Leonard & Karl Marino, Appellant's V. Central Puget Sound Regional Transit, Resp

Court of Appeals of Washington·Decided September 26, 2022·No. 82426-1·Unpublished

Opinion

IN THE COURT OF APPEALS OF THE STATE OF WASHINGTON CENTRAL PUGET SOUND REGIONAL TRANSIT AUTHORITY, a regional transit No. 82426-1-I authority, dba SOUND TRANSIT, DIVISION ONE

Respondent,

v.

LEONARD S. & KARI C. MARINO (EL169 & 13 EL806), individually and the marital UNPUBLISHED OPINION community composed thereof,† Defendants,

IRIS GUY & JANE/JOHN DOE GUY (EL638), individually and the marital community composed thereof; MARK S. & REGINA C. HANLON (EL666), individually and the marital community composed thereof; ADAM SHAFER & HOLLY HART- SHAFER (EL679), individually and the marital community composed thereof; SUNG GON MAENG & JINSUN BAE (EL739), individually and the marital community composed thereof; CHRISTOPHER SMITH & LEAH ANDERSON (EL776), individually and the marital community composed thereof; DAVID K. & NATIVIDAD M. SOIKE (EL778), individually and the marital community composed thereof; MARTIN W. & HEATHER H. YAMAMOTO (EL874), individually and the marital community composed thereof; and OLGA RUZAEVA and JANE/JOHN DOE RUZAEVA (EL875), individually and the marital community composed thereof, Appellants.

† See Appendix for a list of all Defendants.

Citations and pin cites are based on the Westlaw online version of the cited material.

SMITH, A.C.J. —Central Puget Sound Regional Transit (Sound Transit), seeking to construct a light rail station, purchased property in Bellevue’s Surrey Downs neighborhood. This property was encumbered by “Covenants, Conditions, and Restrictions” (CC&Rs) prohibiting Sound Transit’s intended use, and the agency therefore began a condemnation action to remove those restrictions. Before the case went to trial, Sound Transit acquired the votes it needed to amend the CC&Rs and dismissed the case. Its dismissal was vacated after a collection of owners argued that the agency had abandoned the case and they were owed fees and costs as a result. The matter then proceeded to trial under two theories of liability: that Sound Transit committed a taking by engaging in construction activities on its property before amending the CC&Rs, and that it committed a taking by denying the owners their ability to enforce the CC&Rs. A jury awarded the owners $1,000 each.

On appeal, the owners contest a number of rulings by the trial court.

Finding no merit to their arguments, we affirm.

FACTS

Sound Transit Initiates Condemnation Action

The Surrey Downs neighborhood comprises four plats, subdivisions that include multiple properties: Hearthstone Addition Part No. 1, Hearthstone Addition Part No. 2, Surrey Downs Addition No. 1, and Surrey Downs Addition No. 2. Each of these plats is governed by certain CC&Rs. Each CC&R, among other restrictions, limits its constituent properties to residential use.

Sound Transit initiated this proceeding in April 2016 when it filed an eminent domain petition to amend the CC&Rs.1 The CC&Rs’ residential use restrictions blocked Sound Transit’s intended use of land it had purchased at the edge of the neighborhood: construction of a light rail station. Sound Transit’s goal in filing the petition was to remove the residential use restrictions as they applied to the property on which it planned construction. It therefore sought to “ascertain the just compensation for the taking and damaging” effected by the amendment of the covenants.

Some property owners—all located within the Surrey Downs No. 1 and Surrey Downs No. 2 plats—opposed the condemnation.2 In a June 2017 summary judgment motion they asserted that even were Sound Transit to prevail, it would not have acquired the rights needed to operate the planned light rail station. They argued that private easements and noise and vibration restrictions of the CC&Rs were independent bars to the station’s construction, and they requested compensation for these additional alleged takings. They did not prevail on their motion and their petition for discretionary review was denied.

Meanwhile, over the course of roughly two years following the petition’s filing, Sound Transit had voluntarily dismissed many of the named respondents— of which there were initially close to two hundred—after reaching private agreements with them. It obtained property rights of other respondents by

1 The action never addressed Hearthstone Addition Part No. 1’s CC&R

because Sound Transit had already acquired the ability to modify it.

2 Sound Transit, appraising the change in value of the properties at $0,

offered $300 in compensation per property.

default judgment and dismissed them as well. Through this process—and by virtue of its ownership of the properties it had purchased before filing the petition—Sound Transit acquired the rights and votes it needed to satisfy the amendment procedures of the various CC&Rs by early 2018.3 The now

amended CC&Rs read:

The HCT Lots may be used for the purpose of allowing the construction, operation and maintenance of a high capacity transit ("HCT") system upon or adjacent to the HCT Lots and for the purpose of preserving the residential nature of the Property on portions of the HCT Lots available for such development after the HCT system is constructed.

