Pilot Point, LLC v. Town of Cape Elizabeth

• Decision Date: 21 July 2020
• Docket Number: Docket: BCD-19-324
• Citation: 237 A.3d 200
• Parties: PILOT POINT, LLC, et al. v. TOWN OF CAPE ELIZABETH
• Court: Maine Supreme Court

237 A.3d 200

PILOT POINT, LLC, et al.

v.TOWN OF CAPE ELIZABETH

Docket: BCD-19-324

Supreme Judicial Court of Maine.

Submitted On Briefs: April 14, 2020

Decided: July 21, 2020

David A. Soley, Esq., Glenn Israel, Esq., and James G. Monteleone, Esq., Bernstein Shur, Portland, for appellants Pilot Point, LLC, et al.

Durward W. Parkinson, Esq., Bergen & Parkinson, LLC, Kennebunk, for cross-appellant Town of Cape Elizabeth

Panel: MEAD, GORMAN, JABAR, and HUMPHREY, JJ, and HJELM, A.R.J.

HUMPHREY, J.

[¶1] Pilot Point¹ appeals from a judgment entered in the Business and Consumer Docket (Murphy, J. ) concluding, on the Town's motion for judgment as a matter of law, see M.R. Civ. P. 50(d), that its proffered evidence was insufficient to support a finding that the Town of Cape Elizabeth's right to accept the "incipient dedication"² of a particular portion of land lapsed at common law. In addition, before trial, the court dismissed without prejudice as unripe the remaining count of Pilot Point's complaint, see, e.g. , Clark v. Hancock Cty. Comm'rs , 2014 ME 33, ¶ 8, 87 A.3d 712, which sought a declaratory judgment regarding the scope of the Town's development rights should it ever accept the incipient dedication. See Blanchard v. Town of Bar Harbor , 2019 ME 168, ¶¶ 16-22, 221 A.3d 554. We affirm the judgment.

I. BACKGROUND

[¶2] The following facts, which are not in dispute, were found by the trial court and are supported by the record. Surf Side Avenue is a proposed, unaccepted way, or "paper street," in the Town of Cape Elizabeth. The central dispute is whether the Town's right to accept a portion of Surf Side Avenue, referred to as the "Pilot Point Section," lapsed at common law. See Ocean Point Colony Trust, Inc. v. Town of Boothbay , 1999 ME 152, ¶¶ 2, 8-9, 739 A.2d 382.

[¶3] The Shore Acres Land Company recorded the Shore Acres subdivision plan (the Plan) in the Cumberland County Registry of Deeds on April 10, 1911. The Plan shows Surf Side Avenue running northeasterly along the southern border of the subdivision, bordered to the south by the Atlantic Ocean and to the north by subdivision lots 3 through 10 on the paper street's western branch and lots 44 through 47 on its eastern branch. The western branch of Surf Side Avenue is the "Pilot Point Section," and, on the Plan, appears to be the only route of access to lots 3 through 10. These lots were later merged with the corresponding lots directly to their north (labeled 11 through 18 on the Plan), renumbered 69, 70, 71, 72, 73, 74A, and 74B, and are now accessible via Pilot Point Road.³

[¶4] The Town holds no fee interest in any part of Surf Side Avenue, has never accepted public rights over the Pilot Point Section, and has never developed it as a road or other public way. The current owners of several lots adjacent to the Pilot Point Section, and their predecessors-in-interest, have essentially used Surf Side Avenue as their back yards and engaged in some development of the Pilot Point Section where it abuts their respective lots.⁴

[¶5] On September 8, 1997, the Town Council voted to extend the Town's right to accept the incipient dedication of "all proposed, unaccepted ways within the Town of Cape Elizabeth," except for a number of such ways that are not at issue here, for a period of twenty years. See 23 M.R.S. § 3032 (2020) ; Ocean Point Colony Trust, Inc. , 1999 ME 152, ¶ 2, 739 A.2d 382. Following that vote, on September 11, 1997, the Town recorded the statutorily authorized notice in the Registry of Deeds. See 23 M.R.S. § 3032. The Town Council voted to extend its right to accept Surf Side Avenue and other paper streets within the Town for a second twenty-year period on October 5, 2016, and again filed a notice in the Registry of Deeds. See id.

[¶6] This action began on January 26, 2018, with the filing of two independent complaints,⁵ each pleading the same two counts. Count 1 of each complaint sought a declaratory judgment that the Town's right to accept the incipient dedication of the Pilot Point Section had lapsed at common law. Count 2 of each complaint sought a declaratory judgment that even if the Town's right to accept the incipient dedication of the Pilot Point Section had not lapsed, the Town's right was limited by the scope of the original dedication, and it could not change the location, construction, or use of the Pilot Point Section to develop it as a public trail or other recreational space. The court (Cumberland County, Warren, J. ) consolidated the complaints, and the case was transferred to the Business and Consumer Docket (Murphy, J. ).

