St. Johns River Water Mgmt. Dist. v. Koontz
| Decision Date | 30 April 2014 |
| Docket Number | No. 5D06–1116.,5D06–1116. |
| Citation | 183 So.3d 396 |
| Parties | ST. JOHNS RIVER WATER MANAGEMENT DISTRICT, Appellant, v. Coy A. KOONTZ, Jr., etc., Appellee. |
| Court | Florida District Court of Appeals |
Rachel D. Gray and William H. Congdon, Palatka, for Appellant.
Christopher V. Carlyle and Shannon McLin Carlyle of The Carlyle Appellate Law Firm, The Villages, Michael D. Jones of Michael D. Jones & Associates, P.A., Winter Park, Paul J. Beard, II, Sacramento, California, and Christina Martin of Pacific Legal Foundation, Palm Beach Gardens, for Appellee.
We address this case for the fifth time. See Koontz v. St. Johns River Water Mgmt. Dist., 720 So.2d 560 (Fla. 5th DCA 1998) [Koontz I ]; St. Johns River Water Mgmt. Dist. v. Koontz, 861 So.2d 1267 (Fla. 5th DCA 2003) ; St. Johns River Water Mgmt. Dist. v. Koontz, 908 So.2d 518 (Fla. 5th DCA 2005) ; and St. Johns River Water Mgmt. Dist. v. Koontz, 5 So.3d 8 (Fla. 5th DCA 2009) [Koontz IV ]. In Koontz IV, at Appellant's request, we certified to the Florida Supreme Court a question of great public importance. We adopted verbatim the question framed by Appellant. The Florida Supreme Court rephrased and expanded the scope of the certified question1 as follows:
DO THE FIFTH AMENDMENT TO THE UNITED STATES CONSTITUTION AND ARTICLE X, SECTION 6(a) OF THE FLORIDA CONSTITUTION RECOGNIZE AN EXACTIONS TAKING UNDER THE HOLDINGS OF NOLLAN V. CALIFORNIA COASTAL COMMISSION, 483 U.S. 825 [107 S.Ct. 3141, 97 L.Ed.2d 677] (1987), AND DOLAN V. CITY OF TIGARD, 512 U.S. 374 [114 S.Ct. 2309, 129 L.Ed.2d 304] (1994), WHERE THERE IS NO COMPELLED DEDICATION OF ANY INTEREST IN REAL PROPERTY TO PUBLIC USE AND THE ALLEGED EXACTION IS A NON LAND–USE MONETARY CONDITION FOR PERMIT APPROVAL WHICH NEVER OCCURS AND NO PERMIT IS EVER ISSUED?
St. Johns River Water Mgmt. Dist. v. Koontz, 77 So.3d 1220, 1222 (Fla.2011). Answering the certified question in the negative, the Florida Supreme Court held that an "exactions taking" had not occurred. It expressly declined to address any issues beyond the question certified. Id. at 1231.
On review, the United States Supreme Court reversed the decision of the Florida Supreme Court. Koontz v. St. Johns Water Mgmt. Dist., –––U.S. ––––, 133 S.Ct. 2586, 186 L.Ed.2d 697 (2013). In doing so, it concluded that an exactions taking may occur even in the absence of a compelled dedication of land and even when the unconstitutional condition is refused and the permit is denied. Id. at 2596. The Supreme Court declined to address certain state law issues raised by Appellant during that proceeding, concluding that the resolution of those issues was more appropriately addressed to the Florida Supreme Court. Importantly, none of the issues left open by the United States Supreme Court fell within the scope of the certified question. Accordingly, the Florida Supreme Court remanded this cause back to this court for "further proceedings consistent with [the United States Supreme Court's] decision."
Because our decision in Koontz IV is entirely consistent with the decision of the United States Supreme Court, we adopt and reaffirm Koontz IV in its entirety and affirm the judgment below. We deny Appellant's request to reopen the briefing. The constitutional issues decided by the United States Supreme Court were fully briefed here, and that Court's holding does not set forth a new legal construct with which we must re-analyze these issues. To the extent that Appellant seeks to brief the state law issues left open by the Supreme Court, we conclude that those issues were either disposed of in Koontz I or Koontz IV, or they were not preserved and presented in those proceedings.2
AFFIRMED.
The decision of the majority to affirm the judgment in favor of Coy A. Koontz, Jr. ["Koontz"] without any further work from this Court is both incorrect and unfair. If there is to be a summary disposition of this case, in light of the United States Supreme Court's decision in Koontz v. St. Johns River Water Management District, ––– U.S. ––––, 133 S.Ct. 2586, 186 L.Ed.2d 697 (2013), that disposition must be in favor of the St. Johns Water Management District [the "District"], not Koontz.
