California Eminent Domain Report

During Nossaman's recent webinar concerning Transit & Transportation Project Success in the Wake of the Pandemic, I addressed Temporary Construction Easement (TCE) issues. For a re-cap of my presentation on this topic please click here.

Additionally, to view our entire webinar "A Path to Transit & Transportation Project Success in the Wake of the Pandemic: A Panel Discussion Among Legal Professionals," please click here to access the full on-demand recording.

We continue to monitor developments related to COVID-19 and are available to respond to questions and discuss issues ...

For those of you involved in the transportation sector, we invite you to join us on Wednesday, June 3^rd for a discussion on planning, procurement and financing strategies that can be implemented now to support timely project delivery in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic.  We are planning a very interactive webinar where ample time will be set aside to answer questions received from attendees both prior to and during the event.

Topics that will be covered include:

• How to prepare now to efficiently and effectively move projects forward
• Procurement and contracting strategies that enable ...

On April 1, Nossaman’s Eminent Domain Group hosted a webinar to discuss the impacts COVID-19 is having on the Right of Way industry.  First, I’d like to thank the people who attended, many of whom added thoughtful questions to the discussion.  It’s clear a lot of people are giving these issues a lot of thought.  Second, obviously things continue to evolve at a breathtaking pace, and even by the time this post goes from being drafted to appearing on the blog, things are likely to change. 

Note that this post is not meant to recap the things we discussed at the webinar.  If you weren’t able to join us and want to review what we covered, feel free to download the COVID-19 PowerPoint we used, or watch the entire recorded webinar.  No, the purpose of this post is to provide some insights as to what other right of way professionals are thinking about a few of these issues.  During the webinar, we asked several poll questions, and since the Nossaman team found the results interesting, I’m hoping some of you will as well ...

Acquiring a fee interest in property seems to be so out-of-style.  Nearly every linear infrastructure project I work on now involves the acquisition of various types of easements, whether its a typical temporary construction easement, access easement, street/highway easement, or transmission line easement, or a more complicated aerial easement, parking structure easement, or floating easement.  The scope and terms of these easements can have massive ramifications on compensation, and particularly severance damages to impacted properties.  If you're interested ...

We haven't provided much in the way of updates recently on California infrastructure projects requiring eminent domain.  Either we've been too busy to notice or it's been surprisingly quiet recently.  But, some headlines did just catch our attention, so we thought we'd provide an update to our readers.

• San Luis Obispo to Institute Eminent Domain:  according to a recent article in the Tribune, City Council approves temporary easement on private land for work in congested area, the San Luis Obispo City Council unanimously adopted a resolution of necessity, approving the use of ...

A few odds and ends for our readers:

• New Federal Eminent Domain Legislation:  According to the Eminent Domain Law Blog, two Senators have introduced a new bill, Protection of Homes, Small Businesses, and Private Property Act of 2012.  This, again, you may ask?  What ever happened with HR 1433, the Private Property Rights Protection Act of 2011?  HR 1433 appears to be dying a slow death, but the new 2012 bill seeks to pick up the slack.  In particular, it is targeted at the same issue:  preventing the federal government from using its eminent domain power and state and local ...