Suppose you own or lease property and you come to learn that a corporation has plans to locate some type of plant or operation nearby, be it a quarry, strip mine, data center, power plant, hog farm or the like. Permits are being processed with the regulatory authorities, public information meetings are taking place, and the local county and municipal officials are touting job creation and tax revenues from new industry. The community residents voice their objections while industry says it is going ahead with its plans but promises to be a good neighbor.
Local government and regulatory agencies seem complicit but have limited powers to prevent the polluter from operating. It is easy for a property owner to feel powerless and give up, but the law is there to protect property rights, and only the courts can enforce these rights. So property owners have to take legal action to protect these rights.
Property rights are based on a simple principle: Sic utere meaning ‘use your own without injuring others’.
A famous judge once put it this way: “My right to swing my fist ends where your nose begins.” Oliver Wendell Holmes
The law and the courts have been protecting property rights since private ownership of land began in the 1600s. Owning or leasing real property comes with two types of property rights: (1) the right to the “exclusive possession” of the property, and (2) the right to the reasonable “use and enjoyment” of it.
Understanding Property Rights in Relation to Environmental Issues
Exclusive possession means that the owner may prevent anyone from entering the land or casting something objectionable onto it. Persons that interfere with that right are trespassers. ‘Use and enjoyment’ means just that; the owner or tenant has the right to the reasonable use and enjoyment without interference. Persons that interfere with this right are causing a nuisance.
Trespass and nuisance are often confused with negligence, but they are quite different bodies of law. When someone files a negligence lawsuit, the conduct of the person accused of causing the harm, the defendant, is central to the case. Negligence means carelessness or fault.
In a nuisance and trespass case, the court protects property, not the owner of it. A person may be liable for trespass or nuisance even though they exercised reasonable care or complied with all other laws like zoning laws or ordinances. This has been a legal principle since the year 1610 when the English courts shut down (enjoined) a neighboring pigsty finding that it was a nuisance despite being a beneficial and lawful activity. Aldred’s Case (1610) 9 Co Rep 57b
The question for the court or the jury is whether the interference with the owner’s property interest were substantial and unreasonable. And you can probably see why nuisance and trespass cases are case-by-case and fact specific. For example, noise, dust, and blasting vibrations from a coal strip mine invading a nearby residential community would be a nuisance whereas the same mine miles from the nearest home would not.
If it is determined that the interference is substantial, the court has the power to stop or limit the operations. Or it may decide that the homeowners must seek relief in the form of monetary damages.
If the court or jury determines that the defendant knowingly interfered with another’s property rights, it may award punitive damages in addition to compensation for the distress, annoyance, and loss in market value. A corporation that wants to locate a mine, data center, hog farm, or other operation that creates noise, air and water pollution often views the damage to another’s property rights as an “external cost” that the property owners, not the corporation, should bear. The polluter knows that it does not have a legal right to cause this harm but will not stop or changes its practices unless forced to do so by a court order or a substantial punitive damage award.
If you believe that your property rights have been infringed upon or pollution has damaged your property, contact the experienced environmental litigation attorneys of Ragsdale LLC.. Click here for a free case review or call us at 205-290-6800.