Ohio Supreme Court: State historical society can take over golf course built on ancient earthworks

COLUMBUS, Ohio – Ohio’s state historic society can use its eminent-domain powers to purchase out a lease from a Newark golf course situated on a sequence of historical Native American earthworks, the Ohio Supreme Court docket dominated Wednesday.

The court docket’s 6-1 ruling opens the door for the Ohio Historical past Connection to hunt to designate the Octagon Earthworks, constructed by the Hopewell Tradition someday between 100 B.C. and 500 A.D., as a UNESCO World Heritage Website, although it’s nonetheless unsure whether or not that may occur.

The case revolved round whether or not the Ohio Historical past Connection acted in good religion when it provided the Moundbuilders Nation Membership $800,000 in 2018 to interrupt its 22-year-old lease, which runs by 2078. That was the worth of the lease as decided by an appraisal in February 2018.

The Historical past Connection additionally ordered a second appraisal, carried out a month earlier than, that the group’s president/CEO, Burt Logan, mistakenly believed to worth the lease at $500,000. Nevertheless, after the lawsuit was filed, a Historical past Connection lawyer found that appraisal really concluded the lease was value $1.75 million.

That led the nation membership to file a counterclaim asserting that the Historical past Connection didn’t negotiate in good religion as a result of it purposely hid the $1.75 million appraisal.

A decades-old Ohio regulation permits historical past organizations just like the Ohio Historical past Connection to make use of eminent area to acceptable “the positioning of any historic or prehistoric mound (or) earth works.” However the nation membership argued that it already allowed some public entry to the positioning, and that the golf course supplied a much more tangible financial profit to the neighborhood than betting on the unlikely likelihood that the earthworks can be designated a UNESCO World Heritage Website.

Justice Michael Donnelly, writing for the court docket, agreed with a trial-court ruling that Logan acted in good religion as a result of he was introduced with two value determinations mentioned to be valued at $500,000 and $800,000, and he provided the nation membership the upper of the 2 figures as compensation.

Donnelly additionally disagreed with the nation membership’s argument that eliminating the golf course wouldn’t serve the general public curiosity. He famous that the Historical past Connection was instructed it couldn’t be nominated for World Heritage web site standing or get help from the U.S. Nationwide Park Service and the U.S. Division of the Inside till it terminated the nation membership’s lease and eliminated the golf course.

“This park will assist protect and guarantee perpetual public entry to one of the vital vital landmarks within the state of Ohio,” he wrote. “This isn’t simply any inexperienced area. It’s a prehistoric monument that has no parallel on the planet.”

Ohio Supreme Court docket Chief Justice Maureen O’Connor concurred with Donnelly’s resolution, as did Justices Pat DeWine, Melody Stewart, and Jennifer Brunner. Justice Pat Fischer concurred in judgement solely.

The case now heads again to trial court docket to proceed with the eminent-domain appropriation.

The lone dissenter within the case, Chief Justice-elect Sharon Kennedy, wrote that the trial court docket “failed to contemplate the speculative nature of the need of the appropriation” when siding with the Ohio Historical past Connection.

The Historical past Connection’s final purpose for breaking the lease, Kennedy wrote, was to get the earthworks designated as a World Heritage Website. Nevertheless, she wrote, “being nominated just isn’t an assurance that the positioning will likely be chosen for World Heritage standing,” noting that solely two of the 5 websites nominated by the US for World Heritage designation since 2008 have been accepted.

Kennedy quoted a 2006 Ohio Supreme Court docket ruling that the town of Norwood, close to Cincinnati, couldn’t use eminent area to accumulate property that was deemed to be “in peril” of changing into a blighted space.

“What it would grow to be could also be no extra seemingly than what may not grow to be,” the court docket held in that 2006 ruling. “Such a speculative normal is inappropriate within the context of eminent area, even below the trendy, broad interpretation of ‘public use.’”

Jeremy Pelzer covers state authorities and politics in Columbus for Cleveland.com and The Plain Supplier. Learn extra of his work right here.