Articles

caption id="attachment_46396" align="alignright" width="300" The Coachella Valley, a sere and torrid land (photo by Tim Shell)/caption That is the question being asked of the United States Supreme Court in two cert petitions filed last month, Desert Water Authority & Coachella Valley Water District v. Agua Caliente Band of Cahuilla Indians. ...

Today, National Review published my article discussing, Wayside Church v. Van Buren County, PLF's case challenging legalized theft in Michigan. Michigan's unjust property tax law allows local governments to steal from people who fall behind on their property taxes. As I explain in the article, Can the government take your home and all your equity i ...

This week, PLF filed a petition asking the full Sixth Circuit Court of Appeals to rehear the takings case of Wayside Church, Henderson Hodgens, and Myron Stahl. All three lost their property to Van Buren County after they fell behind on their 2011 taxes. The County foreclosed on their properties and sold each for significantly more than taxes owed, ...

caption id="attachment_43479" align="alignright" width="300" Gordon Beyer with grandson./caption Pacific Legal Foundation reviews hundreds of regulatory takings cases a year. Often we cannot take a case, for any number of reasons, even though the facts call out for justice. But, sometimes the brazenness of a local government's land grab so shock ...

Does the Constitution protect you from the government taking your equity in your home, land, or business? That's the question Andrew Ohanessian and Rafaeli,LLC are asking the Michigan Court of Appeals in Rafaeli v. Oakland County. Rafaeli owed the County $8 for overdue taxes, which amassed to $285 in taxes, interest, and fees when the County forecl ...

caption id="attachment_42229" align="alignright" width="196" We all could use 12 Angry Men on our side when the government takes our stuff/caption Kevin Brott wants a jury trial for his Fifth Amendment claim to just compensation. The federal government converted a portion of Brott's property into a public trail. He wants a jury to gauge compensa ...

This week, in Coleman v. District of Columbia, a federal district court held that the plaintiffs have grounds to bring their Fifth Amendment challenge to the District of Columbia's taking of their property under its former tax-foreclosure scheme. Liberty Blog readers may recall that PLF filed a friend-of-the-court brief in support of Benjamin Colem ...

Last Friday we received a disappointing decision in Duarte Nursery v. Army Corps of Engineers. The court ruled that the company violated the Clean Water Act by plowing its property, even though the Act exempts normal farming practices. And, the implementing regulations state that plowing is never even subject to the Act, so long as it does not conv ...

In Michigan, when landowners fail to pay their property taxes, local governments take the property, sell it, and keep all the profits—no matter how small the debt or how valuable the property. As a result, local governments are profiting handsomely over the misfortune of their residents. For example, a few years ago, Wayside Church lost a piece of ...