Justia Vermont Supreme Court Opinion Summaries

Mallets Bay Homeowner’s Association appealed the trial court’s partial denial of its motion to stay the issuance of a writ of possession in favor of Mongeon Bay Properties (MBP) following the termination of the Association’s ground lease. Members of the Mongeon family set up a partnership to own the land under approximately 25 camps, and the partnership entered into a ground lease with the Association, rather than the individual owners of each residence. The ground lease was due to expire in 2036. The lease contained a forfeiture clause, providing that the lease would terminate “if the [Association] shall fail to perform or comply with any terms of this Lease.” MBP sued the Association in January 2012, seeking damages and termination of the ground lease because the Association had failed to perform reasonable repairs and upkeep as required by the lease. The trial court concluded that the Association’s failure to properly maintain the property and the resulting damage amounted to “waste,” and therefore the Association had violated the lease. However, the trial court determined that terminating the lease under the default provision was inequitable and instead awarded MBP damages to cover the cost of repairing the property. On appeal, the Vermont Supreme Court affirmed the trial court’s determination that the Association had breached the lease, but remanded for reconsideration of MBP’s remedy. In 2016, the Association requested that the trial court stay the issuance of a writ of possession, arguing there was good cause for the court to stay the writ until 2036, when the lease was set to expire. The trial court entered judgment in favor of MBP, terminated the ground lease, and held MBP was to be granted a writ of possession for the property. After review, the Supreme Court reversed the trial court’s order in part, and remanded for the trial court to exercise its discretion. On remand, the question about which the trial court should exercise its discretion was whether to grant a longer stay than reflected in an October 31 order. The trial court could exercise that discretion on the basis of the parties’ pleadings, or decide to not hold any further hearings unless it chooses to. View "Mongeon Bay Properties, LLC v. Mallets Bay Homeowner's Assn., Inc." on Justia Law

Plaintiffs Michael and Denise Regan appealed the trial court’s decision denying them relief with respect to their complaint alleging that the redirecting of surface waters by defendant Town of Fayston and defendants Alan and Maria Spector and the Spector Retirement Trust caused ongoing flood damage to their property. In May 2009, “a huge rainstorm occurred with devastating consequences for all parties,” including the Spectors, the Regans, and other neighbors downhill from the Spectors’ lot. A culvert on the hillside above the Spectors’ property plugged, causing large amounts of water to skip over a culvert, which would have carried the water away from the Regans' property. The trial court concluded that “the conditions on the ground of which Regan complains are due almost entirely to the natural evolution of a seepage wetland that was disturbed by and is incorporating over time the installation of two unnatural and unmaintained ponds.” On appeal, the Regans argued that the trial court: (1) abused its discretion by imposing a discovery sanction that precluded them from submitting evidence on money damages; (2) applied the wrong legal standard in rejecting their claim of inverse condemnation; and (3) erred in rejecting their nuisance and trespass claims because the Spectors’ construction of the stone-lined channel in 2008 constituted an alteration of the pattern of flow within the watershed. The Supreme Court found no reversible error in the trial court's judgment and affirmed. View "Regan v. Spector" on Justia Law

This case concerned the taxable status of Schulmaier Hall, a building owned by the Vermont College of Fine Arts (VCFA), two-thirds of which VCFA rented to agencies of the State of Vermont (State) during the 2013 and 2014 tax years. The City Assessor of the City of Montpelier (City) found the property nonexempt for those tax years. In response, VCFA brought a motion for declaratory judgment in the trial court, and both parties moved for summary judgment. Granting summary judgment for the City, the court found: (1) that VCFA had failed to exhaust its administrative remedies before moving for declaratory judgment but also (2) that the property was not exempt on the merits. Finding no reversible error in the trial court's judgment, the Supreme Court affirmed. View "Vermont College of Fine Arts v. City of Montpelier" on Justia Law

Consolidated cases required the Vermont Supreme Court to revisit whether Vermont law recognized a cause of action for private nuisance based solely on aesthetic considerations. Appellants, a group of landowners from New Haven, appealed when the trial court granted summary judgment to defendants, two solar energy companies. The landowners filed suit after their neighbors leased property to the solar companies for the purpose of constructing commercial solar arrays. According to the landowners, the solar arrays constituted a private nuisance because they negatively affected the surrounding area's rural aesthetic, causing properties in their vicinity to lose value. The trial court consolidated the cases and, noting that the Vermont Supreme Court's precedent in "Hager" barred nuisance actions based purely on aesthetics, and granted summary judgment to the solar companies. The Supreme Court upheld Vermont's long-standing rule barring private nuisance actions based upon aesthetic disapproval alone. View "Myrick v. Peck Electric Company" on Justia Law

This appeal centered on a timber harvest by landowner Plum Creek Maine Timberlands, LLC in forestland enrolled in the current-use, tax-incentive program. The Vermont Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation (FPR) issued an adverse inspection report, concluding that Plum Creek violated its forest-management plan and failed to comply with minimum acceptable standards during the harvest. Consequently, the Department of Taxes removed the land from the current-use program and levied a tax assessment. Plum Creek appealed, and the superior court reversed those administrative decisions. FPR then appealed, arguing that the superior court failed to give appropriate deference to FPR’s determination of the proper methodology for measuring compliance with the forest-management plan. After review, the Supreme Court reversed the court’s decision, reinstating the adverse-inspection report as upheld by the FPR Commissioner. The case was remanded back to the superior court to consider the questions raised in Plum Creek’s appeal of the PVR Director’s decision removing land from the UVA program and leveling a tax assessment. View "Plum Creek Maine Timberlands, LLC v. Vermont Dept. of Forests, Parks & Rec." on Justia Law

