New West v. City of Joliet
| Decision Date | 02 February 2012 |
| Docket Number | 11 C 5305,07 C 7214,05 C 1743 |
| Parties | NEW WEST, et al. Plaintiffs, v. CITY OF JOLIET, et al. Defendants. THERESA DAVIS, et al. Plaintiffs, v. CITY OF JOLIET, et al. Defendants. UNITED STATES OF AMERICA Plaintiff, v. CITY OF JOLIET, et al. Defendants. |
| Court | U.S. District Court — Northern District of Illinois |
Hon. Charles R. Norgle
Before the court are motions by the City of Joliet ("Joliet") to dismiss complaints by plaintiffs in three separate but related lawsuits which spring from a contestedcondemnation action. For the following reasons, Joliet's motions are granted in part and denied in part.
The factual background of these cases is well documented in previous opinions by this court and by the Seventh Circuit.1 The following is a brief summary of this complex and enduring matter arising out of a municipality's attempted exercise of eminent domain. Evergreen Terrance, a 356-unit apartment complex in Joilet, Illinois, houses approximately 750 to 800 residents2 who rely on Section 8 assistance. The vast majority are African-Americans. If the half-century-old complex is torn down, alternative housing options nearby may be limited. Seven years ago, in spring 2005, an owner of Evergreen Terrace, New West Limited Partnership ("New West"), sued Joliet alleging civil rights violations.3 New West sued because it was clear Joliet intended to "redevelop" Evergreen Terrace by condemning it and turning it into a park.
Five months after New West sued, Joliet passed a city ordinance declaring the complex a blighted nuisance. Two months after that, in autumn 2005, Joliet filed acondemnation complaint against Evergreen Terrace in state court. The United States Department of Housing and Urban Development ("HUD"), which has a security interest in the complex, intervened as a defendant once the condemnation case was removed to federal court. In September 2006, this court dismissed New West's original complaint. But the Seventh Circuit in July 2007 reversed and remanded, directing this court to take up the condemnation action first and therein resolve issues present in both cases. In December 2007, tenants of Evergreen Terrace filed their own civil rights lawsuit against Joliet. In March 2008, this court denied summary judgment for the defendants in the condemnation case, and in April 2009 the Seventh Circuit affirmed.
In August 2011, more than six years after New West's opening salvo, the United States filed its own civil rights suit against Joliet. The government is now the third party to become both a defendant in the condemnation case and an individual plaintiff in a separate Fair Housing Act ("FHA") lawsuit.4 All four cases are assigned to this court as related under Local Rule 40.4. The four cases are also consolidated for discovery under Rule 42. In the three cases where Joliet is a defendant, Joliet moves the court to dismiss the complaints by plaintiffs New West, Evergreen Terrance tenants Angela Davis, et al. (the "Tenants"), and the United States. The motions became fully briefed on December 19, 2011. Because the legal and factual issues overlap in each of Joliet's three motions to dismiss, the opinion is consolidated.
To survive a Rule 12(b)(6) motion, a complaint must contain facts sufficient to state a claim for relief that is plausible on its face. See Indep. Trust Corp. v. Stewart Info. Servs. Corp., No. 11-2108, 2012 WL 32066, at *3 (7th Cir. Jan. 6, 2012) (citing Ashcroft v. Iqbal, 129 U.S. 1937, 1949 (2009)). The court accepts well-pleaded facts in the complaint as true and draws reasonable inferences in plaintiffs' favor. See Iqbal, 129 U.S. at 1949; McCauley v. City of Chi., No. 09-3561, 2011 WL 4975644, at *14 (7th Cir. Oct. 20, 2011). A complaint must provide the grounds of the claimant's entitlement to relief, contain more than recitations of the elements of a cause of action, and allege enough to raise a right to relief above the speculative level. See McCauley, 2011 WL 4975644, at *4 (citing Bell Atl. v. Twombly, 550 U.S. 554, 555 (2007)).
In a Rule 12(b)(1) motion, the burden to establish standing is on the party invoking federal jurisdiction, here the plaintiffs. Scanlan v. Eisenberg, No. 11-1657, 2012 WL 169765, at *3 (7th Cir. Jan. 20, 2012) (citing Lee v. City of Chi.. 330 F.3d 456, 468 (7th Cir. 2003)). The plaintiffs must show three elements: causation, redressability, and—at issue here—"an injury in fact, which is an invasion of a legally protected interest that is concrete and particularized and, thus, actual or imminent, not conjectural or hypothetical." Id. (quoting Lee, 330 F.3d at 468). To satisfy this element, the plaintiffs must show they have sustained or are "immediately in danger of sustaining some direct injury." Id. (quoting Wis. Right to Life v. Schober, 366 F.3d 485, 489 (7th Cir. 2004)). "Mere speculation" does not establish the injury element. Id.