This case began in 1994. Koontz filed an inverse condemnation suit, claiming that there had been a regulatory taking of his property, depriving him of all economically viable use of his land. The trial court originally dismissed the case, concluding that, by failing to administratively contest the denial of the permit Koontz had sought from the District, the inverse condemnation claim was not ripe. This Court reversed in Koontz I3 , concluding that the "taking" claim by Koontz was ripe for decision. On remand, the trial judge observed that he did not believe that Koontz had a "taking" claim, but felt he was bound by this court's earlier opinion4 . Ultimately, the trial court settled on the Nollan5 /Dolan6 theory of "exaction" as the basis for Koontz's claim that his property had been "taken" without just compensation. This "taking" was the basis for the trial court's judgment finding liability and, subsequently, was the basis for the $376,000 award of compensation to Koontz for the District's "temporary taking" of Koontz's property during the time period that the permit had been withheld.
This Court upheld the judgment that the District had effected a "taking" of Koontz's property and certified to the Florida Supreme Court the question whether the Florida Constitution recognizes an "exaction taking" in a case where there is no deprivation of substantially all economically viable use of the land, but where a condition placed on obtaining approval of a land use permit is deemed unreasonable. St. Johns River Mgmt. Dist. v. Koontz, 5 So.3d 8, 22 (Fla. 5th DCA 2009).
When the Florida Supreme Court accepted jurisdiction of the case, the court rephrased the question to include whether a "taking" had occurred under the United States Constitution as well as two additional issues decided by this Court that were not mentioned in our certified question: (1) whether there can be an exaction taking if no interest in real property was acquired by the District, and (2) whether a monetary condition that is never given up can constitute an exaction. St. Johns River Water Mgt. Dist. v. Koontz, 77 So.3d 1220 (Fla.2011). In reversing this Court's decision, the Florida Supreme Court decided that, because the District never attempted to exact any interest in real property from Koontz and because Koontz never gave up anything to the District, he had no "takings" claim. Id. at 1231.
The Koontz estate sought review of this decision in the United States Supreme Court. 133 S.Ct. at 2588. To its credit, the high court did not pretend that the issues presented in the case involved obvious or settled law. The high court explained that the reason why an extortionate demand for property runs afoul of the Taking Clause is not because the property is "taken," but because it impermissibly burdens a citizen's right not to have property taken without just compensation. Id. at 2596. The compensable injury is the impermissible denial of a governmental benefit. Id. Nollan/Dolan limits the conditions that a governmental agency may place on an exaction in exchange for bestowing the governmental benefit. If property is taken as a result of such impermissible governmental action, the remedy is just compensation under the Fifth Amendment; if no property is taken, however, the remedy is as provided under state law. Id. at 2597.
What was unusual about this case was that Koontz refused to accede to what he considered to be an excessive demand by the District as a condition for issuing the permit; therefore, nothing was taken by the District and nothing was given up by Koontz. In response to the position I had taken in my dissent in Koontz IV, which seemingly had been endorsed by the Florida Supreme Court7 , the United States Supreme Court explained that:
Extortionate demands for property in the land-use permitting context run afoul of the takings clause, not because they take property, but because they impermissibly burden the right not to have property taken without just compensation. As in other unconstitutional conditions cases in which someone refuses to cede a constitutional right in the face of coercive pressure, the impermissible denial of a governmental benefit is a constitutionally cognizable injury.
Id. at 2596.
There is, however, a difference between a constitutionally cognizable injury burdening the right not to have property taken without just compensation, and the "taking" of property. It is certainly possible, as in Nollan/Dolan, to have an exactions "taking" of property, but if no property is taken, there has been no "taking;" rather, the agency has committed a legal wrong that may be redressed in a variety of ways, including a damages remedy if authorized by state law.
As the Supreme Court explained:
That is not to say, however, that there is no relevant difference between a consummated taking and the denial of a permit based on an unconstitutionally extortionate demand. Where the permit is denied and the condition is never imposed, nothing has been taken. While the unconstitutional conditions doctrine recognizes that this burdens a constitutional right, the Fifth Amendment mandates a particular remedy —just compensation—only for takings. In cases where there is an excessive demand but no taking, whether money damages are available is not a question of federal constitutional law but of the cause of action—whether state or federal—on which the landowner relies. Because petitioner brought his claim pursuant to a state law cause of action, the Court has no occasion to discuss what remedies might be available for a Nollan/Dolan unconstitutional conditions violation either here or in other cases.
Id. at 2597.
Because there was no "taking" compensable under the Fifth Amendment in this case, the...
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