[¶7] Pilot Point and the Town each moved for summary judgment on both counts, and, after a hearing, the court denied both parties’ motions for summary judgment on Count 1 because there were unresolved factual issues bearing on whether the Town's right to accept the incipient dedication had lapsed.⁶ The court also dismissed Count 2 without prejudice as unripe for judicial review. See, e.g. , Clark , 2014 ME 33, ¶ 8, 87 A.3d 712.

[¶8] Before trial was held on Count 1, Pilot Point filed several motions in limine seeking pretrial determinations expressly permitting the introduction of certain evidence.⁷ The court granted in part Pilot Point's motion related to evidence of the lot owners’ adverse use of the Pilot Point Section that had been ongoing for less than twenty years before 1997, stating that "[p]laintiffs will be able to introduce any evidence of inconsistent uses up until the date that the Town ... filed its [n]otice, even if they were not present a full twenty years, subject to any other evidentiary objections made by the Town," and denied the remaining motions in limine. Pilot Point then filed an admission that, in light of the court's rulings on its pretrial motions, "[p]laintiffs’ or their predecessors-in-interest's use of Surf Side Avenue between 1911 to 1997—even if inconsistent with the public's right of incipient dedication—was of insufficient duration prior to 1997 to warrant a finding that the public's incipient dedication right had lapsed by that time."

[¶9] The case proceeded to a bench trial on Count 1 on July 22, 2019. Pilot Point made an offer of proof pursuant to M.R. Evid. 103(a)(2), which the court accepted to preserve the excluded evidence in the trial record for appeal. The Town moved for judgment as a matter of law, M.R. Civ. P. 50(d), and Pilot Point made a second offer of proof. After considering the offer of proof and Pilot Point's admission, the court, relying on our decision in Ocean Point Colony Trust, Inc. , 1999 ME 152, ¶ 9, 739 A.2d 382, granted the Town's motion for judgment as a matter of law, concluding that "the purported structures identified ... as having been in Surf Side Avenue between 1911 and September 1997 ... do not exhibit ownership over the property in a manner that is inconsistent with the incipient dedication, and would not likely constitute adverse possession of the property." In addition to granting the Town's motion for judgment as a matter of law on Count 1, the court's final written judgment also dismissed Count 2 of the consolidated complaints as unripe.

[¶10] Following entry of the final judgment, Pilot Point moved for findings of law and proposed supplemental conclusions of law. M.R. Civ. P. 52(b). The court denied this motion.

[¶11] Pilot Point timely appealed, M.R. App. P. 2B(c), and the Town timely cross-appealed, M.R. App. P. 2C(a).

II. DISCUSSION

A. The Common Law Lapse Theory

1. Timeliness of Count 1

[¶12] The Town argues that Count 1 of the consolidated complaints, which sought a declaration that the Town's right to accept the incipient dedication of the Pilot Point Section had lapsed at common law, is time-barred by the six-year statute of limitations for civil actions. See 14 M.R.S. § 752 (2020). The Town's position is that any injury to Pilot Point arising from the Town's actions occurred in 1997 when it put the world on notice that it claimed a right in the Pilot Point Section. See 23 M.R.S. § 3032.

[¶13] We review de novo the question of whether a claim is time-barred by the applicable statute of limitations. Estate of Gray , 2013 ME 29, ¶ 7, 61 A.3d 747. "All civil actions shall be commenced within 6 years after the cause of action accrues and not afterwards ...." 14 M.R.S. § 752. The purpose of statutes of limitation is "to provide eventual repose for potential defendants and to avoid the necessity of defending stale claims." Langevin v. City of Biddeford , 481 A.2d 495, 498 (Me. 1984). Generally, a cause of action accrues when "a claimant sustains a judicially cognizable injury" or when "discrete events make potential litigants aware of possible claims." In re George Parsons 1907 Trust , 2017 ME 188, ¶¶ 15, 19, 170 A.3d 215 (quotation marks omitted).

[¶14] The consolidated complaints were filed on January 26, 2018. The Town takes the position that Pilot Point had six years from September 11, 1997—the date on which the Town recorded its section 3032 notice in the Registry of Deeds—to bring this declaratory judgment action. However, the recording of the 1997 notice merely preserved the status quo by preventing—by statute—the deemed vacation of the Pilot Point Section, along with other proposed, unaccepted ways, and extended the Town's inchoate right to accept those ways for a period of twenty years. 23 M.R.S. § 3032. The 1997 notice did not create any new rights in the Town with respect to the Pilot Point Section beyond those that the Town already had at common law. See Ocean Point Colony Trust, Inc. , 1999 ME 152, ¶ 7, 739 A.2d 382 (holding that " section 3032(2) applies only to those incipient dedications that have not lapsed pursuant to the common law " (emphasis added)). The statutorily authorized 1997 notice does not have any real bearing on the question of whether the Town's common law right to accept the Pilot Point Section had lapsed before that notice was filed ; therefore, the filing of that notice did not create Pilot Point's cause of...