Nollan v. California Coastal Commission

• Decision Date: 26 June 1987
• Docket Number: No. 86-133,86-133
• Citation: 483 U.S. 825,107 S.Ct. 3141,97 L.Ed.2d 677
• Parties: James Patrick NOLLAN, et ux., Appellant v. CALIFORNIA COASTAL COMMISSION
• Court: U.S. Supreme Court

483 U.S. 825

107 S.Ct. 3141

97 L.Ed.2d 677

James Patrick NOLLAN, et ux., Appellant

v CALIFORNIA COASTAL COMMISSION.

No. 86-133.

Argued March 30, 1987.

Decided June 26, 1987.

Syllabus

The California Coastal Commission granted a permit to appellants to replace a small bungalow on their beachfront lot with a larger house upon the condition that they allow the public an easement to pass across their beach, which was located between two public beaches. The County Superior Court granted appellants a writ of administrative mandamus and directed that the permit condition be struck. However, the State Court of Appeal reversed, ruling that imposition of the condition did not violate the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment, as incorporated against the States by the Fourteenth Amendment.

Held:

1. Although the outright taking of an uncompensated, permanent, public-access easement would violate the Takings Clause, conditioning appellants' rebuilding permit on their granting such an easement would be lawful land-use regulation if it substantially furthered governmental purposes that would justify denial of the permit. The government's power to forbid particular land uses in order to advance some legitimate police-power purpose includes the power to condition such use upon some concession by the owner, even a concession of property rights, so long as the condition furthers the same governmental purpose advanced as justification for prohibiting the use. Pp. 831-837.

2. Here the Commission's imposition of the access-easement condition cannot be treated as an exercise of land-use regulation power since the condition does not serve public purposes related to the permit requirement. Of those put forth to justify it protecting the public's ability to see the beach, assisting the public in overcoming a perceived "psychological" barrier to using the beach, and preventing beach congestion—none is plausible. Moreover, the Commission's justification for the access requirement unrelated to land-use regulation—that it is part of a comprehensive program to provide beach access arising from prior coastal permit decisions—is simply an expression of the belief that the public interest will be served by a continuous strip of publicly accessible beach. Although the State is free to advance its "comprehensive program" by exercising its eminent domain power and paying for access easements, it cannot compel coastal residents alone to contribute to the realization of that goal. Pp. 838-842.

177 Cal.App.3d 719, 223 Cal.Rptr. 28 (1986), reversed.

SCALIA, J., delivered the opinion of the Court, in which REHNQUIST, C.J., and WHITE, POWELL, and O'CONNOR, JJ., joined. BRENNAN, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which MARSHALL, J., joined, post, p. ----. BLACKMUN, J., filed a dissenting opinion, post, p. ----. STEVENS, J., filed a dissenting opinion, in which BLACKMUN, J., joined, post, p. ----.

Robert K. Best, Sacramento, Cal., for appellants.

Andrea Sheridan Ordin, Los Angeles, Cal., for appellee.

Justice SCALIA delivered the opinion of the Court.

James and Marilyn Nollan appeal from a decision of the California Court of Appeal ruling that the California Coastal Commission could condition its grant of permission to rebuild their house on their transfer to the public of an easement across their beachfront property. 177 Cal.App.3d 719, 223 Cal.Rptr. 28 (1986). The California court rejected their claim that imposition of that condition violates the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment, as incorporated against the States by the Fourteenth Amendment. Ibid. We noted probable jurisdiction. 479 U.S. 913, 107 S.Ct. 312, 93 L.Ed.2d 286 (1986).

I

The Nollans own a beachfront lot in Ventura County, California. A quarter-mile north of their property is Faria County Park, an oceanside public park with a public beach and recreation area. Another public beach area, known locally as "the Cove," lies 1,800 feet south of their lot. A concrete seawall approximately eight feet high separates the beach portion of the Nollans' property from the rest of the lot. The historic mean high tide line determines the lot's oceanside boundary.

The Nollans originally leased their property with an option to buy. The building on the lot was a small bungalow, totaling 504 square feet, which for a time they rented to summer vacationers. After years of rental use, however, the building had fallen into disrepair, and could no longer be rented out.

