Resilience and Raisins: Partial Takings and Coastal Climate Change Adaptation

February 2016
Citation:
46
ELR 10123
Issue
2
Author
Joshua Ulan Galperin and Zaheer Hadi Tajani

The increased need for government-driven coastal resilience projects will lead to a growing number of claims for “partial takings” of coastal property. Much attention has been paid to what actions constitute a partial taking, but there is less clarity about how to calculate just compensation for such takings, and when compensation should be offset by the value of benefits conferred to the property owner. While the U.S. Supreme Court has an analytically consistent line of cases on compensation for partial takings, it has repeatedly failed (most recently in Horne v. U.S. Department of Agriculture) to articulate a clear rule. The authors argue the government should compensate property owners based on the free market value of their remaining property, the calculation of which should include all nonspeculative, calculable benefits of the taking.

Joshua Ulan Galperin is Clinical Director and Lecturer in Law at Yale Law School and a Lecturer at the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies. Zaheer Hadi Tajani is a student at the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies and Pace Law School. In May 2016, he will receive a master’s degree from Yale and a J.D. from Pace.

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