In its motions, Joliet argues for dismissal on grounds of failure to state a claim upon which relief can be granted, the lack of a case or controversy, and duplicative litigation. These arguments are advanced against each plaintiff. Joliet advances a separate argument against New West to dismiss an implied preemption count. The court addresses the common issues first.
Joliet contends that Article III bars claims by the plaintiffs because their complaints attack the events leading up to the unconsummated condemnation process. "Such harm," Joliet argues, "will exist only if Joliet prevails in the eminent domain case, and not before." Mem. in Supp. of Mot. to Dismiss Second Am. Compl. or, in the Alternative, to Stay the Action 11 [hereinafter Mot. to Dismiss New West]. Joliet believes the resolution of the condemnation case will control everything else in the related litigation. Joliet contends that the plaintiffs cannot maintain any lawsuits because either Joliet will win the condemnation action, defeating all of the plaintiffs' claims, or Joliet will lose, avoiding injury to the plaintiffs in the first place. Of course, the Seventh Circuit has implicitly rejected this argument. See New West, 491 F.3d at 721 (). The Tenants and government now allege similar injuries.
Apparently to avoid the thrust of the 2007 panel's decision, Joliet clothes its discredited Article III injury arguments in ripeness terms. The doctrines of Article III injury and ripeness are similar but distinct. See Blake-Bey v. Cook Cnty., No. 10 C 5246, 2011 WL 760074, at *2-3 (N.D. Ill. Feb. 24, 2011) . Article III standing is a constitutional threshold matter, while ripeness is a prudential concern ordinarily arising in pre-enforcement agency disputes. See Wis. Right to Life State Political Action Comm. v. Barland, No. 11-2623, 2011 WL 6225138, at *4-6 ); see also Jennings v. Auto Meter Prod.. Inc.. 495 F.3d 466, 477 (7th Cir. 2007) ().
Article III injury and prudential ripeness overlap when the certainty of an injury is in doubt—just what Joilet contends here. See Ind. Right to Life, Inc. v. Shepard, 507 F.3d 545, 549 (7th Cir. 2007). An Article III injury must be "(a) concrete and particularized and (b) actual or imminent, not conjectural or hypothetical." Barland, 2011 WL 6225138, at *4 (quoting Friends of the Earth v. Laidlaw Envtl. Servs. (TOO, Inc., 528 U.S. 167, 180-81 (2000)). Similarly, "[r]ipeness concerns may arise when a case involves uncertain or contingent events that may not occur as anticipated, or not occur at all." Id. at *6 (). Indeed, ripeness, like other prudential standing doctrines, springs from the Article III requirement of a See Warm v. Seldin, 422 U.S. 490, 498 (1975); Barland, 2011 WL 6225138, at *6; see also Pilsen Neighbors Cmty. Council v. Burris, 672 F. Supp. 295, 307 (N.D. Ill. 1987) (). Because the concepts aresomewhat conflated in Joliet's motions, the court in an abundance of caution construes Joliet to be making both Article III injury and prudential ripeness arguments.5
The Tenants argue their injury is imminent loss of their homes, which is "concrete and particularized" for Article III purposes. That Joliet has not evicted them does not avoid the injury. Joliet has for years been trying informally to raze the apartments, and for the past six years suing to take Evergreen Terrace through eminent domain. Simply put, Joliet is not giving up. The loss of homes, on these facts, is "certainly impending" and satisfies the imminence requirement. See Mass. v. EPA, 549 U.S. 497, 542 (2007); Pac. Gas & Elec. Co. v. State Energy Res. Conservation & Dev. Comm'n, 461 U.S. 190, 201 (1983); Bauer. 620 F.3d at 708; Sierra Club v. Franklin Cnty. Power of Ill., LLC, 546 F.3d 918, 926 (7th Cir. 2008). Moreover, the Tenants allege Joliet has systematically tried to evict them by interfering with Section 8 renewals and refinancing at Evergreen Terrace; that Joliet's motive for this is racial animus, inferred from allegedly racist comments made by Joliet city officials; and that Joliet has rallied support to raze the complex by stigmatizing it as a den of crime. These alleged injuries are concrete and have already occurred, satisfying Article III injury. A ripeness inquiry raises no question about either the "fitness of the issues for...
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