Machipongo Land and Coal Co., Inc. v. Com.

• Decision Date: 30 May 2002
• Citation: 799 A.2d 751,569 Pa. 3
• Parties: MACHIPONGO LAND AND COAL COMPANY, INC. and The Victor E. Erickson Trust and Joseph Naughton, Appellees, v. COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Department of Environmental Protection, The Environmental Quality Board and Arthur A. Davis, Secretary of Environmental Protection, Appellants.
• Court: Pennsylvania Supreme Court

799 A.2d 751

569 Pa. 3

MACHIPONGO LAND AND COAL COMPANY, INC. and The Victor E. Erickson Trust and Joseph Naughton, Appellees, v. COMMONWEALTH of Pennsylvania, Department of Environmental Protection, The Environmental Quality Board and Arthur A. Davis, Secretary of Environmental Protection, Appellants.

Supreme Court of Pennsylvania.

Argued November 13, 2001.

Decided May 30, 2002.

Michael David Bedrin, Wilkes Barre, K. Scott Roy, James M. Sheehan, Harrisburg, for Department of Environmental Resources.

Richard P. Mather, Joseph G. Pizarchik, Harrisburg, for Com., Dep., et al.

John J. Walliser, for Pennsylvania Environmental Council, amicus curiae.

William W. Warren, Jr., Harrisburg, Timothy J. Dowling, for Pennsylvania League of Cities and Municipalities, amicus curiae.

Thomas L. Wenger, Harrisburg, PA ST Assoc. of Township Supervisors, amicus curiae.

Enrico Genaro Nardone, Trucksville, John D. Echeverria, for 10,000 Friend of PA, Citizens for Pa's Future & Pa's Trout.

Carl A. Belin, Clearfield, Joel R. Burcat, Harrisburg, for Machipongo Land and Coal Co.

David James Porter, Pittsburgh, for Pacific Legal Foundation/PA Farm Bureau/PA Builders Assoc., amicus curiae.

Gregory Barton Abeln, Carlisle, for Washington Legal Foundation (WLF) and the PA Chamber of Business and Industry, amicus curiae.

Henry McC. Ingram, for PA Coal and PA Landowners Associations, amicus curiae.

Before FLAHERTY, C.J., and ZAPPALA, CAPPY, CASTILLE, NIGRO, NEWMAN, and SAYLOR, JJ.

OPINION

NEWMAN, Justice.

When state government determines that an intended use of private property conflicts with legitimate public purposes, there can be no doubt concerning the power of the government to prohibit the private use. Penn Central Transp. Co. v. City of New York, 438 U.S. 104, 124-125, 98 S.Ct. 2646, 57 L.Ed.2d 631 (1978); Machipongo Land and Coal Co., Inc. v. Commonwealth, 544 Pa. 271, 676 A.2d 199, 202 (1996). Indeed, "[l]ong ago it was recognized that `all property in this country is held under the implied obligation that the owner's use of it shall not be injurious to the community.'" Keystone Bituminous Coal Assn. v. DeBenedictis, 480 U.S. 470, 491-492, 107 S.Ct. 1232, 94 L.Ed.2d 472 (1987) (quoting Mugler v. Kansas, 123 U.S. 623, 665, 8 S.Ct. 273, 31 L.Ed. 205 (1887)). However, in our constitutional democracy, government's power to protect the public is tempered by the level of intrusion upon individual property rights. The United States Constitution provides:

No person shall be ... deprived of ... property, without due process of law; nor shall private property be taken for public use, without just compensation.

U.S. CONST. amend. V. Similarly, the takings clause in the Pennsylvania Constitution provides:

[N]or shall private property be taken or applied to public use, without authority of law and without just compensation being first made or secured.

PA. CONST. art. I, § 10. On the other hand, the responsibility of government to protect the environment from private injury is also clear. PA. CONST. art. I, § 10 provides that:

The people have a right to clean air, pure water, and to the preservation of the natural, scenic, historic and esthetic values of the environment. Pennsylvania's public natural resources are the common property of all the people, including generations yet to come. As trustee of these resources, the Commonwealth shall conserve and maintain them for the benefit of all the people.

In this case, we are required to weigh the governmental obligation to protect the environment against the individual right to do as one wishes with property one owns.

Specifically, this case asks us to determine whether the designation of the Clearfield County Goss Run Watershed as unsuitable for mining ("UFM"), pursuant to Section 4.5 of the Pennsylvania Surface Mining Conservation and Reclamation Act ("PaSMCRA"), Act of May 31, 1945, P.L. 1198, as amended, 52 P.S. § 1396.4e(b), was so unduly oppressive so as to constitute a taking.

