with FAHA's public participation requirements and issuance of the ROD are "considered acceptance of the general project location." Id. § 771.113. In projects like this one, subsequent phases of the project such as final engineering design, property acquisition, and actual construction "shall not proceed" until after location approval. Id. § 771.113; see also id. § 771.127.

The SHA began studying alternate locations for the Route 50 Bypass in 1976. Officials considered a number of different routes, held public meetings, and prepared a draft environmental impact statement (DEIS). In 1981, however, the project was shelved for lack of funding.

In 1985 funding was restored, and the SHA again explored alternate highway routes. After a public meeting the SHA issued a new DEIS examining various alternatives and promoting one, dubbed Alternate 4, as the preferred corridor for the Bypass. Alternate 4 traverses two census

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tracts to the north of Salisbury in Wicomico County, one of which has a greater than ninety percent African American population and the other of which apparently is predominately white. When the SHA issued the FEIS in May 1989, Alternate 4 remained the agency's preferred route. On August 17, 1989, the FHWA issued a ROD granting location approval for Alternate 4.

Since 1989 the Bypass project has progressed slowly. Planners have pressed ahead, pursuing additional permits and preparing final engineering designs. And in 1997 Maryland's Governor Parris Glendening announced that funding had been allocated for construction.

Meanwhile, opposition to the Bypass mushroomed in Jersey Heights, a predominately African American community lying just to the south of the highway's approved location. In a series of meetings with SHA officials, community members alleged that they had been excluded from the highway planning process and voiced their objection to the siting of the Bypass. In 1994 residents filed an administrative complaint with the FHWA. After an investigation, the FHWA found that no discrimination had occurred in the siting process. That ruling has been appealed with the agency.

In September 1997 the Jersey Heights Neighborhood Association and a number of individual Jersey Heights residents (collectively the Neighborhood Association) filed this suit in the United States District Court for the District of Maryland. Their complaint named several federal, state, and local agencies and officials and asserted claims under FAHA, NEPA, Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 (Title VI), 42 U.S.C. § 2000d et seq., the Fair Housing Act, 42 U.S.C. § 3601 et seq., and the Maryland Environmental Policy Act, Md.Code Ann., Natural Resources § 1-301 et seq., as well as the Equal Protection Clause and 42 U.S.C. §§ 1983 and 1985.

Specifically, the Neighborhood Association alleged that African American residents did not receive individual notice that the Bypass was in the works or that public meetings were being held, even though similarly-situated white residents did. They further claimed that the DEIS and FEIS were based on inaccurate data, ignored socioeconomic impacts, and failed adequately to compare siting alternatives or mitigating measures. Finally, they contended that the Bypass would have a disparate adverse impact on their African American community.

On the defendants' motions the district court dismissed the case in its entirety, holding that the Neighborhood Association had failed to state a valid claim under the Fair Housing Act and that the remainder of its claims were barred by statutes of limitations and by laches. Jersey Heights Neighborhood Ass'n, 2 F.Supp.2d 772. The Association appeals with regard to the federal and state defendants, and we affirm in part and reverse in part.

II.

In an attempt to escape the limitations problems in this case, the Neighborhood Association's complaint tells the hundred-year history of the City of Salisbury and the neighborhood of Jersey Heights, beginning at the turn of the century and ending just before the appropriation of highway construction funds. An Article III court, however, must focus on concrete disputes between particular parties. And the concrete dispute before us concerns only the siting and planning of the Route 50 Bypass.

In considering the Neighborhood Association's complaint, the district court separated its claims into those...