This case centered around sixteen shares in the Malletts Bay Club, Inc. (MBC) that were sitting in escrow since 1998, when George Gordon conveyed the associated real property to J. Douglas Johnson. On summary judgment, the trial court ruled that defendant James McGarry, as transfer agent for the shares, breached the parties’ contract and his fiduciary duty by failing to issue the shares to Gordon’s successors upon their demand, and that defendant MBC had waived its right to challenge Gordon’s failure to transfer those shares to Johnson by agreeing to the Gordon-to-Johnson conveyance. After its review of this matter, the Vermont Supreme Court concluded that the agreement defining the parties’ rights and obligations with respect to the MBC shares did not require McGarry to return the shares to Gordon on demand, and that based on undisputed evidence, MBC did not waive its right to enforce its bylaws with respect to the transaction. Defendants were therefore entitled to summary judgment and plaintiffs were not. The Court remanded for further proceedings to resolve any remaining claims of plaintiffs that were not the subject of the cross motions for summary judgment. View "Rounds v. Mallets Bay Club, Inc." on Justia Law

Neighbor Mary Bourassa appealed the Environmental Division’s affirmance of a zoning permit application by Philip and Barbara Wagner and Christopher Guay, who wanted to build a single family residence and detached garage on two merged lots of a six-lot subdivision in Grand Isle. Bourassa, an owner of another lot in the subdivision, opposed development, chiefly on the ground that the proposed house would not be constructed within the “tree line” on the property, as required by the subdivision plat plan. Finding no reversible error, the Supreme Court affirmed. View "In re Wagner & Guay Permit" on Justia Law

This case was the latest in a series of lawsuits, spanning more than thirty years, between defendant Alpine Haven Property Owners’ Association, Inc. (AHPOA) and certain home/lot owners. Plaintiffs filed the underlying suit against AHPOA in May 2011. Plaintiffs asserted that their property was not part of a common-interest-community (CIC) and that they were not required by their deeds to be AHPOA members. Plaintiffs acknowledged an obligation to pay the reasonable costs of services provided and accepted, including maintaining the right-of-way, snowplowing, street lighting, and garbage collection. They argued, however, that they should not have to pay AHPOA for special assessments, annual meeting costs, insurance, road expansion or improvements, or any other AHPOA expenses not specified in their deeds. Plaintiffs also argued that a 2011 “Amended and Restated” declaration was not validly adopted. The dispositive question for the Vermont Supreme Court's review was whether the undisputed facts supported the trial court’s conclusion that “chalets” within Alpine Haven constituted a preexisting CIC governed by Title 27A of the Vermont Statutes Annotated. The trial court found a “series of deeds” sufficient to constitute a “declaration” of a CIC under the Vermont Common Interest Ownership Act (VCIOA). Plaintiffs argued that the court erred in reaching this conclusion. The Supreme Court agreed with plaintiffs, and therefore reversed and remanded for additional proceedings. View "Khan v. Alpine Haven Property Owners' Association, Inc." on Justia Law

The lender Cenlar FSB appealed a judgment in favor of the borrowers Laurie and Joseph Malenfant, Jr. in the lender’s second action for a judgment on the note and foreclosure, after the first was dismissed with prejudice. The lender argued that the first dismissal could not be interpreted as vacating the judgment on the note and for foreclosure that the trial court had previously issued in that case. Alternatively, the lender contended that its notice of default in the initial foreclosure action was sufficient to satisfy its notice obligation in connection with its second foreclosure action. After review, the Supreme Court concluded that the trial court’s dismissal with prejudice of the first action on the promissory note and complaint for foreclosure did effectively vacate that court’s prior judgment for lender on the note and for foreclosure. Furthermore, the lender was not, on this record, entitled to pursue a second action because it had not taken any steps to reinstate borrower’s monthly payment obligations after lender had accelerated the note. Accordingly, the Supreme Court affirmed the trial court's judgment. View "Cenlar FSB v. Malenfant, Jr." on Justia Law

This case came before the Vermont Supreme Court following the Environmental Division's decision on remand that a rock-crushing operation by North East Materials Group, LLC, (NEMG) was exempt from Act 250 as a preexisting development. The Environmental Division reached the same conclusion in its first decision, but the Supreme Court reversed and remanded, holding that the court used the wrong legal standard in deciding that the rock-crushing operation did not constitute a cognizable physical change to the preexisting development and that one of the main factual findings in support of the decision was clearly erroneous. Appellants, a group on thirteen neighbors to the operation, appealed, arguing that the Environmental Division erred in applying the Supreme Court's instructions on remand. After review a second time, the Supreme Court concluded that, even assuming that crushing operations were part of the preexisting quarrying development, findings on the location and volume of the crushing operations were too limited to support a conclusion that the present operations did not constitute a cognizable change to the existing development. Accordingly, the Court reversed and remanded for further proceedings. View "In re North East Materials Group LLC Act 250 JO #5-21" on Justia Law