The Regulation, its Origins, and Purposes

In 1980, the General Assembly amended the PaSMCRA to comply with the Federal Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act (FSMCRA), 30 U.S.C. § 1201, which required states that wished to regulate mining to meet specific federal requirements. Among those requirements, was one directing states to create a mechanism to designate certain lands as UFM. 30 U.S.C. § 1272. In Section 1201(c), Congress explained that FSMCRA was necessary to protect the environment, its water and its streams from pollution caused by mining. Section 1201(c) provides:

[M]any surface mining operations result in disturbances of surface areas that burden and adversely affect commerce and the public welfare by destroying or diminishing the utility of land for commercial, industrial, residential, recreational, agricultural, and forestry purposes, by causing erosion and landslides, by contributing to floods, by polluting the water, by destroying fish and wildlife habitats, by impairing natural beauty, by damaging the property of citizens, by creating hazards dangerous to life and property by degrading the quality of life in local communities, and by counteracting government programs and efforts to conserve soil, water, and other natural resources.

30 U.S.C. § 1201(c).

In Hodel v. Virginia Surface Mining and Reclamation Ass'n, 452 U.S. 264, 101 S.Ct. 2352, 69 L.Ed.2d 1 (1981), where the U.S. Supreme Court rejected a claim that the FMCRA was facially unconstitutional, the Court also explained the purposes of the FMCRA by quoting U.S. Senate and House Committee reports. Those reports detailed the need for legislation to protect the environment from the "adverse effects of surface coal mining." Id. at 279, 101 S.Ct. 2352. The Senate Report concluded that:

[Surface] coal mining activities have imposed large social costs on the public... in many areas of the country in the form of unreclaimed lands, water pollution, erosion, floods, slope failures, loss of fish and wildlife resources, and a decline in natural beauty.

Hodel, 452 U.S. at 279, 101 S.Ct. 2352 (quoting S.Rep. No. 95-128, p. 50 (1977)). The House Report noted the effect on streams. It stated:

Acid drainage which has ruined an estimated 11,000 miles of streams; the loss of prime hardwood forest and the destruction of wildlife habitat by strip mining; the degrading of productive farmland; recurrent landslides; siltation and sedimentation of river systems....

Hodel, 452 U.S. at 279-280, 101 S.Ct. 2352 (quoting H.R.Rep. No. 95-218, p. 58 (1977), 1977 U.S.C.C.A.N. 596, (quoting H.R.Rep. No. 94-1445, p. 19 (1976)).

Pennsylvania codified the federal criteria to be used to determine whether land should be deemed unsuitable for mining. 52 P.S. § 1396.4e(b). 52 P.S. § 1396.4e(b) provides:

(b) Pursuant to the procedures set forth in this subsection, the department may designate an area as unsuitable for all or certain types of surface mining operations if such operations will:

(1) be incompatible with existing State or local land use plans or programs;

(2) affect fragile or historic lands in which such operations could result in significant damage to important historic, cultural, scientific and esthetic values and natural systems;

(3) affect renewable resources lands in which such operations could result in a substantial loss or reduction of long-range productivity of water supply or of food or fiber products and such lands to include aquifers and aquifer recharge areas; or

(4) affect natural hazard lands in which such operations could substantially endanger life and property, such lands to include areas subject to frequent flooding and areas of unstable geology.

The General Assembly recited that the purpose of the PaSMCRA is to "prevent... the pollution of rivers and streams," protect wildlife and the environment generally, and to maintain jurisdiction over in-state mining activities. 52 P.S. § 1396.1. Additionally, the regulation sought to "strike a balance" between the environment and ensuring a ready supply of coal. Id.

The UFM Designation and the Property of Machipongo Land and Coal Co., Inc., the Victor E. Erickson Trust and Joseph Naughton

Pursuant to 52 P.S. § 1396.4e(b), in May of 1989, the Brisbin Recreation Board and the Locust Grove Sportsmen Club filed a petition with the Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Resources¹ ("DER") requesting that the Goss Run Watershed (the "Watershed") be declared unsuitable for mining. The Petition sought a UFM designation for the entire area of the Goss Run stream extending to a point below the Brisbin Dam.

The regulation, which would have the effect of prohibiting the mining of coal in a large portion of the Watershed, affected the rights of the owners of property in the UFM area. Those property owners included Appellees, Machipongo Land and Coal Co., Inc., the Victor E. Erickson Trust and Joseph Naughton (Collectively, the "Property Owners").

Machipongo Land and Coal Co., Inc. ("Machipongo") is a Pennsylvania corporation, doing business in Clearfield County, Pennsylvania. Machipongo owns in fee simple 373 acres within the UFM area and 200 acres outside of the area. (R. 260a, 403a-405a, 414a). It also owns a coal estate of 1000 acres in Clearfield County outside of the UFM area. (R. 260a). Arthur Minds, a Machipongo Vice President, testified at trial that sometime around 1915 or 1917 his grandparents acquired the Machipongo property. (R. 1037a). He said that his grandfather was in the coal business and that Machipongo now holds the property for future coal development. Id. Machipongo stipulated that it did not know what its predecessors in title paid for the property (R. 263a) and the record does not disclose whether Machipongo paid anything for its interest.

Machipongo has owned the property for approximately forty-eight years and owned it on May 23, 1992, the effective date of the UFM designation. (R. 263a). The parties also stipulated that Machiongo has used land within the UFM area...