SCOTUS will dig into debate over alleged cemetery on Pa. farm [property rights]

Philly.com ^ | 5/24/2018 | Jason Nark

[dirtboy]

- snip -

Knick, who purchased the farm in 1970 to raise horses, denies Vail ever personally spoke to her. She claims she first caught wind of the issue in 2008, when it was was being discussed at public meetings. The Vails, she noted Monday, are “politically connected” in the area. In 2012, Scott Township supervisors passed an ordinance that in essence granted public access to private cemeteries during daylight hours; landowners could be fined $300 to $600 per day if they didn’t comply.

J. David Breemer, an attorney with Pacific Legal Foundation representing Knick, said Scott Township’s action is a direct violation of the Fifth Amendment, which prohibits the taking of private property without compensation.

“It’s a pretty serious intrusion,” Breemer said.”It shouldn’t be hard for a court to decide this is a taking of property or not.”

Knick sued Scott Township in Common Pleas Court in Lackawana County in 2013, claiming her property rights were violated. That court refused to rule on Knick’s case, according to her legal team, so she filed in U.S. District Court. In 2015, the federal court granted the township’s motion to dismiss Knick’s case, citing a 1985 Supreme Court decision known as Williamson County, which required plaintiffs to first file suit in state court, which Knick had already done.

[Reno89519]

This might be private property, but access to existing cemeteries seems to be in the public interest. What are the landowners gonna do, deny families access to their buried ancestors?!

[Sacajaweau]

Landlocked parcels have an "unwritten right" to access a highway.

There must have been a path at one time. Find the right old map, and you'll find the path.

These usually aren't too hard to solve.

[ConservativeMind]

Compensation for a public good should be in order.

[MortMan]

If their ancestors wanted to maintain access, they needed to have an easement on the deed.

[Sacajaweau]

Defining a private cemetery is tricky. It's private if someone is still taking care of it. Otherwise, it becomes the responsibility of the Town in which it lies.

Just finished with one of these problems.

[bgill]

For all the money she’s spent on lawyers, she could have had someone come out with a machine that sees underground to determine if those are graves. IMO, those large flat stones look like tombstones. If they are, she hasn’t a leg to stand on. Evil woman.

[centurion316]

Laws intended to protect cemeteries and provide access to the public (mostly descendants and families) have the effect of destroying these cemeteries and they are lost forever. Developers understand that if their construction crews come across an unknown cemetery, they know that they must bring out the bulldozer or the Bobcat and make it disappear in the dark of night. Bury the tombstones and scrape away any signs of its original purpose. Farmers with bushhogs and a front loader have done the same for years.

Yet, if we build a reservoir, we arrange to move the cemeteries to a piece of higher ground with public access and everybody is happy as long as you disinter the bodies and not just move the tombstones. Putting the burden on land owners is a recipe for disaster.

[bert]

Actually, find the old USGS 1:25000 topographical map and the cemetary will be marked

[Sacajaweau]

Not so....There are all different kinds of access easements.

[Dr. Sivana]

Vail said health reasons would prevent him from making the 262-mile trip to Washington in the fall for arguments. He’s baffled things have gone this far.

“It’s absolutely ridiculous,” he said Wednesday by phone. “The court’s time she has wasted and the money she was wasted. All I want to do is walk into the cemetery, clean it up a a little and plant a flag.”

Vail is the one who went to the local government without even approaching the landowner and getting an ordinance passed. A little late to say "Who, me?"

[Leaning Right]

> This might be private property, but access to existing cemeteries seems to be in the public interest. <

Very true. But on the other hand, what landowner would want strangers on their property? A reasonable compromise might be an ordinance allowing families access to such a cemetery on Sundays only, from say 1 PM to 5 PM.

[Sacajaweau]

We did GPR (ground penetrating radar) on our site. We also found the law that made it the responsibility of the Town.

[dirtboy]

The alleged graves are over 200 years old.

[Sacajaweau]

I’m afraid not all of them are on there. I furnished our county with several locations not on the maps.

[Sacajaweau]

Not terribly unusual. It was a time period when they were trying to figure out what to do with these little abandoned cemeteries. Our state came up with solutions in 1826 and 1828.

[Governor Dinwiddie]

Evidently the person who wants access never even spoke to the owner and went straight to a lawsuit. Sounds fishy to me.
 

[Sirius Lee]

This might be private property, but access to existing cemeteries seems to be in the public interest. What are the landowners gonna do, deny families access to their buried ancestors?

Yup. The landowners can and should be able to deny access to trespassers. If the town wants the land, they can pay for it via eminent domain, but the filthy politicians probably don't want to give up the power to make the landowner pay property taxes on the extra acreage.

[CaptainK]

Knick said she spent “many thousands” of dollars on the case before Pacific Legal Foundation, a firm described on its website as challenging “burdensome laws in courts and legislatures across the country,” took the case pro bono.

[Eric in the Ozarks]

The 1960s Denver water supply dam at Dillon, Colorado featured moving of a fairly large cemetery. The diggers worked out of trailers at the site and food was brought out to them from area restaurants prior to closing the dam.