The Nollans' option to purchase was conditioned on their promise to demolish the bungalow and replace it. In order to do so, under Cal.Pub.Res. Code Ann. §§ 30106, 30212, and 30600 (West 1986), they were required to obtain a coastal development permit from the California Coastal Commission. On February 25, 1982, they submitted a permit application to the Commission in which they proposed to demolish the existing structure and replace it with a three-bedroom house in keeping with the rest of the neighborhood.

The Nollans were informed that their application had been placed on the administrative calendar, and that the Commission staff had recommended that the permit be granted subject to the condition that they allow the public an easement to pass across a portion of their property bounded by the mean high tide line on one side, and their seawall on the other side. This would make it easier for the public to get to Faria County Park and the Cove. The Nollans protested imposition of the condition, but the Commission overruled their objections and granted the permit subject to their recordation of a deed restriction granting the easement. App. 31, 34.

On June 3, 1982, the Nollans filed a petition for writ of administrative mandamus asking the Ventura County Superior Court to invalidate the access condition. They argued that the condition could not be imposed absent evidence that their proposed development would have a direct adverse impact on public access to the beach. The court agreed, and remanded the case to the Commission for a full evidentiary hearing on that issue. Id., at 36.

On remand, the Commission held a public hearing, after which it made further factual findings and reaffirmed its imposition of the condition. It found that the new house would increase blockage of the view of the ocean, thus contributing to the development of "a 'wall' of residential structures" that would prevent the public "psychologically . . . from realizing a stretch of coastline exists nearby that they have every right to visit." Id., at 58. The new house would also increase private use of the shorefront. Id., at 59. These effects of construction of the house, along with other area development, would cumulatively "burden the public's ability to traverse to and along the shorefront." Id., at 65-66. Therefore the Commission could properly require the Nollans to offset that burden by providing additional lateral access to the public beaches in the form of an easement across their property. The Commission also noted that it had similarly conditioned 43 out of 60 coastal development permits along the same tract of land, and that of the 17 not so conditioned, 14 had been approved when the Commission did not have administrative regulations in place allowing imposition of the condition, and the remaining 3 had not involved shorefront property. Id., at 47-48.

The Nollans filed a supplemental petition for a writ of administrative mandamus with the Superior Court, in which they argued that imposition of the access condition violated the Takings Clause of the Fifth Amendment, as incorporated against the States by the Fourteenth Amendment. The Superior Court ruled in their favor on statutory grounds, finding, in part to avoid "issues of constitutionality," that the California Coastal Act of 1976, Cal.Pub.Res.Code Ann. § 30000 et seq. (West 1986), authorized the Commission to impose public access conditions on coastal development permits for the replacement of an existing single-family home with a new one only where the proposed development would have an adverse impact on public access to the sea. App. 419. In the court's view, the administrative record did not provide an adequate factual basis for concluding that replacement of the bungalow with the house would create a direct or cumulative burden on public access to the sea. Id., at 416-417. Accordingly, the Superior Court granted the writ of mandamus and directed that the permit condition be struck.

The Commission appealed to the California Court of Appeal. While that appeal was pending, the Nollans satisfied the condition on their option to purchase by tearing down the bungalow and building the new house, and bought the property. They did not notify the Commission that they were taking that action.

The Court of Appeal reversed the Superior Court. 177 Cal.App.3d 719, 223 Cal.Rptr. 28 (1986). It disagreed with the Superior Court's interpretation of the Coastal Act, finding that it required that a coastal permit for the construction of a new house whose floor area, height or bulk was more than 10% larger than that of the house it was replacing be conditioned on a grant of access. Id., at 723-724, 223 Cal.Rptr., at 31; see Cal.Pub.Res.Code Ann. § 30212. It also ruled that the requirement did not violate the Constitution under the reasoning of an earlier case of the Court of Appeal, Grupe v. California Coastal Comm'n, 166 Cal.App.3d 148, 212 Cal.Rptr. 578 (1985). In that case, the court had found that so long as a project contributed to the need for public access, even if the project standing alone had not created the need for access, and even if there was only an indirect relationship between the access exacted and the need to which the project contributed, imposition of an access condition on a development permit was sufficiently related to burdens created by the project to be constitutional. 177 Cal.App.3d, at 723, 223 Cal.Rptr., at 30-31; see Grupe, supra, 166 Cal.App.3d, at 165-168, 212 Cal.Rptr.,...