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By WILLIAM HANLON
Rappahannock News Staff Writer
Obscured to the general public by the controversy surrounding the U.S. Supreme Court’s abortion decision last week, a High Court landuse ruling released the same day was read with interest by many Northern Virginia public officials, landowners and their attorneys.
The decision in the case, Lucas vs. South Carolina, like the decision in the Pennsylvania abortion case, failed to wholly satisfy partisans on either side of the issue involved.
“We think it’s a very narrow decision that will have a very limited impact on what local government in the PEC region has been trying to do in terms of land-use policy,” said Bob Dennis, president of the Piedmont Environmental Council.
At issue in Lucas was whether a South Carolina landowner was entitled to compensation from the state for coastal land he bought for $1 million to develop, but which was rendered undevelopable by the state Beachfront Management Act.
The case, which many landowners’ rights activists had expected to result in a clear-cut and precedentsetting victory for their side, was decided by the High Court. In a 7-2 vote, the justices said the government must pay compensation to landowners who are deprived of all economic use of property so long as the use is not considered a nuisance under local common law.
The court remanded the case to South Carolina, where the court that originally heard the case and awarded the landowner $1.23 million is to decide whether the single-family-home development planned by the landowner is a nuisance under South Carolina law. If the South Carolina court decides the use is a nuisance, then there is no taking of property by the state and the land
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