Except for the HCT purpose described above, the HCT Lots may only be used for residential purposes, and no permanent building may be erected other than a single family dwelling.

Dismissal and Vacation

Having acquired the power to amend the CC&Rs independent of its condemnation action, Sound Transit moved to voluntarily dismiss the case. The motion passed without response from the remaining litigating property owners and was granted by the trial court.

The still-litigating owners then moved for attorney fees and costs under RCW 8.25.075(1)(b), which directs the court to award condemnees costs and fees if “[t]he proceeding is abandoned by the condemnor.” The trial court concluded that the equities supported a theory of abandonment and reserved its decision on fees. Four days later, before the court had readdressed fees, Sound Transit moved to vacate the voluntary dismissal order. It argued that vacation

3 The vote threshold needed varied by plat.

Surry Downs Additions Nos. 1 and 2 needed 75 percent approval; Hearthstone Additions Nos. 1 and 2 needed only 50 percent.

would “cure[] the unintended consequences identified by the Court in the Abandonment Order,” returning the parties to their respective positions prior to the dismissal. The trial court agreed and vacated the dismissal. The owners sought and were denied discretionary review of this ruling.

Claims Brought to Trial

After the reinstatement of the case, a second set of cross-motions for summary judgment, a corresponding motion to clarify, and motions in limine refined the claims that would be argued at trial.

Sound Transit, having amended the CC&Rs, did not believe that trial was necessary. It moved for summary judgment, asking that the court enter an order determining that the respondents to the condemnation action no longer had compensable rights because “ ‘the property rights sought to be altered . . . [have] already been acquired.’ ”

The owners filed a cross-motion, pointing again to other, unamended provisions in the covenants to assert that the agency was still bound by certain restrictions. They specifically pointed to noise, dust, and vibration restrictions of the CC&Rs.4 Here, the owners presented evidence that Sound Transit had

4 The restrictions in Surrey Downs Additions Nos. 1 and 2’s respective

CC&Rs: “There shall be no noise, vibration, smoke, dust, odors, heat or glare produced as a result of the home occupation which would exceed that normally produced by a single family residence.” And: “NUISANCES. No noxious or offensive activity shall be carried upon any lot, nor shall anything be done thereon which may be or may become an annoyance or nuisance to the neighborhood.”

Free access — add to your briefcase to read the full text and ask questions with AI

Leonard & Karl Marino, Appellant's V. Central Puget Sound Regional Transit, Resp, (Wash. Ct. App. 2022).

Leonard & Karl Marino, Appellant's V. Central Puget Sound Regional Transit, Resp (Leonard & Karl Marino, Appellant's V. Central Puget Sound Regional Transit, Resp) — published by Counsel Stack Legal Research, free access to 12M+ legal documents.

Related

State v. Elliott
785 P.2d 440 (Washington Supreme Court, 1990)
State v. Amunsis
377 P.2d 462 (Washington Supreme Court, 1963)
Kohl v. Zemiller
529 P.2d 861 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1974)
Baxter v. Jones
658 P.2d 1274 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1983)
Mills v. Park
409 P.2d 646 (Washington Supreme Court, 1966)
Palmer v. Jensen
913 P.2d 413 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1996)
State v. Wandermere Co.
949 P.2d 392 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1997)
Port of Seattle v. Equitable Capital Group, Inc.
898 P.2d 275 (Washington Supreme Court, 1995)
Brazil v. City of Auburn
610 P.2d 909 (Washington Supreme Court, 1980)
Lange v. State
547 P.2d 282 (Washington Supreme Court, 1976)
State v. Wilson
493 P.2d 1252 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1972)
In Re the Marriage of Yearout
707 P.2d 1367 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 1985)
In Re Marriage of Shoemaker
904 P.2d 1150 (Washington Supreme Court, 1995)
Phillips v. King County
968 P.2d 871 (Washington Supreme Court, 1998)
State Road Department v. Chicone
158 So. 2d 753 (Supreme Court of Florida, 1963)
State v. Lord
165 P.3d 1251 (Washington Supreme Court, 2007)
State v. Gamble
225 P.3d 973 (Washington Supreme Court, 2010)
State v. Kirkman
155 P.3d 125 (Washington Supreme Court, 2007)
State v. Shaw
86 P.3d 823 (Court of Appeals of Washington, 2004)
State v. Castellanos
935 P.2d 1353 (Washington Supreme Court, 1997)