Also known as: municipal governments · local government · municipality
Written by attorneys — see sources below.
The government of a particular locality such as a city or county. It possesses authority to enact zoning ordinances that divide land into districts and restrict uses when the classifications are reasonable and substantially related to public health, safety, morals, or general welfare. The same authority is subject to limits including protection of vested rights in preexisting uses, the dormant commerce clause, and requirements for just compensation in eminent domain.
Matrix Technologies purchased land inside City of Norfolk and sought to construct a manufacturing plant. The city had previously divided the area into districts that confined manufacturing to an industrial zone several blocks away. Matrix applied for a variance that the city denied. The denial stood because the classification reasonably advanced public health and safety goals.
Meredith Maxwell had operated a small auto-repair shop on her property for fifteen years when City of Norfolk rezoned the block for residential use only. She continued the repair business without expansion. The city could not force immediate closure because the prior lawful use created a vested right that survived the zoning change.
Majestic Construction generated construction debris inside City of Norfolk and arranged to ship it to an out-of-state recycler offering lower rates. The city enacted an ordinance requiring all locally generated waste to be processed at a single designated in-state facility. The ordinance fell because it discriminated against interstate commerce by blocking access to out-of-state processors.
Miguel Mendoza obtained a building permit from City of Norfolk under existing zoning and spent substantial sums installing foundation and utilities for a new warehouse. Before any certificate of occupancy issued, the city rezoned the parcel and revoked the permit. The revocation was inequitable because Mendoza had changed position in good-faith reliance on the prior permit.
City of Norfolk approved a redevelopment plan that authorized taking several privately owned parcels for transfer to a private developer promising new office space and increased tax revenue. Maria Morales owned one of the targeted parcels and challenged the taking. The taking was permitted because the plan served a public purpose of economic revitalization even though the land would ultimately be conveyed to private hands.
In the late 1990s the city of New London, Connecticut, confronted severe economic decline after the 1996 closure of the Naval Undersea Warfare Center, which had employed more than 1,500 people. The city's unemployment rate stood nearly double the state average and its population had dropped below 24,000 residents from a 1970 high of 30,000. State and local officials therefore designated the Fort Trumbull peninsula for targeted economic revitalization. In 1998 the New London Development Corporation, a private nonprofit entity, was reactivated to prepare a redevelopment plan covering roughly 90 acres. The plan divided the area into seven parcels designated for a waterfront conference hotel and marinas, retail and entertainment space, research and office facilities, parking and park support, residential units, a Coast Guard museum, and additional office and retail uses. The city council formally approved the plan in January 2000 and authorized the NLDC to acquire needed parcels by purchase or, if necessary, by eminent domain. Petitioners Susette Kelo, Wilhelmina Dery, and seven other owners held fifteen properties within parcels 3 and 4A; ten of those parcels were occupied by the owners or their family members and none was alleged to be blighted. After negotiations with the NLDC failed, the corporation initiated condemnation proceedings against the remaining properties in November 2000. In December 2000 the petitioners filed suit in New London Superior Court asserting that the proposed takings violated the public-use limitation of the Fifth Amendment. Following a seven-day bench trial the Superior Court entered a permanent restraining order barring condemnation of the parcel 4A properties but denied relief as to the parcel 3 properties. Both sides appealed to the Connecticut Supreme Court, which upheld the validity of all challenged takings. The United States Supreme Court granted certiorari to review the federal constitutional question.
View caseMustafa Mahmoud and other nonresidents sought to build multifamily housing in Village of Arlington Heights but were blocked by single-family zoning rules. They sued the village alleging discriminatory impact. The suit was dismissed because the plaintiffs could not show a substantial probability that removal of the zoning would result in the housing they desired.
In 1971 Metropolitan Housing Development Corporation applied to the Village of Arlington Heights, Illinois, for rezoning of a 15-acre parcel from single-family to multiple-family classification. Using federal financial assistance under section 236 of the National Housing Act, MHDC planned to build 190 clustered townhouse units for low- and moderate-income tenants. The Village denied the rezoning request. MHDC, joined by other plaintiffs, brought suit in the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois alleging that the denial was racially discriminatory and violated the Fourteenth Amendment and the Fair Housing Act of 1968. Arlington Heights is a suburb of Chicago located about 26 miles northwest of the downtown Loop. Most land in the Village is zoned for detached single-family homes. The Clerics of St. Viator own an 80-acre parcel just east of the center of Arlington Heights that includes a high school, a novitiate building, and vacant land. Since 1959 all land surrounding the Viatorian property has been zoned R-3 for single-family use with relatively small minimum lot-size requirements. In 1970 MHDC entered into a 99-year lease and accompanying agreement of sale covering a 15-acre site in the southeast corner of the Viatorian property. The agreement set a bargain purchase price of $300,000 with the sale contingent upon securing zoning clearances and section 236 housing assistance. MHDC's plans for the Lincoln Green project called for 20 two-story buildings containing 190 units with a mix of one-, two-, three-, and four-bedroom configurations and a large portion of the site left open. The development did not conform to the Village zoning ordinance and required rezoning to the R-5 multiple-family classification. MHDC filed a petition for rezoning with the Village Plan Commission accompanied by supporting materials that included an affirmative marketing plan designed to assure racial integration. MHDC consulted with Village staff and incorporated every recommended change into the plans. During the spring of 1971 the Plan Commission considered the proposal at three public meetings that drew large crowds. Opponents focused on the zoning aspects. They argued that the area had always been single-family. They also argued that the buffer policy adopted in 1962 called for R-5 zoning primarily to serve as a buffer between single-family development and commercial or manufacturing districts. At the close of the third meeting the Plan Commission recommended denial. On September 28, 1971, the Village Board denied the rezoning by a 6-1 vote. In June 1972 MHDC and three Black individuals filed suit against the Village. A second nonprofit corporation and an individual of Mexican-American descent intervened. After a bench trial the District Court entered judgment for the Village in 1974. The Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit reversed in 1975. The Supreme Court granted the Village's petition for certiorari in 1975.
View caseA municipality may not eliminate a lawful preexisting use immediately upon rezoning. The owner retains a vested right to continue the use unless the right is lost through abandonment, statutory discontinuance, or a reasonable amortization period.
A landowner acquires a vested right when, in good-faith reliance on a permit or existing zoning, the owner makes substantial expenditures or otherwise changes position so that depriving the right would be inequitable. Jurisdictions differ on whether a valid permit plus substantial construction is required or whether a balancing test applies.
No. An ordinance that forces all locally produced solid waste to be processed at a designated in-state facility before export discriminates against interstate commerce and is unconstitutional as a protectionist barrier.
No. Zoning ordinances that divide a municipality into districts and restrict land uses are a valid exercise of the police power when the classification is reasonable and bears a substantial relation to public health, safety, morals, or general welfare.
…to a former chairman, a “prudent tradition” that the Commission include one or two lawyers, preferably with experience in municipal government, and several laymen with no specialized qualifications other than concern for the good of the city. Goldstone, Aesthetics in Historic Districts, 36 Law & Contemp. Prob. 379, 384-385…